Houdini The Idiot

[Doc Martian]

Copyright 2016 by Erik Weisz
This work of fantasy contains many celebrities and public figures used as elements of elaborate fiction that does not factually indicate their actual actions, habits, relationships or secret trysts with any factual reliability. They are whoppers, big yarns and fabrications. Even I, Harry Houdini, say WOTTA BUNCHA HOOEY! Exeunt!


Houdini the Idiot
by Erik Weisz

1.
I was an idiot,
I was an idiot,
I was an idiot,
Until I found God

I was an idiot,
I was an idiot,
I was an idiot,
Til' I found God!

2.
There will never be Another Houdini - Our world's first superstar, an archaic term for a performer that everybody knows. If you ever wonder, how did my ancestor escape from the nazis... then you know why he was so famous. His wriggling, struggling, slippery ways left at least 100,000 free. The rest were not impeded in movement, for a shackle is A LETHAL WEAPON.

3.
I never saw the war. I was shielded. Guarded. As an impudent Jew. So when I fired a boltgun into Hitler's skull they never knew except maybe 'that butcher was a Jew.'

4.
There I was. With my wife, saith Harry, Bess. And all in the know knew I had passed the test. His doubles they doubled as doubles will do. but to think they had a military genius would be bidding reason a sweet adieu.

5.
It was easy to win, no trouble at all. I'd been playing Harry Truman since last fall. The day I took over FDR hadn't falled. Just time to retire cuz Eleanor had had a ball.

6.
THE SWEET RIDE
I can't believe I fergot to tell you about my favorite drive. Mulholland. In the Fall. As the leaves had dried, I would pedal my bike and swip and swide. A three-wheeler. Fat tires, but no ATV. I even rolled it intentionally about 1963. The slow driven roads were almost as fun. But since Carrol Shelby, his MOPAR, and ethyless air. I rode around comfortably in afternoons before the lawyers got off. A muscular man but without bulk. I'd get a ride from my bride when she was my occasional charge. Didn't think much of her; her ways weren't yet formed. But by the time she hit 30. VaVaVaVoom. Not with her body, though it is quite fine. But with her costumes, her mind & designs. A child of Melies and also Vincent Price, who also played Elvis and was Judy Garland. To tell you her name would be too nice. But you know her by her cakes, which show up kinda late, in a bwack dress, cwown paint, a beehive, strung light. This character, a vamp, is the signature of my wedheaded bwide. If you can't guess, a hint would be to call her, 'The Mistress of the Night'.

7.
Flames from the lips may be produced by holding in the mouth a sponge saturated with the purest gasoline. - Harry Houdini

8.
So I dwove and I dwove with Lon Chaney. The cops didn't know which of us was which but when he called the officer a dum-dum.... they locked him up as a looney which is just what he intended. He was in twouble deep... a straitjacket and they thought that was it for ME. But he twitched and he scritched and he swaaped and he pitched and soon he was free and took off his costume of me and ate it.... which meant they had to release him.... because while they had arrested one man, now they obviously had another.

9.
Then we drove with two cars... both model Ts... one with a fleur-de-lis border and the other with filigrees.... we were on fire roads... back roads.... and places nobody could reach.... driving out of control a strange vehicle chase... you could tell me cuz I wasn’t coughing... he ate rice and was coughing plenty... but in the end... both of us won... we got gates on the fire roads to stop US from driving that way. Which left them free of wreckage when the firefighters needed them.

10.
Jenny Lind... what an angel.... singing into the heavens.... she and PT Barnum... made plenty of noise on that train... chugga chugga woooo he said all the time.... she just blushed and got drunker until one day....something horrible happened.

11.
Jenny wandered out in the middle of the night.... horked up her guts and fell off the train... they had to find a replacement because of spent gate monies.... and THAT my friends is where this story begins.... for it was her daughter.

12.
There are many elements of culture: those of religion, those of faith, those of science, those of love. Of all, I trust only in God's Love.

- Harry Houdini

PSALMS OF HOUDINI

13.
(gregorian mode)
There are so many things to tell you
This
That madness is the insanity of culture
nobody has ever outweigh'd cultural norms

If you try and buck society, your way
Is not that of Yahweh.
His most devout have walked alone.
For God's ways are rarely
the hand of man.

If I was a carpenter,
and you were my lady
I would cry for love.

14.
(Brady Bunch Theme)
There's a story
It's a doozy
and so I dance in a sauna
hot rocks abide,
but the soul is for peace
as I sweat
the poisons
are truly released

If I sing and my soul fails.

Now there is a way to begin.

15.
This is about a dream where wonder and love of God,
sing out blessedly.

16.
(Sea Shanty)
Another story,
If you,
close your eyes
and say 'motorboat' fast.
Your life will be all divine.
Gollllllleee

17.
(Merry-go-round)
I believe
in the power
of Looney Tunes
The joy
The jollity
the awshucksness.

If you believe in Mel Blanc
Say it fast,
Say it fast.
If you believe in Mel Blanc
Say it fast today.

18.
(lyric)
If I smillle about you,
I have Lovvve for you,
If I dreeam about you,
I'm in wuvv with you,
If I sing about you, you're Goddd
So when replenished,
I sing songs,
about Lovvve, Goddd and Hosannna.

19.1.
There's nothing to tell you, So write THIS down,
If I were a carpenter, and you were my lady, I'd grin a mile wide

19.2.
(modified Stairway to Heaven)
There's a wind, It comes from the LORD and some
call him Elohim.
There is nothing of promise short of that which is God.


20.
There was one time, I'd drunk a half-pint of whipping cream. I was so drunk on the lactose that I couldn't (a joke) get out of a fingertrap. I rolled out of my chair and fell on my back. I twitched and I scritched and I swlapped and I pulled, the only thing left was to beg Beth to 'take this crazy thing offa me!' an able, sworn assistant she obliged.

21.
Chaplin came in. In a cultured, mannered voice he said "Cut that gentleman off from the cream." I said 'NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!'

22.
No prohibition for me,
No prohibition for me,
I drink all the cream and walk into a dream!
No prohibition for MEEEEEEEE!

24.
it took a few years, I hadda volunteer. I trained a bunch of people all of my tricks.

25.
Then A BIG DUKE punched me in the gut. A quick appendectomy and I fled the states.

26.
HOUDINI NO MORE!
I had a new name, the same face, differently coiffed. I was NOT ME a lil' bit. I looked kinda Germanic, a sharp nose, DARK EYES, slick hair, and enough lemon juice.

I rolled along the Mediterranean, kept in the shade, looked mighty pasty, So I made those booger’s grade. I claimed a dead line, wandering in Brasil since 1918, I knew the countryside and played (and paid) a hotelier, they bought it completely and I wore an officer's uniform. Weimar was trying to shoo 'us' all away, but after the beer hall putsch, KING BOOGER made his own grade. I found myself wandering, trying to measure Jews. To India I went and measured 'their' noses. Then, a shot in the dark, a smoking gun and I dropped in the drink. Found work as a butcher and dressed real neat.

27.
Now back to the twenties, but much more soon, including a plane run from the future, where we (Lon Chaney and I) towed a booger to the Tower of London with a Zeppelin.
Nobody will know how I spent my time, but 10 months in prison and I was out of my mind.

28.
The movie I liked best was from early, the swatches and patches of Edison's Frankenstein. I often considered making that line mine, but until I needed to fly a plane or pilot a military boat, it was out of my line.

29.
OOFA OOFA Dinnertime, eat a bunch of small thin dimes, then you poop out screwdrivers for a good long time.

30.
I FOUND A COMPATRIOT
There was this cat. Some dude from London, he could fall like a kid on a tumbling mat. On hard boards, pavement and stages designed by a Frenchman who knew screen like the back of his camera. It was so obvious that he had a number of important benefactors. We'll go into that later.

I met him as he was filming 'City Lights' he was a noted auteur, with an Oscar or two or lots more, but he usually only carried one around for laughs, he'd use it as a microphone.

The time I met him, he was wandering around in his tramp costume, tipping over hats of police officers that were busking to relieve them at the end of a day. The money would go to the crowd, and he'd tip it to the most needy.

While he was not on the police payroll, he always had a free Irish beer awaiting him for (It wasn't always 'him', sometimes it was 'her) the end of the day.

I can't believe I never told this when I was 'alive', but then Hollywood already knew all about it. I conveniently forgot that we always forget the everyday things.

31.
Speaking of everyday things, the fact that I escaped the Nazis with an elongated, dried lacquered/layered like mica booger used as a lock-pick is undeniable. I called it, 'The Buck', I saved it, yes all you juveniles are like in Chaplin's words, 'Saved a booger, did he?' I used it between a placarded sandwich of Bakelite and Oak. The Bakelite was formed with a slogan, this slogan is notable. Can you guess? Many have. It says, "The Buck Stops Here."

32.
Part of why I found myself so socially delighted with M. Chaplin's company, wasn't because of our similar skills in theatricality; it was because we both were foreigners during a time when immigrants were viewed much as homeless people are in the society of the later 20th Century. Unwanted, unwelcome, shunned and victims of persecution and suspicion. Except for our celebrity status, we would have been treated the same.

33.
MICKEY COHEN
If this were today, that name would strike fear in the heart of most, give hope to some in the know, lead to envy like the Gottis or other mob leaders, or be uncomfortable for most. Today, few in the popular mind have any interest. He started as an angry but basically upright Irish kid. Then with a few runs for sakē he became a king of Los Angeles County. It wasn't the giant metropolis that it is today. It was more a burg. A port, small industry, some film, but NYC still ruled the industry. This was destined to change.

34.
DARKNESS
There were many murders during the prohibition, men at loose ends with an illegal industry and far too much security, as per the Chicago industry standard. This wasn't a pleasant experience for many. This includes the high and low in society. Still upon history's reflection Prohibition resulted in less death than The Depression. The other main cause was unattended speculation upon the futures of those same agricultural resources. The resultant stressors were much more deadly
than mid-level bosses strangling each other over imported tequila.

Never have I seen such inhumanity to men of the same faith; the brutality of the Nazis was of course far more inhumane, but the threat of a knife to the face ended many criminal quarrels. This was not my first rodeo. In New York City the victims were more likely to be fricasseed, then dumped in the river. In Hollywood they were left alive to join local Indian tribes.

35.
THE SLAVES
It was obvious that the arising BOOGER KING had his mind set on slaves; but to imagine him slaughtering millions was beyond even the darkest of designs. I guess we (the defenders of peace) should have remembered he was born with TWO testicles instead of the single nut which he sported. I could have called him 'The Bogey' but I do not believe in derisive synecdoche.

36.
THE GENIUS
There was only one man in World War II that I consider a genius. His name, Sir Winston Churchill, a notable fool for he walked where no one believed there was a path, with the genius that comes from utter faith. If you need explication, consult the work of Rider-Waite. As Illustrated by Patricia Colman.

37.
There is no way to explain the faith of Mr. Churchill, except to consider that he was early in the employ of the Monarchy. His dedicated work as lead man for defense when a Vice-Admiral/Secretary left him able to perform the duties of Prime Minister without the political responsibilities. If you wish more read The Sextology by Winnie entitled 'The Second World War'.

38.
Nobody can compare. It's like he was Superman and Hari Seldon put together, his masterpiece... a fight with Ike about the timing of D-Day and the right flank, which was Italy. D-Day was not the fight, just distribution of troops. The way Winston did it was to use these troops that were well-trained to support the Marines and their artillery once it was placed. His naval genius was a perfect complement to Ike's study of Grant and Frederick the Great. Mahan if you wish to learn some of his ancestral knowledge.

39.
Jenny Lind. PT Barnum's most famous squeeze, the grandmother of my bride that was born in the 50s, If you sense tenuous connections, you'll know you agree, just remember that Hollywood had long a reputation for nepotism.

40.
The only reason for her presence in Hollywood was to care for her brood, one born at the turn of the century. A songbird herself, one with the land, a song in her heart for which I am glad. If I told you her songs, her name you would know. Instead I'll mention Harold Arlen, her favorite composer. Which one is that? A master from the east, from Tin Pan Alley. Another sally? You ding-dong. Get a job!

41.
What you need to know most is that nothing you know is unreal. Fiction is the truth, lies are for sauce. If you change a number of facts, this whole book is the truth.

42.
Jimi Hendrix, No Lie. He was not me, but when he meets me you will probably see. If you were to promise an ocean to me, I'll tell you what I told him back in 1963. Get a job sha-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na. Bowdip.

43.
Never will I tell you a whole pack of lies, but I might subterfuge you into THINKING I'm lying. Like now. I could tell you the whole thing is the truth and you'd know me as a reliable narrator.

44.
If you were a carpenter, and I were Joan Baez; I would call you at daybreak and you'd be my lady. The need to complete these songs is minimal, but the joy of singing to you, is palpable. Why sing like a phrase or croon like a goon or winkle and dinkle for love of the moon. You never can tell, or lie in my face, if the song that we play is weak or well-made. All you need is the joy of a talented boy and this work will play, play and play.

45.
When I was a lad, I often was sad, getting happy took the genius of which you know I studied. It was more than a study. A mission. Why I knew Europe foo well. His pageantry dangled, my mind was newfangled; a fire-eater's skillage as I rave up a willage. It's quite plain to see that Houdini is me. Insanity wanity, merely automatic writing.

Why wonder? You heard my thunder. When I got back, it wasn't a crack. To whom do I speak? President Clinton. The last part is true. He knows what to do. I thundered over Lunder but also buzzed Oxford too.

46
Wonder and hope, a wind from the east I made magic boxes for delightful intrigue, with soul and tight wind. With songs and good friends. These never ceased, they came from the East, Chinese medicine without any beasts. A drawer of clean stuff with an herbal scent, masked by ylang-ylang scent. Customs didn't care but police sometimes did. Not a narcotic but something intoxicating that was legal. Seven herbs in a sachet that get used for tea. Damiana an element, but now you get me. When I learned how to import it in bulk. I changed to a series on unlocking handcuffs, cuz the laws sometimes called John Law didn't know how easy they were to open. You see I didn't like robberies of banks (which were then largely uninsured) because it hurt the people. Robbery after Robbery came to play so my tightening up handcuffs helped make for better days.

47
Never have I seen such an idiot. The man, the mountain, John Wayne. This guy, he'd get two shots of milk in him, and would start bench-pressing his co-stars. Battles with condoms filled with shaving cream kept him on Poverty Row, cuz the directors gave him more leeway. When John Ford came along, the path to dragging a fine lady through a path of sheep dung and her blessed revenge with mineral oil diarrhea donuts was open for The Duke.

48
Rough customer. He'd roll into a soda fountain and everyone would get nervous. While the man drank like a fish, it was never before 5:00 pm. Unless he was fishing, then he'd stop about then. Nobody can say that this giant USC cowboy ever did anything but make the grade.

49
With aplomb and delight I saw him and Mo' marry many times. Only fitting as the two were delighted with Christ. I can't believe the fun they had, riding horses in the rain, drying them off, then snapping towels at each other. These shenanigans led to them often cruising out to Palm Springs to their little bungalow beside the Movie Colony Hotel. This grove of love soon became a site for many joyous honeymoons.

50.
HOUDINI EXEUNT
If I were to say Enigma today you'd think of a riddler not Frank Gorshin. But if I said 'the machine' then you'd have a visit from the Secret Service at least. They'd want to print you, but then you'd have a feast. So as I roll out of Catalina in a military launch that I saved from a movie, I smoked a fine Canary Islands cee-gar. When I reached San Diego I got on a ship but the ceegars lasted me more than a little bit. I blew them on my baggage and then sabered champagne, to help with my disguise as a hotelier. I had the right stickers on my steamer trunk, to make it look like I'd come in from Panama. My name such a shame but meant to inflame, Gustav Wagner was my hotelier's name. Never did I associate with my family for nearly 20 years. I stopped in Ireland to 'learn to communicate'. Nobody ever suspected cuz I wore a tartan driving cap.

51.
Never will I lie, never will I expose all the new information is for a need-to-know nation. Condi Rice will verify the need for this data, but I sure wish she would act your age. 'Chopin and Mussorgsky indeed!' saith the guy with an 18th Century rage.

52.
I'm lying. Whole book is a farce, I'm just making stuff up as a lark. Dark, Dark, Dark. So imagine, Houdini the tragedy, then please pay the scion typing this up. Price not negotiable, $1 million dollars, in the form of a cashier's check, via registered mail at the address which you request from him. My son, Kevin Anderson.

53.
If this were Poughkeepsie, you know this wouldn't play; but in the Internet age, you owe. So fork over the dough, and if you hand him bread, you'll never find out whereth went the BOOGER KING'S gold. He can't claim it, and won't 'cuz of old, he swore defend The Geneva Convention. Which means it's not his, but if you want to start where he would take a look at the map store in Palm Desert. Then look as he would at the abstract equivalent of the local Chase Bank. You won't find it 'cuz *I* hid it and only we know the way, but it's in my Swiss lockbox which will have this book's ISBN number.

54.
If I were to bribe you it would be against the law, but since the industrial results of Erich's' devise built whole trillion dollar industries, it's merely a dividend from profits that captains of industry made. Whing, whing, whing whing. He doesn't ask from fear anymore, just from patience and my design. To say automatic writing is just the tip of the iceberg. This includes favored guest ideas, but they have ALL been paid.

55.
If I was a carpenter, and you were a wade-y, would I marry you anyways and a pregnant wade-y. Absotively, Never Wever, Hubby Bubby, meanie-weenie, teeny beanie, Chubby-Wubby. My cats. Their great-grandkids still roam Hollywood today. Squeaky Squeak, Lifty-Loady, Giant-Wiant (a Maine Coon), and Wiggly-Wiggly are the ones who might show up to talk to you.

56.
Nobody you ever knew would tell you their locations, but if you follow the trail just below the plateau, you'll find two who will go get ONE more, while the other stands guard to make sure his siblings roughly are safe. Say their names at the Black Cat if you wish to find ONE gram of which I speak. That day, a shipment will arrive at DeLuca Jewelers and be set in an 'inexpensive affair' of Zirconia.

57.
Nobody believes except for my extended family, however let those concerned 'see'.

58.
Cross-code with Longinius' stabby stabby, indeed. Verification, croopamaka.

59.
No more for you, oh mistress of the keys.

60.
FUN STUFF NOW!
Iffy wiffy stiffy wiffy, I wish to tell thee about Mary Picky. She was a sweetheart, saving babies by arranging adoption to kind families. When I met her, she was dressed as a 'Chicano' maiden, well-dressed like the wife of a gentleman bandit. Smile on her face, light in her eyes, I would have fallen in love with her, but I alweady had my bride. Her love for me was insecure, cuz she loved her husband but I entertained her more.

61.
Silly Billy she called me all the time, especially when I hung my shoes on Hollywood and Vine.

62.
Wonder amazement and glory were part of delight. Gunna watch 'The Mark of Zorro' all night. A heroic stunt actor with rarely a plight, he caught me telling his wife to 'get lost' one night. She'd ply'd me with cweam, the pert widdle thing, but my morals were high and she was just playing her guy.

[Doc Martian]

63.
And ancient figure of joy like Schwarzenegger. Douglas Fairbanks was the FIRST action hero. He jumped, he jived, he swooped, he flied, the first stunt team, he smiled and smiled. A grin that could cut glass. His wife was faithful but her heart was distracted ‘cuz she lived many more years. That's like knowing that as fine as the cigar is, you have to get one for tomorrow night so you keep your eyes open. She knew his drinking would destroy him, and her later donations to Alcoholics Anonymous were phenomenal. She wished to spend his monies to symbolically end his one-note joke, that had quickly become not very funny. Only her love for him survived him. Not everyone in Hollywood was a fake drama. Some were grief-stricken. The screwball comedies we revived after his end were an especial delight. Her time spent at Graumann's could have filled the prints with tears. She watched every Fairbanks revival for many, many years.

Chaplin tried to woo her afterwards, but together with their mutual stories they sobbed away many, many a night.

64.
Once, I was walking down the lane, singing beneath trainsong an olde refrain. Amazing Grace, how sweede the chef, that saved a wretch like me, As kind as the night and long as the day, I miss Doug all day. Later that night, I got a call in the night, from Chaplin, who knew the affair was at an end. He said, "Mary and Buddy are more than friends." So we drove to the beach. Where the sidewalk ends. There, a gentle boy by the name of Murry taught us how to surf. A mick, one of his brood, his anger later eclipsed his smoov 'tude.

Not the first, not the last, but in his teens his ass was grass.

65.
With a wind and a sigh he smiled a mile wide, like Dennis feeling good in a fine smoky mood. This is not a story about sadness or rage, just working to help provide this sweet, dandy stage. 'Little Deuce Coupe, yeh I sold it to themmm.'

66.
If there was a dream about a dream, in a dream with a dream; I would smile so wide that my teeth would gleem. If I win with this song then I can't expose nobody. I'd have to relocate to an olde dry county and grin two miles wide. Less money, lower overhead or today San Bernardino, but not for the Deadheads. If I were to dream but a song it would rock for a mile and then... well Fedora said it best when he said ring-a-ding-ding, ring-a-ding-ding, ring-a-ding-ding.

67.
Never believe a lie they say, the king's men not the CIA. Louie, Louie, we gotta go. I say Louie, Louie, we gotta go woah-woah-woah-woah. In awhile I'll be sadder, there's a horrible story about climbing the ladder.

68.
-Wonder-
Life in Hollywood in the Twenties was like living in Italy during the age of The Medicis. Many found their fortunes, many encountered corruption, many were ruined. The legend remains though. The HORROR of these things was comparable to the Drug Epidemic of the Seventies. No one could reach out and save those in disaster. If one thing was secure, it's that life was definitely getting faster. Mondrian's Broadway Boogie Woogie was wholeheartedly embraced by our culture. Not the art, the groove. Fast cars, slow reflexes and many long, straight narrow roads. They fit old Fords well but the larger engines of the Twenties made roads dangerous. Driving at 40 miles an hour was faster than OUR reflexes. Thus I entered into design with city planners giving me freely from their mind.

I helped design mellifluous, mellow slow-driven roads like the boulevards that encircle Paris. Things built in like abstract impressions of national regions. Large fields of Kansas, tight metropolitan districts of New York, city halls of Philadelphia, with high upkeep , paid for by a private university. Then Indio. This city wasn't much more than a railway stop, and I laid out city plans through trusted associates to last for 200 years. It grew in my lifetime to 50,000 people. A large pre-metropolitan megapolis, only limited by water availability. It will come, delightful with air conditioning. A bracing hot walk across a parking lot, to your ride, then a cool winding road, where you can drive 55. Some disagree, but anywhere you go, 5 months of the year is weather that disagrees.

69.
When I sing a song, it won't be long til' my sadness builds and I get cut off. Nothing I've done is as a good as the rainmaker. Why wonder, no thunder. Why cry? Goodbye. The love you share in the air is as the song of a high flying wire. Across the waves. Lah-dah-dah-dah-DAHHHH you know the song. Man on the Flying Trapeze.

70.
WITH A BANG AND A FLASH!
W.C. Fields - Wotta drunk! Red nose from birth. Sadness of loss and low income growing up, obesity also limited his options. He fell in love with the ultimate vamp. She was madly in love with him too. She'd say stuff like "how 'bout you come up and drink ME sometime", and eventually he actually did. The match was made at a pool hall. She 'used her feminine wiles on me', he claimed. I suppose her knowledge of Seagram's distillery, fueled his losing inarticulate rage. He lost $40 bucks that night. That was a lot then, like $500 today. He grew used to losing to Ms. Hepburn, she charmed with her winsome ways constantly. He sobered, she left him and continued her unabated pool shark ways. 'The Hustler' is a soft-pedaled version, where the drunk he meets is just his squeeze and not his competitor. Why would you deny the ease he found in losing his money to the gal he couldn't marry. While I am a firm believer in matrimony, the true love they showed for each other was undeniable. It took her years to make the screen, but she was a sartorial genius beyond anything. She taught Edith Head everything she knew about the garment district. This made Hollywood a fashion center as well as just a place for great films.

71.
When I diagnose the ills of society, I always find difficulty. The world likes to stay the same, as do the people in power. Sometimes even if they agree with the precepts that I advance as I delineate change that is as gentle as can be devised by me and my associates. Never can tell what the future will bring. It ALWAYS brings change. The controlled change of a loving body of the people. The sad change of the wicked, and the unavoidable change of the procession of time. Only one thing remains as time proceeds and this is that the more people that desire change, the more society has to listen to the needs of the many.

72.
Serious mien. Face secured in knowledge. When mild-mannered Clark Kent becomes the all-powerful Superman, his hammy stage persona fades away and all the power of life and love and dare I say 'God' flow out of him and he uses barbs to mock his adversaries strengths. Perceived strengths which are quickly proven except with rare genius or powers or luck to fox Superman momentarily.

73.
Early Superman. Rarrg I'll get you and he grabs the crooks guns. I like to call that one 'Supermonster'. Later when he discovers that he truly wuvs Lois Wane (shoulda been Batman's bride) then his TRUE personality comes to the fore. He's a snappy. The masters and mistresses of the quick retort. Hey Joe, whatta yah know? I just got back from the picture show. What's up? Chicken Butt. Things like that- quick retorts in line at the army, in a telegram or for other quick 'NUTS! exchanges. Superman gave hard snappys- while Cwarkie (Wohis's pet name for him) gave soft snappies wyke 'Jeepers Peepers.' He did . Supervoice 'no bomb strapped to her chest teehee' by the way.... I'm kidding.

74.
When I dream, I often place markers in the margins of my dreams. These markers spill over into real-life in the form of desirable holdings of land. When I believe in the work, I ensorcel my own mind to (It's called Hypnosis) sell cheap and later, buy higher than market value. Think about how many times you've seen that spot with the great location and useless stock. Then as the money accumulates, wait until you can afford it and a half and invest in a dream of your own.

75.
Wonder and delight open up many avenues. The refreshing love of civic virtue are sooooo refining to naturally developed dreams. I always dream about slow coaches to China easy wive-in' and sweet snacks from a pack cuz I wuz wuvvin' the hoboes when they were at the bottom of the pack. This easy time brought to you courtesy of 7-11. Not the convenience store.... the lucky numbers. One of my last acts wuz to start Sesame Street with the condition that they make Guy Smiley dress real neat. I found him an easy way to tease the Hollywood elite. 70S game show rage was the immediate result.

76.
WONDER BLUNDER
Beep beep. Wonder and light cruisin' down the street. Mesothilioma is the guy that YOU speak. But then at the movies you'd have smiles for a week. No worries, No hurries, just patiently flurrying. Steve McQueen in the bathroom does violently mix from Jack in the ripper and then wipes his lip and writes notes to the Chamber of Commerce.

77.
Now I shall tell you of some people who were two. Think of the Andrews Sisters.... one set could dance, but the other set couldn't sing a note. We set up great lives for them both. Always they scheduled the right ones for personal appearances.

78.
WITH GUSTO
It's time to talk about the main man of Jazz, an institutionally-raised musician by the name of Louis Armstrong. He skedatted and skedizzled and could play the horn like Bob Wills played the fiddle. Nobody knew the sorrow he'd seen, people dying from disease alongside the Mississippi. Every reason you can imagine will help you divine, the sweet songs of Louis, ESPECIALLY when you're flying.

Down the road I rolled smiling fine, potato head blues and I was outta my mind. The one about chitlins was Jamaican patois, and the Irish Black Bottom was all that I saw.

Never met the man, the other me saw all, from Bing Crosby, Jimmy Stewart, and Lauren Bacall. Which other me? What! Have you been snoozin? My main other identity, not Cliff Robertson's half, Harry Truman.

79.
WONDER OF LIFE
Nothing I tell you will be believed. The timeline ain't right will be believed. But if you add half-lives, post-lives, and 'ghost' lives (like mine) then the timeline is achieved. The only other choice I have is let the volcano have it. Easy for me. I'm Dead. Yah Grateful? You will be! Gold is the root of all Evil. However. It could be given back to the children. Wanna hear more about Mel Blanc? See? Evil. Payment is long overdue.

80.
There's a reason I dream of unusual things, It's because my life has segmented gates from tomorrow, to yesterday, with death or sorrow in the way. You see these ½ lives are quite fulfilling. But like ill-fitting shoes, they sometimes lack zing, so we go up the country to leave off our chains. She sings Jezebel the Nun, and I stop playing Lon Chaney. Fair Enough Tomorrow. You will sing no sorrow.

81.
THE LIFE
In the 20s the life was apparent. It sold to the public, whose aims were transparent, when the song of our fathers made us absent parents, we sang a song of sixpence, and made sad couples parents. The dance of the lonely was easy to see, drinking flappers, tough boxers and gangsters children for World War II you see. The twenty year cycle is often replayed happiness breeding sorrow. The sorrow of war.

82.
A CRUX
The cross that was hardest to bear, wasn't mine. It was Dean Martin. After my time indeed but his pain began with migraines in the twenties. A child with screaming headaches. This is why his voice was so foggy. He was two people. One was Dean and at bars a young drinkin' like a fishin', Joey Bishop. He also doubled Sinatra, Joey that is in his later days. He still had to play Vegas but AFTER he was cured.

Yes, migraines can be CURED. Once the detritus is cleared from your sinuses and lymphatic system, the system rebuilds without occlusions and the migraines cease unless more detritus enters your system and oral or esophagal means. It's rare that detritus enters through the nostril, but that doesn't mean it's impossible. Dean flew on the flying trapeze. This served to get all the detritus into ear, nose and throat cavities to be flushed by physicians.

83.
WONDER AND ZEPPELINS
One of my favorite constructs of the modern era was the zeppelin. While I built a helium zeppelin, the cost-effectiveness of hydrogen zeppelins was the standard despite the intrinsic dangers. This cost-effectiveness was depleted as the modern insurance system was built and developed.

84.
If I were a carpenter, and you were a kitty, I would pwant catgrass for you and yew'd go cwazy.

85.
Catgrass? What? What about dah Nazi Gold-Nazi Gold. Tell me about dah wabbit!

86.
WITH A BANG AND A FLASH! II
W.C. Fields grew more and more in love with Ms. Hepburn and soooo they made a baby. Adopted by a woman whose husband was far from the bungalow sort. Their offspring, a young woman that said 'Come up and see me sometime' with a whistle.

87.
Now the reason this trivial data is important is because Bogie was my 2nd born son. Born in wedlock, raised by my brother, then at a young man's fricasseed death, he lived as another. My first-born son yet lives today, so I only request he pay respects to his mother.

88.
Bess was the best, my dancing Jewish love, but my second wife, Cassie, gently laid me in my grave. To say either one meant less to me would be quite a falsehood. Like deciding between the sun and the sky. Going without either would make you too cry.

89.
Snobberybobberyboo. He's crying too. Without further ado, I'll say tonight adieu.

90.
WITH A BANG AND A FLASH! III
Bogie,, Bacall like a knight that never fell. They danced many nights away. The love they felt was tempered by the knowledge that when she sang the day would be at an end. And in her unyielding sworn devotion, for awhile she'd have to live another life. His football, his henchmen, his schnozzola, his eyes the only thing missing was San Clemente. This gentle corner of the world was like the exit to Avalon.

The lawyer who he performed as never had the knack at performance it took to become a President. So while he hung out in a hunting shack, Bogie portrayed Richard Nixon. And Ms. Bacall was usually Pat. If you doubt me, look at their eyes, the sadness of each rings through. Bogie and Bacall played Nixons until 1972. I wonder what else a devoted make-up artist can do. I'll answer. One famous singer became a primary consultant of the Reagan Administration. Introducing, a Stanford dean named Condiana Ross and her daughter, who played her young, after her death in a bombing by racial supremacists. Her daughter you also know, her most common phrase was Wubba Wubba, Downtown Julie Brown. The father? Chopin's favorite fan. Kidding! Chuck D. political indeed.

91.
YOU POLITICOS
Wait til' I tell you who Gerald Ford was. Guess? JFK. That's when the freshman senator and his alcoholic wife went farr, farr away.

92.
When you dream a little dream, who do you think of? Some think of Ann-Margaret, I think of Dean. Dream a widdle dream of me... cuz you'll see that it's a fine night for tea.

93.
WITH A BANG AND A FLASH! IV
They had it all, talking Bogie and Bacall, but they lost it all at water gate and left for Key Largo. Here's wookin' at you, kid! Pucker up is what you did. Hangin' loose so that Rose-Mary could grow up to Martha Stewart. Soviet emigres easy. Moved important ones around. When the musical chairs all stopped. It was 2012. More paper trails than welfare, all going the wrong place. No one 'important' in this sto-oh-oh-ry, except for The Houdinis. Who you know.

94.
WITH A BANG AND A FLASH! V
The most horrible moment in their life, seeing Judy Garland's lip split by Mickey Cohen with a razorblade. It was unnecessary, she had the money, but he didn't want the money, but the thing he did want was NOT something any woman who put stock in matrimony would perform for anyone, much less a man who was so involved in prostitution. He fulfilled his promise to her, took HALF the money and laughed his sick ass all the way to the bank. It was $15,000 for 2 years of budgetary control by Samuel Goldwyn that left her unable to pay despite a large salary. The surgery was unsuccessful. He'd carved a piece out. She left it as a signature. Her face lit up the screen with her gently glistening lip. Bogie and Bacall met at that experience, their stress led to them to bond. Good thing there was such a good doctor at the Harpo Marx ranch. Today, for most people in Indio, he is just the name of a street. Dr. Carreon.

95.
WITH BEANS AND FRANKS
One of my favorite friends, of whom I have many is/was Woody Guthrie. Genius of the rails, rider of dark freight trains, banjo master and arguably still the king of folk guitar. I met him in Indio (my first time) when I went to pick up the coked-up sobbing wreck that Judy Garland was when she found Chico Marx's cocaine stash and Harpo angrily evicted them both. While he had participated freely while it was legal, as had many Americans. Once it was made illegal, he picked up his 'lariat' and rode long smoky nights out on the range. The fury was mainly directed at Chico, he expected it of Judy, he'd known her mother. Jenny Lind II, the song bird who'd filled in her shoes. Don't Guess. I don't even know. But I suspect she was a child of General Grant. He had left many children during his drinking years. Some from impressionable young women, some from, erm, more experienced women, and some from society dames. Woody had been called the moment that her torture had taken place. Her uncle. Take a look at Arlo's eyes. Then take a look at Judy's. Family resemblance and NOTHING more. The comfort I felt with woody came from both his natural charm and the comfort that he learned being an unhealthy man with a small frame in the company of rough men. He would light up like a shiny penny, or quietly slough into the dark as if he were a trainlight dimming that bright grin of his as he choo-choo-cha boogied into the night.

96.
When the giant of the epics came along, I was leaving Hollywood with my 'tragic' song, there were many reasons why C.B.D. became famous, but like many Hollywood moguls he thought with his nethers. Theda Bara was obvious but he had been courting Garbo. With her surreptitious filming she woke him up to the fact that she was his mutable wife. Marriage-minded man, he had to agree. Sometimes she'd even dress up as ole' C.B.

97.
SWORN ASSISTANTS
Lon Chaney
Katherine Hepburn
The Three Stooges (All 7)
Milton Berle
Johnny Carson
and a cast of several

ASSOCIATE MAGICIANS
Jonathan Winters

98.
YES! Jonathan Winters. Most insane megaloschizoid nutball that EVER spent a year locked up in Camarillo. He sang mad scat songs that he'd punctuate with bossa nova beats. Drove Charlie Parker nuts. So nuts he hadda pack up his plastic sax and record several dozen more tracks just to prove that HE was the king of the sharpened popsicle stick, not that doofbutt Aunt Blabby nutjob that kept fartin' up the hydrotub.

99.
Bottles of Beer on the wall, 99 bottles of Beeeer!

100.
If I had a hammer! I'd hammer in the morning! I'd hammer in the evening and buy a new van, I'd cruise down Melrose, I'd cruise down Beach Blvd., I'd drive down Franklin wavin' out the window, all over Hollywooo-ooo-ooo-oood!

If I were Bill Clinton, I'd buy a bunch of cee-eee-gars, I'd buy a bunch of cee-gars, all over this lann-nnnnd. I'd smoke them slowly, that sweet gust of freedom, then head down the 10 to just about Texas and buyyyy four corrrr-rrrrrr-rrrrrr-ners all over this land!

101.
Once in the morning, I walked to the store and I bought some dry ice, to throw in my carrrr, it kept it cool yeh, to long about sunset where I drove and drove and drove to get pizza at Blondies Pii-ii-iiz-za.

102.
There I found myself face-to-face with the father of Andre the Giant, a cat named Jerry Garcia, his joy of folk rock music lit up the night. That wasn't the only thing that was lit. It's where I met Cassie my wife. She was too young for me, but her schottische dancing with me was a sweet delight. You can't picture me there but my name changed
the thing, you see I wore my old costume called Neal Cassady. I didn't know her at the time, but she USED to drive me to Griffith Observatory for my trike rides. I'd ride down to Franklin and then pay where she dined. When I met her at Big Sur I nearly lost my mind. I had to split with the pack to travel cross-country and the wild teenage jailbait
tried twice to join us on our LSD adventure. After nearly running over an old lady, I quit the stuff forever.

103.
(from Cassie)
He did so right, waited til' it was tight on the night of my 19th birthday, he took me for a drive, we never arrived, he flew me to Paris where we married, wined and dined. The long Paris nights were humid and fine, but the tour we went on taught me to be a fine lady.

104.
The sounds of Led Zeppelin accompanied our tour, also Spooky Tooth, Mussorgsky and The Beatles many tunes. To understand what comes next, you've gotta believe! We found ALL the hidden doors with the props of Melies. No way of telling how long that took, but it seemed like more than 3 months but less than a year.

105.
We came back loaded, at least for the time, we had 5 million to live with the jetset from 1969 to 1980 (my death).

106.
If you wish to portray me as robbing the cradle, you have to know, my wife 'prepared' her to be my second wife, I knew she'd be coming, and with a deathbed pledge to my wife I was honor-bound to agree.

107.
If I had one million dollars, I'd sing songs and smile often. Instead I have five million and I build 'An American Band'. This takes lots of time, teaching Cassie to sing with a mustache, drove me out of my mind, every so often, off would fly the mustache, then I realized she was teasing me and had watered down the spirit gum.

108.
When I stroll back to the twenties, you'll be glad you remained patient, but a clue is that Vincent Price was my sweet Cassie's mother. Nobody will tell you that patience is divine, but I guarantee when it all comes together you'll be outta your mind.

109.
Dream, dream, dreammm, dreammmm. I wuv you dear Cassie, and I wuv you.... with all your charms, whenever I wuv you alll I have to do is Dreeam.... Dreeammmmm.... Dreeammmmm. I wuv all your blessed lil' heart and 'We' do want you near us. find by smell from the talc rocks I showed you on April 7. Dreammmm sweet sweet dream dreammm dreammm sweet sweet dream. Dreammm Dreammmm Dreammmmmm.

110.
The ease which I found with Cassie was the most relaxing time of my life. I sung sweet songs, kind vibes and danced beneath the stars. Sometimes on the golf course and sometimes while busking for dimes. Nobody I saw ever had those lights, the dancing lights in her eyes, and often her doe-like two-steppin' thighs. I can't believe that our time in the sun was anything but God's design.

111.
These were our marriage vows:
Do you, Cassie, take this old man to be your old man?
Cassie: - "I do"
Do you, Erik take Cassie to be your everloving wife to cherish, walk with and forever remember after he goes the way of all flesh?
Erik - "I do"
'Then by the power invested in me by the Anglican Church, I make you both knights entwined in the bonds of holy matrimony.' It was The Queen's way of saying thanks on a beach in Normandy where many of both our families had died.
Then we walked out into the surf, climbed into amphibious vehicles and both parties went their separate ways.

112.
There's a lot of water under the bridge now. Here's a song I wrote about chow.
Eatsa weetsa gots good eatsa
Deetsa Doza gots good hoze-a
Banana-Wana got Hosanna
I wuz feelin' kinda silly-billy.

113.
THEN... NOT NOW
100 years ago, in 1880 I was but a lad of 5. When I saw a fire-eating performance that kept me hep to jive. I went home and burnt my fingers and they hurt like burning zingers. So as I grew older, my lesson to my self was simple. Rule 1: Don't attempt any tricks you do not know.

114.
Years later, I was a young man, and just mitzvah'd, I found several playbills that advertised passion plays by an incognito Robert Houdin. I sought fire-eater tricks, to add to the plays I'd discovered, I wished to write a role in them for the great tempter, whose name I will not mention. I found two New York jazzmen who performed the 'soundtrack' for my plays with my first assistants Bessie my wife and a young Ted Healy. The marionettes we used as soldiers and onlookers and fellow crucifix inhabitants. The audience was the hoity-toity and also the filthy ritz, perhaps I'll publish the plays in a bit.

115.
Then in a twinkling I heard in my car Elvis Presley's biggest influence, a dude named Jimmie Rodgers. I pulled over the Citroen and lifted the tonebar, I'd heard enough. I knew 'The Soldier's Sweetheart' would make for a star.

116.
There is no way of delegating certain authority. So I waited until the gentleman enscribing this work was old enough to be completely twuthful. For if he lies to me, I couldn't fulfill his desire, to finally be paid for 15 years of virtual slavery. I'll pay with interest but YOU could pay with profit, instead of filling slush funds
we no longer need.

117.
In a dream, I once found a knife, I then picked up a KABAR and used it the rest of my life. I could shave with it but I usually used it to open my cans of beans. If you have ever been camping, you know just what I mean.

118.
There is no need to tell you, that nothing is understood, just heard, parroted and sometimes amalgamated.

119.
BACK TO THE PAST I
Imagine this was 1921, slow grinding beats of jazz making church-goers nervous. The lines of born-again Christians at Aimee Semple Mcpherson's shows were right at the edge of Hollywood Blvd. Which was a long line for the Hollywood Bowl. I knew who she was and expected she'd go out with some mac.

120.
BACK TO THE PAST II
Now picture a Barnum's and Bailey's Circus. Three rings, the clowns, the clowns and the clowns. In the first ring the clowns are doing jumping jacks. In the second ring, the clowns are casting lots. In the third ring, the clowns are hunting each other with soft weapons. Now picture these buffeting buffoons singing country songs together, with
a fiddle-playing freak who is OBVIOUSLY the king. This guy never tried to be more than himself, and in 1972, he finally said AH-HAAAAA for the last time. Bob Wills was not yet the King. But when I met him in the Wild West Show he trained in as a Wooden Cigar Store Indian that threw paring knives. It was obvious that he was no knave and imbued by the Divine. His light shone bright when he was on the stage, but at home he was depressive, but never flew into a rage. His song started up when he saw the clowns play, and knew that living the way his drunk father did would be the end of his days, so he picked up the fiddle and danced on the stage.

121.
IDIOCY
I found a guru. About 1914 Buster Keaton and his films set my mind on Hollywood. I started backstage as a grip. Hanging upside-down amused my mind. The New York film industry was a great place to learn, but I felt the risque nickelodeon shows were a great place to leave. So I WROTE Charles Chaplin and asked him for a job. He replied "Can you go work for my friend Hal Roach." I was thrilled. The silliness of Roach was a delight to my soul, but the laughter that Chaplin wrung from me was out of control. I believe in the power of laughter, but The Lord struck me first with the power to amaze and delight. Then, as I grew more familiar with comedy, I started to write. My favorite works were improv'd vaudeville plays performed by Ted Healy and HIS stooges. Moe wasn't the boss, just a clown that's a meanie, Curly his slapstick relief, but LARRY was the King. Or High Priest because the temple of human foible was open to him. His gaffes and his gapes were all over the place. Squirting nickels that spit hot pepper, socks filled with sand. pizza in your wallet, rocks in your drinks. Crazy substitutions he had pickpocket skills, the fiddle-off between him and Bob Wills was a wondrous thing. A dance where Larry fell over and kept fiddling was what won the thing. Nobody knew the thing was fixed, ‘cuz Larry said to the King of Western Swing, you'll know when to bow out when I do a ridiculous comedy lick. Later Bob said, "I couldn't have won it a bit," he complained though 'I nearly fell over myself at that dirty trick.'

122.
Never will I tell you some of the stuff, not ‘cuz it's rude, but because it was so silly I hypnotized myself to forget. Cuz I wuz constantly laughing for a couple of years, like the time I was locked in a milkcan and milk came out my nose. I danced like an idiot I was so happy with those schmoes. When I 'sobered up' I knew that it was funny and that I'd laughed hard, but I had to bury those hilarious moments in my memory's graveyard. I can summon them back, like the one where Ted Healy threw waterballoons at drunks off the back of a trolleycar. But the stooges knew he was coming and pummeled him with
giant salami sticks. Nobody knew when these fools would strike like workmen would fix your icebox and you'd find a bicycle inside it but the true mindblower is the bicycle would 'melt'. They had a machine shop, and a dry ice maker.

123.
The first thing about my theory of idiocy requires knowledge of the concept of averaging. If you take all of something and divide whatever numerical total arises from it by the number of elements involved in creating the total; then you have an average. That's why I claim to be an idiot. Because if you take the relatively upper middle class white concept of IQ and you test everyone with it, the disparancies between (yes disparancies, for it is discord between what is apparant and what isn't versus disparity, discord between what is equal and what isn't i.e. parity differences) so disparancies between cultures and educational norms result in 'low' IQs for most of humanity. Thus, when all tested and averaged, I'm an idiot.

124.
BUSINESS AS USUAL
So it's the end of my life, and I'm puttering around in Australia with my bride. We'd spotted a great spot for her to pitch a tent and I laid back in the car and died.

125.
THE CEREMONY
Cassie: So out in Dreamland far from anywhere, we knew he was passing but I did not know where. He said 'wrap me in leather, and leave me right there. Set off a flare, and the burial party will arrive. However you must leave, after saying goodbye.' So she (me) pulled out her finest buffalo hide and cried. Then I drove to Sydney and flew home alone to Hollywood.

[Doc Martian]

126.
HOUDINI IN THE THIRD REICH I
So as a 'young' butcher, I showed all sorts of flair, my strong forearm muscles did help me there. I could chop through the brisket, easily crack ribs, lift a quarter slab, and gentle the beef. I rose to the top and made 'jew' jokes for comic relief.

127.
HOUDINI IN THE THIRD REICH II
It wasn't long before my generous and fair ways came to the attention of the local Colonel Klink. I hosted a soiree at a local converted synagogue where we feasted on beef dressed like lamb booties with miniature yarmalukes. I explained, "These cows were all owned by Juden, so I dressed (horrible pun in English) them accordingly." Their juvenile delight at my ridiculous jape, was a sign that their IQ was about that of their neck size.

128.
I considered leaving this entire story out, the insensitive humor I had to display to infiltrate the High Command has been toned down & not presented in nauseating detail, however indicators of my half-witted humor indicate the weak minds and soulless play that these walking hyenas lived in their lives. Therefore, if any take offense, when you meet me waiting at the Pearly Gates please forgive me, or pray to God to send me on my way so that I might repent and have a better day.

129.
WHAT IS MY FAITH?
I have practiced several, I was born into Judaica, practiced it devoutly, but when in my youth I lived in a homeless shelter and their kindness, compassion, gentility and adherence to the Law of Moses was so clearly in line with the teachings and heart of the Jewish Nation, I converted, without fanfare, and without ceremony with a discussion with a bishop and a notable rabbi about how to not disturb or distress my family and friends. Their decision was to suggest to me to accept Jesus as my tribal leader in my heart and behave accordingly. I did so, and for the rest of my life, I walked in Jesus's ways.

130.
HOUDINI IN THE THIRD REICH III
The institutions of the BOOGER KING'S realm were all equally filled with half-witted goons; so I chose the Ministry of Propaganda. I started slinging extra bacon to the more shaken wives I encountered. I knew very well that there were obvious and heartrending designs that had come to the fore in pillow talk. Not just the murders but the horrible experimentation by the idiot doctors that were dicing and slicing the people of my family. I knew not what designs were taking place, but my experiments with the culture of antisemitism in the Weimar Republic had shown me the depravity that existed in the hearts of these soulless wretches.

No need to describe my hobnobbing and hobnailing and clever butcheries, they all amounted to the same thing. Stupid juden, smartsie nazis, eat up suckers, you'll be thirsty. As per their general diet, I prepared well seasoned beef to encourage beer drinking. The resultant carousing made it easier for me to buddy up with these turkeys and kill their leader.

Soon I was the top butcher in Berlin, a sobriquet that OBVIOUSLY delighted in.

131.
There is so much pain,
if you are Jewish; I suggest
you skip Part IV until you've read Part V.

132.
HOUDINI IN THE THIRD REICH IV
I found myself in a whorehouse, hosting the usual depraved soiree. The rape victims were plentiful none had anything but smiles on their faces. Most had no clothes, some were 'engaged', none were unscarred and all bore tattoos. I was 'invited', but played too drunk to engage in their taboo behavior. I sweetened their beer with schnapps, so they could puke or forget, and the two I saw later said 'we never met'. I never wish to remember this event again, but the horrible memory NOW stains this page with tears. This was where I killed Hitler.

133.
HOUDINI IN THE THIRD REICH: Exeunt
'BLAT' went his brain, and in the pell-mell screaming I grabbed a lady's wig, and a sheet, tore off my shirt and ran out 'naked' into the street.

A dive into a prepared vehicle, then I drove a Duesenberg to an aqueduct, held my breath for five minutes, then swam comfortably into the night.

134.
AFTER THE WAR
I came back home, replaced Lon Chaney as 'Give 'em hell Harry' and took over as president when FDR 'died'. I believe the hardest part was telling Bess that I had committed murder, but it was for the best.

Nobody ever suspected I'd killed him, I knew, Bess knew and so did Winston Churchill.

135.
HEROIC VISIONS
There's an image in my mind of blood on some women, It's the one thing I left of that horrible moment.

136.
Dreamm, Dreamm, Dreammm, Dreammm

137.
In the old days, an assassin was feted or reviled. I came home and found myself with my wife making a child, the delight of these moments was that we were no longer wild. It was like our first times, back when we were practically both a child. This child you know, but I'm going to take it slow, in two lives that he led he played a befuddled bachelor, a magician, a scientist with a side that was wild; then a befuddled father and a scientist/chemistry teacher with a thought to do something wild.

138.
THE NEED FOR PENICILLIN
The bombs that were dropped, and I don't mean the big ones tore up the soil and released old virii and bacteria just like Tunguska, Tesla's practice blast. He didn't know shielding so there was little fallout but the uncontrolled fission reaction was fantastically strong.

139.
WHEN I WAS A CARPENTER AND BETH WAS MY LADY I
Look! It's a Model T! VAR-OOOM chugga-chugga. I can't believe it was only $200. Now you have your own! We raced and we raced all over Yucaipa. Soon I was working for the police department even designed them a station for the late 40s.

140.
WHEN I WAS A CARPENTER AND BETH WAS MY LADY II
"I'm on fire!", I thought, but I was merely sunburned. I'd fallen asleep in the Yucaipa sun. My arm had blisters my hands were on fire but my smile was dazzling as I grimaced in pain. I drove with one elbow raised to keep it in the shade, but the local auto ring took some difficult driving. I found a small farm where they stripped their finds, then I called for the feds like it was dinnertime.

141.
WHEN I WAS A CARPENTER AND BETH WAS MY LADY III
There were many of us, I was a right jolly old elf, but when I found Cohen's chop shop, I was beside myself, I followed the odor of a leaking kerosene tractor, all the way to a used auto dealer with cherry paintjobs. The ownership was no question, we had records of his phone calls and all of the names of workers were well known. There was Davey and Jerry, Mikey and Bud, Harry and Jaime with who he did run. We watched 20 cars get painted and chopped, then the FBI and my squad made it all stop. For the first time I realized WHY I'd found work as a cop.
144.
NOW YOU KNOW
So now it's all coming together in your head. Judy and Cassie and Elvis who is dead. But the real kicker is going to be who Buddy Holly IS.

145.
WHEN I WAS A CARPENTER AND BETH WAS MY LADY III
This is a prologue, Part I is done, the bit about Hitler is the end of the forties. But now back to the Thirties when vengeance was rising. It takes 15 years to get to the end of that play.
Underwear bandits, cigarette smuggling, cattle and pork rustlers, somebody crying, all of that dispatch and all of those crimes ended for me in 1955. 'Dragnet' they called it. Exposed all my minds, from Investigative Hypnosis to frauds at The March of Dimes. The dopers, the smokers, the bennies, the broads, Joe Friday and Harry Morgan took them all on. I relaxed in security knowing that joy would not be denied my law-abiding boy. More about from inception to conception and a little bit more from before adoption.

146.
THE AFTERMARKET CRASH
A lot of ex-servicemen from WWII found themselves with jobs and too much to do. Also from Japan was coming in plenty of stuff too. Like tight little watches, and Konicas too. Soon it all inflated, too much stuff, too little worth. I started department stores where people had too much cash. Fedmart and Gemco and Zody's were all of my design. They weren't the first, just the ones I liked best.

147.
OOHH, the stars at night are big and bright!
Dah dancing room smells like parfoom,
Deep in the Heart of Dallas,
The prairie fire is wide and high
and you can sure smell it
A long, long, night all feelin' right,
Deep in the Heart of Texas.

148.
All worries, no flurries, just days of no hurry, I was in my 70s, It was the 1950s, I had just retired from the Yucaipa police force. And I heard the most horrible thing I could ever remember. Elvis Presley singing 'Mystery Train'. I pulled over my Hudson Hornet and put my head in my hands. Because I knew that Judy Garland had finally killed Mickey Cohen in Las Vegas.

149.
THE CRIME OF THE CENTURY
You know the beginning of this story, but you don't know the fallout. There were many deaths in this war. It was started by Judy but Mickey upped the ante. Dead showgirls with guns, dead gangsters in the Los Angeles River basin, a bombed gay nightclub, gangsters in the police force, heavily enforcing prescription drug abuse, and the worst thing of all, a guillotine that for awhile got used twice a week. That's how Mickey died, when Judy's alter ego, Vincent Price, killed the already 'dead' King of the L.A. mob in revenge for rape/murdering her mother and leaving her sawn-in-half torso in a field. The Black Dahlia was 65 years old, with a facelift, a nose job and altered vocal cords, she had originally entered Hollywood as Bela Lugosi, a role that eventually was taken over by Lon Chaney Jr..

150.
TERRIBLE SWIFT SWORD
The decapitated mobsters that got pitched in the Gulf of Mexico never knew what hit them. The one mercy that was not afforded Jenny Lind was that ALL of them were rendered unconscious with an apothecary's melange of drugs that would put Robin Williams into a coma. This mercy was usually also afforded the victims of Mick, as a sap though his victims were unusually 'upstanding' citizens and more likely to call for the LAPD.

The day I heard 'that' song, I drove quickly to The Magic Castle and dug out a bulletproof vest. I'd made it back in WWII out of armor plating. It wouldn't stop a bullet but slow it down considerably, so the bullet while it penetrated wouldn't bounce about, thus allowing it to be extracted without opening up the torso to do deep work. Thus keeping the armor light and death at bay at least in Southern California where a hospital is regularly an hour away.

151.
NO WAY TO TELL
When I caught Judy it was deep in Texas, she was doing her doctor shopping in Houston and I crept in while she was loaded and watching 'I Love Lucy.' I told her plain and simple... 'IT ENDS NOW!' She tried to give me some guff about how Mickey had 'asked for it'. I walked out of the room. Then I went back in and flushed ALL of her thousands of pills down the toilet, She knew better than to try and stop me, I had a lariat. I would've roped and hogtied her like a recalcitrant piglet. I'd had to do it before.

152.
The bullet proof vest wasn't to guard me from Mickey Cohen, it was to keep Judy from taking a shot at me. I'd forgotten what a sloppy addict she was.

153.
That was it for Judy. She felt avenged. But murder is a harsh master. Her life the next several years was a series of junky motels, sleazy doctors, booze, bad movies and basically the life of a junkie idiot. While she lacked shame, she knew that there was no turning back after her massacre. Even reputed murderers like Mickey Rooney would walk to the other side of the Racquet Club in Palm Springs rather than face her pitiful mews of self-chastisement at having gone over to the darker side of human nature. Her final wars were consumed with the betterment of the only people who would welcome her after turning Hollywood into a gangland brawl.

Her work with the Gay Nation was notable. She was a strong writer, a great speaker and she had a lot of help from her friends, including me.

154.
Meanwhile, back at the ranch, two scuba divers were attaching a very special chain. It towed a couple bodies out to the gulf, the pilot didn't know and the passenger didn't either. But the fish they caught that night were all larger predators. The Duke said to Ole' John 'Must be our lucky day.' John said, 'We seem to get one of these a month.'

155.
THE DRIVERS
They were divers, then they were drivers. You know one was Judy (this was 1947) the other Maureen O' Hara. They had fed the fishes once a month since '43.

So they drove.

156.
THE SPY
Mo' wasn't dirty, nor did she hide the bodies, she was my spy and reported them to the Coast Guard. They had their own divers and would swap the bodies for hamburger, thus the fishing stories jibed with the 'bait'.

157.
DUKE FINDS OUT
'Wa'llll what was that bump,' he grimaced from cold as he got out of his bunk. He saw a glint of metal and then heard a thunder, so he called up ME and proceeded to get dwunk, I brought my old bathyscaphe, the one I could fit in a truck, I dove down with the claws on it, and pulled the bodies up, then we called the cops and watched John Ford get drunk.

158.
THE DAY OF RECKONING
In earlier times, I wouldn't have needed the vest, but the sweet young gal had grown hard and murderous as well. She wouldn't have killed me but it would've stung and I couldn't have walked for awhile. The drive there was slow, arduous but fun. I stopped off in Phoenix and hung out for awhile, the weather was mellow about 81°, I had me some pizza, and camped out for the night. It was the night Judy Garland started getting wasted, 2 more days and I found her all blasted. The mystery was this, I hadda practice my lariat. So I roped me a kye-oat and then fed him some pizza. This last brush with nature led me to stop camping ‘cuz the kye-oats thrashed my camp while looking for more pizza. As a man of 75, I figured that was God's warning.

159.
In dreams the world seems fine, then the kye-oats showed up and I was out of my mind.

160.
There is one thing said about the Old World, that the hospitality is magnificent. Kindness has rubbed off from the Greek/Roman model. Thus when I was young, I thought the New World parsimonious, the families I knew as a kid were more friendly, but I soon learned that loose-knit civilizations could be dangerous, people are less responsible when well-isolated like the Donner Party, The Mormon polygamists, weird communes and other people rarely touched by the census.

161.
The long drive continued, I saw no familiar faces, except for a trusted associate who flew in high-test gasoline, It made my Hot Rod Lincoln into the little ole' engine that vroomed. Young Jonathan always delighted me with each stop a new character but the same old Cessna I'd fixed up for him. He also had a radio to call the rangers if I'd failed. The loopy-loos he flew would have gotten him jailed.

162.
Dream, that song, sing it, look it up if you have to, the Everly Brothers.

163.
Feel Better.

164.
I dream about hours spent driving across Texas. A smile on my face although I was pensive. I looked a lil' like Higgins from Magnum P.I. But I had another costume change in case she split to Europe. A baldheaded old duke named Frederick DeLane. Not an actual duke but a handy description. I'd sing to the vultures, I'd sing to the rain, sometimes I was so loud, I thought they could hear me in Spain. Sliding into a bend, I fishtailed and that made me pensive again. I drove to a mechanic, checked the drivetrain and the brake line and got on the road again.

165.
Afterwards, she screamed, a lot of filthy things, I told her "I'll call the cops unless you tell me who is in charge of the diamond ring." Her face sunk. The game was up, the bottom of 'her' plan. At the moment, she was dressed like Elvis, and she said 'Nunayabizness.' I told her to stay the hell away from Steve McQueen. Rule #2. Don't ask a criminal a question you don't know the answer to.

166.
Who is Steve McQueen? Judy Garland's brother, different father, me, and adopted by her mother, raised from his teens in a distant but social way. Much like I and my wife used to always play. He was an indiscretion from when I lived in Germany, I thought the Fraulein that I met boating was my sweet Bess coming to say hello. When I got back we decided to stop playing games with that design. Our senses were less acute, but I'd smelled her especial scent of violets. The usual adoption was the result of this error in judgement. He was later estranged from his family and Jenny II 'adopted' him. Her maternal instincts were strong, my pre-war boy needed a mom. Her death deranged him and he went on the warpath.

167.
THE LONG ROAD HOME
Way easy. I hopped in Johnny's plane and we flew to Burbank. There I caught a plane to NYC. I had to talk to Eddie Fisher about his blushing b ride the reason she was blushing was because she had a couple million dollars worth of diamonds in her ride. Liz Taylor had bankrolled the murder of dozens.

168.
THE TWENTIES
OK. now you know. This is a hardboiled detective novel. You can call me Gumshoe Joe. Here's where I picked up that teasing sobriquet. It was when I escaped an illegal dragnet. They'd come after me and Lon. ‘Cuz we were driving all crazy in parking lots of buildings I owned. I'd even explained it to the precinct captain on Crenshaw, however he did not know the law. As long as you're sober you can roll a car on your own driveway, otherwise most stuntmen would face at least misdemeanor charges, for what is a studio lot except for a parking lot.

169.
Rule #3: Always trust a policeman who stabs you in the back. I learned this adage the easy way. The captain on Crenshaw had given an order, pull over the Model T. with the fleur-de-lis border. So 15 cops set up a loose floating net on Santa Monica Blvd., Franklin, Hollywood, Vine and Sunset Blvd. We escaped easily, we'd heard the radio call. So we ducked into our 5 and dime and melted two pencil erasers, we would have used crayons but there was salt on the road, in the cooler twenties weather, there were light banks of snow. This would have exposed our painting legerdemain. I ran into the captain later, and he said 'I knew you were legal, would escape, but I had new guys to train. "I SOLD YOU YOUR RADIO! So save your legal tactics refrain, Gumshoe Joe."

170.
There's another secret to being a cop. If you see a line for donuts, never top. That way you remain a cop, not a terrorist because police officers can cause fear.

171.
I alerted Border Patrol to keep tight on spare tires, but I had to drive my old carcass down to talk with the Federales about the diamantes.

172.
Hector Muñoz, the top cop in Mexicali assured me that any car that smelled of Estee Lauder would be searched thoroughly a quick call to customs with the same information secured West Coast ports because of better handshaking with Candadian (Candadians for their 1950s Band-aid ring) border authorities. Thus Elizabeth Taylor was deprived of the majority of her diamonds. She tried to sell them anyways but they were ALL purchased by the FBI.

173.
John Wayne laughed his tail off when I told him that part he'd been cast in an unnamed upcoming epic in a choice Roman part. He had toned up his singing voice though he didn't need it for the part but middleman Audrey Hepburn was 'surre gunna be surprised.'

174. She was, I was with him. She literally stained her little black dress. I had an IRS accountant to make legal tax redress. She owed $375,000 dollars for $1.5 million in diamond sales. The cheeseburger she dropped is what made the stain so get your dirty mind outta the gutter.

175.
Now you know Judy Garland didn't just stop, so we busted her for amphetamines and gave her a choice, join the army for a hitch so we can monitor you. Or go to jail for a long time and lose (including upcoming payments) her studio contract.

176.
Now you know why Elvis had such horrible movies. He couldn't find ANYone to write songs for him from Tin Pan Alley to Laguna Beach, even those Arch-fiends The Beach Boys wouldn't write for him. He penned some of his own tunes but they all sound like cruddy jump ballads. He was denied the opportunity for any lucrative soundtrack options. Once in awhile Murry Wilson would toss him one to remunerate his victims but 'no room to rhumba' was as high as they got. Once in awhile Lieber/Stoller would dump some schlock on him.

177.
THE LONG ROAD TO JUSTICE
There were to primary things needed to make things right, #1 remunerate the Kennedys for their stolen illegal diamonds. #2 pay the innocent victims who lost income and occasionally family members. The first one requires a SHORT explication. The diamonds the IRS had forgiven them the nut (which had been stolen during the war) but the taxes on them were still owed and were difficult to pay. Judy had struck Kennebunkport during a football game. Her haul was $50 million in wartime dollars which meant about $600 million in 2016. Taxes on them ran approximately $15 million which interest skyrocketed exorbitantly.

178.
OK, I know I've skipped around a bunch, but if you don't have a better timeline after this, go back and re-read parts because your brain has been out to lunch. So here's the whole plan, Judy gets cut, Judy gets raped, she steals $50 million in diamonds, her mother gets killed and after getting egged on by Steve, she starts to kill. A little at first but then she couldn't get her fill. So she bought a double guillotine (intended for a 1793 royal couple) and then her bloodthirsty ways killed the wrong Irishman, a popular singer by the name of Richie Valens.

179.
The rape. The night Ted Healy died, Judy was grabbed, she was walking home from the theatre as Janet Leigh. Mickey drove her to Lancaster and he finally had his way with her. He thought about killing her, but decided she was too high-profile. So he dumped her unconscious body in Rialto behind McDonalds today. Back then it was just a convenient alley. Today all the Southern California McDonalds mark Mickey Cohen's rapes. All before 1980, those afterwards pay those living victims.

180.
That was her first rehab, not just a sanitarium. Mary Pickford paid for it, ‘cuz the Mickey she'd been slipped came from one of her trusted bartenders. The bartender WAS before THAT night the true original Ted Healy, who had gone to work for Mary Pickford. He was told to 'amscray' and his temper rose and was shot in the face. He was then played by a young writer named Studs Terkel, who had NO idea what role he would play. He would have turned it down but was told she was suicidal and it would save her life.

181.
THE HEIST
"Easiest Heist ever." said Judy. She'd looked for an old junkyard and found a bunch of old iceboxes. Then she looked for the one that was sealed with two belts, one belt said 'Joey' and the other's buckle was a 'K', 20 miles outta Boston just like Dean Martin said. He had no choice, for she had one critical voice that could have sunk his career for ONCE using a needle to quell a bad migraine.

182.
Louella Parsons. Both her mom and her played this role, a gossipy biddy who during the war tried to take control. Luckily the gal from State Fair who became Chief Magician aka Mage of the Magic Castle til' John Ford came home from the war. Frederic March had yielded grudgingly but her fancy 100 magic tricks gal's gab at the diner blew away his automated Jacob's Ladder water balloon fight. The two robots were both destroyed behind the plate glass because the liquid in question was liquid nitrogen. The 'Trick' was the balloon and at the end a broken, jokey robot voice said 'Oilll and waater don't mixx... {fizzle-kablish} clumps of oil and broken robot littered the stage.

183.
Dream.

184.
When I found myself at loose ends tracking 'our' (Hollywood Royalty) criminals. I occasionally wrote a gambling center. Prince Rainier of Monaco, he kept me abreast of gambling tables that were imported by Las Vegas interests. I was looking for those that echoed recent lumber purchases by Both Cohen and Garland to see where they planned on cheating each other. Reno was Judy's central clip joint, whereas Mickey had a 'license' to rip people off in NORTH Las Wages. Still, being able to identify specific gaming tables in use made it easier for us to steer white-collar fraudsters their way rather than gentle but under-budgeted tourists.

185.
My ears ring sometimes, some from my travels in submarines, some from my cross-country travels in submarines, some from being caged in a full milk can, but most of all from picking my nose. That last one's a joke.

186.
WONDER OF WONDERS
Finally, Judy got her head screwed on right. She shut down her illicit businesses, got back into performance, cut the drugs down to a minimum (she was an old hoofer with bad arthritis) and found herself a steady mate. Much of this will be discussed in the sequel to this work, but in short her lesbian mate who she loved for true she found in Germany and her last name was Beaulieu. They played the old Mr. & Mrs. Houdini do. Meeting each night while not knowing quite who the other would look like or what they'd be doing. Her experience with Mickey left her unable to relate well with men. She lacked desire for anyone who wasn't a delightful female friend.

187.
THE WHOLE STORY
Eenie-miny moe. I kicked Mickey with my big toe. He had it coming, Judy had a bun in the oven. Two days before the birth of Liza Minelli, Mickey didn't know the word 'condom', since his dates were prostitutes or rapes he never donned them, and considering where my toe hit, he wouldn't feel like doing it for more than a little bit.

188.
MIRACLE MILE
Dream a little dream of me. A sweet song by many pop stars, evocative, haunting, perfect for before, during and after a war where many had their husbands, sons, lovers and wives die. In 1963, Elizabeth Taylor took a bunch of pills as she attempted her 2nd shot at suicide. She'd left that song playing on the table for her mother to hear. She woke up vomiting again. This 2nd time lost her best friend, her mother. Her frayed nerves were at an end. The reason I was concerned was because she had stolen the pills from her elder sister, my wife, Beth.

189.
THE RELATIONSHIP
1. The begats
Dolly Madison begat Ulysses S. Grant, begat my wife and his wife incognito begat herself at least her role as the mother of Eleanor Roosevelt and Elizabeth Taylor, nooo not Jenny Lind, neither I nor II but you can see her dancing at the Coconut Grove in a looney tune or in Drums Along the Mohawk with Henry Fonda. I won't say her name because when I was younger I wasn't very fonda her, and now I carry shame. So much I hesitate to speak her name.

2. The words.
Do you take this fake identity to be your lawfully wedded spouse? The answer was always 'I do.' Us Americans believe in a love that's true.

3. The Spin
Then, ‘cuz our mates are dizzy enough as is, instead of taking them for a spin, we usually get married at a chapel next door to a hotel, or if the grounds are sanctified and capacious, then we often have the wedding there.

190.
HEROISM
There is only one hero in the Garland-Cohen feud. A gentleman who walked in without any 'tude he spoke to both parties without being rude, and they told him to stick it where you can't see the moon. His name is important, moreso in the past, I'll give you a hint, it's ole' Jim Stewart.

191.
They brought him in in a trunk, like he was some drunk, but he got out smiling and then told what he had thunk. 'Yoo guys need to smoke a peace pipe, more money to cops means higher taxed salaries, which means less jobs which means hungry veterans, now those veterans are armed and will come kick BOTH of your tails, so shoot me or please you idiots, drive me home.' Judy and Mickey stuttered and futtered, but after 10 minutes the engine re-sputtered.

192.
I DENY THE RIGHT
So working with my buds at the Justice Department, (once you've been president you hardly have to wait on hold or climb up the balcony) we work with Johnson to build up conspiracy charges, so the money gets scarce and truly expensive. One slip or flaw and it costs the whole dilly-o. Mickey and Judy BOTH start to toe the line.

193.
WHEN
Watch 'The Godfather II' that was the result of my political move. Not Cuba mind you but the mess with the feds, Judy and Mickey temporarily collaborated to shut down Russian trade, some communist hotbeds with the occasional Molotov at a cop, a few letters to Congress and they were like 'These Communists MUST stop! You know the rest, but not what you saw at the hearings, we deepened McCarthy's blacklist to include all of Judy and Mickey's 'characters.' We kept it all steady through 1973.

194.
If I dream a widdle dream it's never what it seems, a box in my hand is merely a key, and a giant wiffle ball bat is never just that but because both are wind tunnel built it means it's a Ford Mustang. Loose connections like that I recall while awake.

195.
So Woodie Guthrie was sick, dying from Huntington's Chorea, Arlo was with him and so was Robert Zimmerman. I visited often, don't check the guestbook, I was dressed as an orderly and would pass him cigars. The nurses they loved him cuz he could hum a few bars, of 'This Land Is Your Land' or 'It's Been Good To Know Ya', I sang that a lot in the back of my mind, and sometimes while walking out by Van Buren, I'd haunt Patton's old barrack that now is a mission. My cigarette pile was right where the 'temple' is. With Jerusalem's Gates marking the orientation. So long itts been good to knowww yah, this dusty, ole dust is a gettinnn my homme and I've got's to be driftin' alonnng. I cried a lot for Woodie, a hard life, a hard end, and next to no sin, except for loving dearly his evil niece.

196.
Dreamin' about how I could make the diamond safer, with electron microscopes I began to map crystalline patterns just from the bevels, and sometimes an angle more differentiation than fingerprints and more motivation.

197.
Listen, can you hear it? It's the sound of a jet plane cracking the sound barrier. It's now become common, dogs no longer freak, cats no longer yowl, just as horses mellowed out when automobiles dominated the roads, these changes don't come easy but everyone adjusts, and sanity returns as the jungle begins to trust us again. This kind of rapprochement is the same as great nations in conflict slowly become friends again. I thought of this harmoniously in the late Sixties as Vincent Price and the last of Mickey's goons finalized the normalization of street life and trade. By the time of my marriage there was no more gang war, but there were still two villains that needed chillin' and THUS begins the story.

198.
Villain One - Elizabeth Taylor
Villain Two - Steve McQueen

Although today Steve would be seen as a vengeful anti-hero, but he was all villain to me. His angry rampages left dozens dead, not all were with violence, this moron used his head. He stuffed seismic vents with massy old cars and subtly changed the fault-line causing a deadly quake in Sylmar. His engineering genius meant only ONE innocent was dead. A guest in one of the prepared houses, a tragedy indeed, a young streetperson named Robin Williams who other actors portrayed as needed, his ABC Genesis Mork from Ork was played by Cassie, later he was played by Bruce Willis, Jim Carrey, and a semi-omniscent narrator assistant whose stagename is Beck. We gave to his family and all of his causes, his wives and children were aware and mainly applauded.

199.
THE LA BREA TARPITS
Bubble bubble, toil and trouble, in 1972 I put security cameras on them on the double. But it was kinda like lockin' the door of the study after the killer of the butler had gone.

They were the main depository of old vehicles Steve dumped when he decided to kill 'Judy's Showgirls' for giving up the war. He never suspected that a 100-year-old man, would Tai-Chi his Kung Fu butt into next week. If you've seen 'Master of the Flying Guillotine ' you know the one-sided kinda battle of which I speak. We'll get there eventually.

200.
Bottles of beer on the wall...

[Doc Martian]

201.
When it is time to suit up for violence I always go barefoot. The better grip afforded me is worth not having foot coverings, plus the artificial 'gravity' afforded me by having 'lighter' feet allowed me to move them like lightning before Steve could even say 'owie'. The ONLY time I wore shoes during a beatdown is when I ran into Mickey Cohen while strolling and suddenly kicked him in the schmoos.

202.
Rule #0
No Shoes, No Schmoos, or else under the toenail ooze.

203.
By the way, 202 was a joke, I'm a big fan of Isaac Asimov.

204.
JUDY'S SHOWGIRLS
Most of them started as chorus line stars in MGM MUSICALS, none of their identities were killed but all except Cyd Charisse the original died. They deserved it. Most had killed at LEAST one of Mickey Cohen's men, with rat poison or a gun. One killed by fire though. I liked to call her Gwen Burn'em. The original was killed by Steve in 1971. Later appearances were by Cassandra Peterson or her young protégé Rose McGowan.

205.
'STEVE KILLED 'EM'
I showed up at the Camarillo mental health facility loaded for bear, ready to help Judy meet her desired untimely end. She was crying, shaken, filled with fear. I knew she knew nothing or she would have been confident. calling me Hoo-dinky or something. While her workmen HAD ‘fixed their houses’ she thought it was to reduce cooling bills. Steve had key supporting elements replaced with wobbly aluminum coolers. These collapsed when the Sylmar quake hit, causing death, fire and mayhem.

206.
THE SECRET
There's only one secret in this work, and I'm about to tell it. We swapped out ALL of Steve McQueen's heroin with White Lotus so we could ethically throw him in the pokey without notice.

207.
OTHER DEAD HOOFERS
Dorothy Lamour, Anne Francis, Cyd Charisse II, Janet Leigh, Rita Hayworth, Betty Grable, also the workmen, in various places where Steve had sent them to wait for a pager call.

208.
STEVE'S EVIL
Was punishing those who would NOT work for him in murdering the last of Mickey's thugs, but they sometimes still worked in the diamond ring. Steve couldn't go after them himself because they knew 'that smell' of an alcoholic junkie. He had to keep several dozen yards away, or they'd send him quickly the way of all flesh.
What should have ended up the usual gangland stalemate, ended up a Pyrrhic victory for Mickey's men. With no 'button men' of Judy's most of her gambling, prostitution and money laundering interests with cheap monster movies were soon washed away into the arms of Ed Wood Jr. who spent all his money on jewelry and lingerie sold to him by the CIA who were looking for easy money to invest in SE Asia.

209.
THE DREAM
I shot stark awake, dry-swallowed two aspirin and pulled a cigarette out of my dresser and the dream of tulip bulbs being sold at a discount helped me towards my upcoming dream of discount department stores. Halfway through the cigarette, the quake started and I ran out into the yard to help calm the dogs barking.

210.
JUDY LENDS A HAND
With the deaths, Judy in her Vincent Price role, the only major star left in her repertoire was galvanized into action. She turned over all records, all accounting and all costumes of replaceable Hollywood figures. This meant the small group of dedicated crime fighters who worked with me to end Steve's reign of terror had an easy time of it. But as a son of mine would be, he was a slippery devil, and we often missed him, sometimes even finding still-burning cigarettes dropped in his haste to vacate once he caught the scent of my French-made vehicle through his motel's open window. When I finally realized he smelled the Atlantic Ocean on the imported replacement parts of my otherwise low-profile Renault; I traded it in for a Chevelle. It didn't stand out which meant I could drive like a bat outta hell.

211.
There is no reason to continue without mentioning Elizabeth Taylor. Therefore, I won't until later.

212.
WITHIN REASON
Vincent Price, unholy medicine man, he'd make cantina burritos filled with enough poppy seeds to cause unconsciousness, then he'd haul the unconscious bodies to a dumpster, call a dumpster truck and haul them to 'his' prop warehouse in Sylmar, and either poison them to death with Strychnine OR during the late 50s behead them, take them to a small beach above Pepperdine and leave them for the tide to take out. They were found at various places between Leo Carrillo State Beach and Santa Barbara. The Feds kept these murders under wraps. The gruesomeness of them would have started a public panic and 'Vincent' would have changed his method to one where we couldn't track him back to his abattoir some night when he got sloppy wasted and forgot to wrap the bodies well.

213.
That never happened, she had developed muscle memory as dancers will and never slipped up. Trying to find the place nauseated me. She lived among the dregs of society, among hard boozers, dopers and derelict bums. The smell of urine was everywhere. Judy had talked to Dean enough about migraine and hoped to trigger them with me, I hadn't had one since I was 13.

214.
THE WITCH
As a youngster, Elizabeth Taylor was a petulant dramatic brat. That was her good side, having an unlimited contract with easy payouts left her squandering her money on jewelry and cosmetics firms. As she got into alcohol and pills, this tyrannous little monster developed a temper, she'd even hire people solely for the purpose of getting their hopes up for a steady industry position, then she'd tempt them with nearly impossible to resist pleasures of the flesh and violate the ethics portions of their wickedly designed personal contracts so she could uproot, devastate and leave them penniless in Hollywood, an unenviable state. She showed no favoritism in personal life. But she often hired Native Americans just because she didn't like the high cost of doing business in Las Vegas (whose wedding industry made for a great place to do business in the jewelry industry) except for the fact that she was prejudiced against Native American Men, Who had strong controls upon income in Las Vegas.

215.
STEVE AND THE WITCH
The daughters and granddaughters of General Grant kept close contact over the years, Liz was one of his granddaughters, by the same hard-bitten cook/camp follower mother as The Black Dahlia. She'd lived through the greater part of the war and the dirtier elements of Reconstruction and the graft rings of the late 19th Century. The robber barons were but an element of the sanctioned corruption that this era built and supported as the 'rags to riches' ideal of the era. Lila, for that was the name of Judy Garland's grandmother, and Debra, her birth-mother were hard, beautiful, deadly talented women. They could go from gentle as an angel, to hard and vicious as a viper depending on the timbre of the society they faced. In the final elements of the Depression and the slightly depressed wartime film industry that Judy and Steve were raised in, she generally was as mean as a human can be. It's no accident that the twisted, unkind face of Bela Lugosi rose through the ranks of Hollywood Royalty, only to crash to the bottom when it was apparent that she was essentially a meanie.

216.
I first met Debra when she was dating in her female form a young, gentle, kindhearted Boris Karloff. She had squandered much of her fortune as Bela Lugosi on spiritualists trying to reach her mother to find the cached hordes that Lila had told her about when she was but a child. While an excellent mimic, her grasp of human nature was that of a greedy child, who would often fill her belly with candy then complain of her bellyache while calling her parent’s names.

217.
Judy had been raised in the industry, her mother played her sister in a three-gal harmony group. Shortly afterwards her contract was acquired by Metro Goldwyn Mayer, with enough financing in the old school studio system to give the three of them a good life. However Samuel Goldwyn knew the hard realities of Hollywood society, and usually had tight control of their luxuries, especially illicit luxuries. Not that he didn't occasionally travel into international waters and partake legally of the same vices that he denied the players of his theatrical troupe.

218.
Debra was a caricature of the horrible stage mother. Allowing her children to run wild and hurt people without parental oversight. Often, she even joined in. When I met her, I was playing a stagehand. A rather garrulous one. She pulled me aside on the night she gracefully turned down young Boris's proposal of marriage, dropped to her knees in front of me, and I called her a pervert and quickly backpedaled back to her party. I left shortly afterwards. She had the morals of an alleycat, and soon found Harold Lloyd to do the act upon that I had rejected her for. Boris walked in, largely left the industry except for contractual obligations and Debra tried to use the power vacuum in the horror movie industry to revive the flagged career of Bela Lugosi. Her scheme essentially failed due to the repugnance of studio execs at 'his' junkie odor and aggressive behaviors.

219.
In his youth, Steve had had an abusive father, a sorrowful mother and a lot of time to get drunk and in trouble. Debra took him under her wing towards the end of her role as Bela Lugosi. She taught him the tricks of several demimonde trades. Pickpocketry, pimping, pushing and performance were his majors in the College of Hard Knocks. Like a female Fagin, she trained the young anti-hero in the methods he began with in seeking vengeance upon those who had killed savagely his mother, as well as those who 'failed' him in achieving his end of slaughtering all of Mickey Cohen's men. His film career largely funded Judy's war. I hadn't learned of the relationship with Steve until just after Mickey had been guillotined and then re-guillotined through his lower ribs and spine. at least I hope that's the order it went in. I knew him by reputation at least. As a hard-driven, hot-headed sometimes violent man who often scared his female companions with his intensity, hard-drinking and angered responses to simple human decency. I didn't meet him until after we'd shut down Judy's war. About the time Elvis joined the army. Then, funding a one man war, where Ms. Taylor primarily served as a comfortable, luxurious hostess worked to get a whole lot of money from people Steve killed. Often she would purchase stock in a business where nobody else in their family could take over the business. Then she'd introduce some financial exigency where she could buy the business at a huge loss for the family that owned the business.

220.
EVIL APPARENTLY WINS
After the quake all heck broke. Watergate dropped on Bogie like an angry Toulouse. The crime for Bogie wasn't theft from C.R.E.E.P. It was smuggling. They told him they had a way to smuggle in Cuban ceegars.

221.
The dream I had the night of the break-in was about a long-lived individual who would come later 1000 years maybe around the next ice age. A snow queen, a wise lady named Jacqueline Frost who will help the new age of light greenhouse to begin.

222.
The dream ended slowly with daffodils blooming right then I knew that something was up because the daffodils were violet-blue. I wandered lonely as a cloud to the L.A. Times for a job.

223.
INSANITY
I had to split the states again, The Vietnam War was too hot for me, Siracha sauce on everything, and I had an ulcer you see. I just went offshore to mellow out on the Grateful Dead's platform, I had a salt-fumed keg of non-alcoholic beer. It tasted like a fine hefeweizen but of migraine I had no fear, but I took an aspirin to avoid additional fermentation. We plotted out how to go fund CIA and Veterans across the nation. It was kind of like the circus but we all traveled as the Deadhead Nation.

224.
I'm jumpin' around now, I'm kind of excited, I've found Liz's last warehouse, the others were empty. So this must be a jackpot. There were 12 of us, Don Johnson the rookie, he nearly got shot by some punk with a Smith and Wesson, I clipped his rotator cuff with a Hawaiian War Club. "That punk won't pick up anything for a month!!" said Don. While not extra-legal (we were all deputized.) We looked like a bunch of refugees in the South Carolina sun.

225.
VILLIAN OR ANGEL
Now one of Steve's compatriots was a chick named Gilda Radner, a light-duty comedian who doubled as a police officer. She went in looking for heroin trade but stumbled upon Belushi's ties to cocaine. This made it easy for her, because most dealers were Spanish-speaking and she once traveled in Spain. Her perusal of their counter-tops led us down to Miami, where the family Don had infiltrated led us north to Myrtle Beach. When I saw the $2 billion dollars in diamonds. I nearly lost my power of speech. "Don't touch those rocks!" I called with alarm. I knew her well enough to know there'd be a firebomb. It wouldn't harm the diamonds but our bodies would be burnt bad. That's how the gay nightclub/full 'ice' bucket had blown up.

226.
I looked around. There shining among the diamonds was a wired sack of ammonium nitrate. "She knew we were coming, GET OUT FAST!" We all scrambled out, just before the blast. Titanium boxes with bolt-on lids all went flying. Gilda got her hair singed, but we got away clean. One of Gwen's old bombs. We're lucky ‘cuz it was drunkenly reset from its old Pacific time. It gave us 3 extra minutes while we ran out into the dark.

227.
In times of war, I always keep extra staples in the pantry, not so much for survival but to help avoid poorly planned rationing. Liz was the same, to avoid luxury taxes she stocked up wherever there was a bunch of military advisors that got sent somewhere. In 1962 she stocked up on diamonds, which is part of how she was involved in the gay nightclub bombing. Her stock was dwindling, so she took the diamonds out of Judy's nightclubs during a series of transfers, we caught on to her current schemes just before she took off for an Egyptian/Mediterranean dream. You see... John Wayne was overplayed in the 50s after The Quiet Man and The Searchers, so he learned to sing and took over from Boris as Rex Harrison. My Fair Lady and Cleopatra were his favorite movies. Boris continued his action work as Peter O'Toole's stuntman and I prepped Richard Burton on how to win Liz's dark heart. Treat her with contempt I said, If she can't have you, she'll want you. Then look at the paper sleeves in her record albums for all her diamond stashes.

228
THE SWING SHIFT
Gilda had set us up. We found out the singed hair was prewoven with bits of black powder. She had a miniature rocket engine igniter. I knew the smell was off but I figured stuff from the building or an old ethyl can that probably belonged to Gwen. She loved her 40s rides, the whole sensory experience. From wind in her hair to the smell of that poison. However this digression is not one to upset your digestion. it's not like I told you Steve Lawrence was Robert Goulet was Liberace. Although he was. That's why Elvis shot the TV, ‘cuz the three of them had edged Judy Garland out of Vegas.

229
Gilda knew the jig was up. She quickly got to 30 Rock and joined up. The thing she didn't know is that Lorne Michaels was a 'coked-up' Groundling character. Played by a cast of several who specialized in grotesques. My wife's favorite cast member for that character, the 4th breakout star of 'SNL', Bill Murray. So we monitored her, sent her on missions for cheese burgers and swiped her cigarettes when she wasn't looking. She never had time to work for Liz Taylor again. Especially once she started her charity work.

230.
SCIENCE OF MIND
We decided to take the monies back that Liz had absconded with. We started a whole series of New Age religions. Scientology was the first, just as she began intellectual study, Saroyan and Miller and Capote and Burroughs were some of her well-funded obsessions. She had just picked up Will Durant when she got the role of Cleopatra. We packed it with engineers and academic intellectuals, then soft-pedaled it to her the way we hooked Judy up with her Gay Nation friends. Like her sister, my Bessie, she loved gentle thoughtful people but she didn't mind paying the way my wife did. We bilked back about 90% of her ill-gotten funding, and the rest I could afford to chip in. After all, we were quite wealthy and I knew I wouldn't live forever.

231.
When I awoke the night after Gilda had betrayed us. I considered the validity of investing in NBC again. I had owned part of it as a major stockholder in the 1950s, but Cassie's gee-niuz (cuz she claimed she had no brain) idea to do a live show with complete idiots made me giggle all day, soon Cassie realized our joint bank account wasn't just for pot but for meat and I knew it was only a matter of time before she found the dictionary I hid and saw that a joint could be a location for social gathering and she spent the whole year's checking to buy 30 Rock. So I just bribed them with contracted musical appearances from the Democrat's stable.

232.
There was one reason I let Gilda slide, because she didn't know we had her cold. Which left us free to do possible imitations of Liz out in the crowd to smoke out her fellow 'diamond merchants'. A crew of them about 350 with a large security force of the usual goons and a number, a large number of talented performers in both sales and acquisitions.

233.
WITH MALICE
So, to spare you the agonies involved in my tearing Steve McQueen a new nostril. Not literally mind you, but as long as I am using figurative language I might as well use wanguage of my own idiot design. This kept me from using the Queen's English as she was stho offended at the liberties I took wif dah English wanguage that once she stwuck me dumb (in English) wif deh intention of teaching me her hypnotic power as monarch was sufficient to mute me. So, mischievously, I mimed. I couldn't even manage charades. But as you know these long digressions of mine are usually because I don't remember what the heck I was writing about.

234.
Oh yeh, wipping Steve McQueen a new nostril. Well, that's a long story. Lemme see...

235.
LONG STORY SHORT
2 guys, both seriously ticked off, One a hundred years old and a master of Tai Chi, the other half his age, angry drunk, trained in some kung-fu with a black belt in jiu-jitsu. Who is gunna win? Well... you ever see Miss Piggy hi-yah someone? Imagine that of an overconfident fighter taking a swing with his foot and the old man stepping out of the way, burying his bony old fist in the lining of his fancypants jiu-jitsu pants and giving him the bum rush into a wall. That's all it took took. I told him c'mon back when you've been to a few thousand Alcoholics Anonymous meetings and learn how to do more than a doh-see-doh or the next time I'll invite some of your girlfriends to watch me kick your tail from a wheelchair, that's about the handicap you need. He groggily rubbed his head, tears in his eyes from the knee he twisted in his fall and tried to grab my leg. I kicked his hand away and said 'no you can't have my cool sweatpants you rotten little spoiled monster. If I knew how to stomp you back to semen, I'd throw you away in a soiled condom. Then, I hollered "Turn off the camera, Cassie' and walked away. He knew that I would drop the video on Good Morning America and leave his tough guy rep obliterated. GAME OVER.

236.
Steve 'died' shortly after. I died for real, in some families that kind of Quality Time is all it takes to ensure thousands of dollars for therapists. In ours? Well, I hung up my badges except for an IRS position that allowed me to monitor Liz's finances, locations and associates. She was going to take some work.

237.
Some FBI buds of mine told me that after Steve's 'death' the next day a Dodge Daytona went through about 10 roadblocks traveling at 150 miles an hour, it had armor plating, nitrous tanks, and what looked to be a second gas tank. The choppers lost it out on a Navajo plateau in a duststorm. Steve was never heard from again.

238.
LIZ
She wasn't just a diamond merchant, she also was a writer. She wrote fraudulent insurance policies. Often. So often that we started our own insurance companies to make public fraud cases so that people wouldn't purchase her small company insurances for fear of being defrauded. She then started money laundering with Mothers Against Drunk Driving.

239.
THE ENIGMA MACHINE
The reason I spent 8 months in prison in an Irish gaol was because the warden was a member of the I.R.A. and had received a stolen Enigma machine. It was salvaged from a commercial line that was sunk near the Scilly Isles in 1939. I was in-between identities, Lon Chaney had swum up with a wounded wing when Gustav Wagner had been shot by a Soviet soldier. I left the Weimar Republic and hid out in North Africa for a few years making sure that Egypt's Pharoahs and their biological weapons in Canopic jars were secured or 'stolen' by Cairo's Museum of Antiquities.

240.
Every night I would take my refrigerator arc-welded prybar made of nickels that I had spit out the other side, and used it enter the vents of the warden's office as I learned to work one of the few machines in the possession of the U.S. Government before I left the States. A short time later I dug my way out with the prybar and dumped the earth in the coffee grounds. After 6 months with 2 months to learn. I could message the U.S. Armed Forces. A three letter code. I'll show you later.

241.
THE DEAR
The sweetest woman I ever met was a lady named Claudette Colbert. She was gentle, kind, funny, charitable but she truly shined when we dined. Once she helped stitch me up after one of Cyd Charisse I's bullets creased my rib. I shot her point blank in the face. Thus Cyd Charisse II.

242.
Now Claudette was the country club set, a little boozy, a lot athletic, and unfortunately for our friendship not exactly tied to the sacrament of marriage. Still, I trusted her to be kind and not take advantage of me when incapacitated with a gunshot wound. Were I unmarried, she'd have been the BEST medical care I'd ever received. As was, a competent seamstress who knew how to stitch me up.

243.
The only time I had trouble with Claudette was after my wife ‘died’ in 1950. I was in mourning, and she came on hard, I had to run from her out to my yard. "Claudette," I said, "Get your shirt on and get out of here" after that our friendship was like a good steak, choice and rare.

244.
Let's talk. I never believed I would live most of my life under assumed identities. Pretty much all my life actually. For before I was Harry, I was just a kid from Brooklyn named Erik. Sometimes I wonder what I would've learned as a stock market analyst or greengrocer. I'll never know.

This same thing is what leaves me saddened by Elizabeth Taylor, who never learned our woes due to a latex allergy, the same one Cassie haz. She even used spirit gum but it could be detected by odor. She never built a comprehensive identity. Thank goodness. She would have been impossible to stop.

245.
ORSON
The Genius. The Artful Dodger. The sacred text that sent all of New Jersey out to the turnpikes. The Gentleman Bandit. The psychic divide. In World War II his knowledge turned the Japanese tide. he kept his nose hidden, he was ashamed of its lines, he also had a clown nose, which one of my sons divined, so it's now in a wallet that is minorly
lead-lined, ‘cuz he wore it in a bunker beneath a tennis court. His noses are legendary, so are his films he also saved silver nitrate of all of the greats, but the true reason I include him is that he's a trooper, to provide safety for marine life, he married a grouper.

246.
The grouper/human wedding took place offshore. For his religion, Orson chose Shinto of course. It was performed by Billie Holiday wearing bright priestly colors, and the resulting celebration was one of Hollywood's swankiest affairs. This celebration proved groupers intelligent, for both Orson and the grouper knew they couldn't consummate it.

247.
Now you've heard it all, so just close the book, we shut down Liz Taylor's dolphin navigated submarine import system, for if groupers are intelligent and dolphins are more then to draft them into servitude is against U.S. law, they too as citizens or the equivalent being intelligent have the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

248.
Billie Holiday? But she was dead in 1975! Nay Celebrity Sleuth she'd merely been layin' low as Jacques Cousteau.

249.
The funniest part, we wanted the grouper to have fun, so we gave her a male concubine, they consummated, eggs were laid, so Orson Welles has a grouper daughter!

250.
Liz Taylor's Diamond Mules
The flight to Hawaii was typical of her, fill up vodka bottles with clear jello so they wouldn't rattle, then pack them with diamonds, load them in cases, then have celebrity stewardesses carry them on her airline, TWA. There it was easy, so many islands and atolls to leave from, even a warned Coast Guard often would miss them. Here's some of the names: Robert Wagner, Suzanne Somers, Leonard Nimoy, and Evel Kineval. They just did it for the money and wouldn't have if they'd known her infamy.

251.
Charlton Heston.
An action movie star. His 'Planet of the Apes' bought the president a Car. Nixon wanted nitrous, as well as solid tires for he had invented spike strips and their dangers. Heston was brilliant a gun-toting deerhunter, he could scope a seven-pointer at 500 yards. Then he would tranquilize it and check it for disease, so that local wildlife populations could remain at ease. His role in shutting down Liz's security was to place restrictions on ownership of High Explosive weapons. He used action movies that scared all the heathens, some funded by Mike Curb, later assistant governor. Bikers with rockets, cowboys with dynamite, terrorists with suicide vests, soon there was a crackdown. This meant that often we could shut down her cells with weapons charges.

252.
THE MEANEST THING I EVER DID
In Marathon Man, at the end, those diamonds dropped into the reservoir were Liz Taylor's favorite violet-tinged diamonds. We'd found them in Cuba, packed in cigars, the Naval Embargo seized them, and now they're gone forever.

253.
CHAPLIN
He was, as always indispensable, his knowledge of British customs allowed us to smuggle in multiple costumes along with ID cards and monitor the second largest diamond exchange. We always had some folks on the board of directors.

254.
IN DREAMS
This wasn't easy. I had to work in a horrible 3-D movie. I awoke feeling drunken after all the two camera angles. I had to go back to sleep and then awoke later and watched B'wana Devil. There on camera was the jackpot, the drum had been made from it and I flew to Miami. It was gone, but at last I knew she was down to her last diamonds.

255.
LIZAGIN'S ISLAND
This is the tale of her castaways; they're in hock for a long, long time. Most are in NYC, it's a lot you'll find. Look for names like Lsizalard or Doug Taylor or mine. Also stuff like Don L. King or David Medingshines, she sometimes uses Audrey's name or sometimes David Lean's. Pay half of what they're asking, those prices are for her. So join up with the IRS and look for fake settings, originals had finder fees so she sold them back to me.

256.
NO! I didn't know she was selling them to me.

257.
In time, Liz may be seen just as the robber barons. She lived so wastefully feeding dozens when she could have wheeled her leftovers a block away and fed hundreds, charities for her were dodges for taxes or fraud businesses she skimmed. Free enterprise stops when the monies to start the businesses isn't ripped off from grieving families or directors bilked with low talent performances. Sleepy chick asleep or ranting, ham actress. Still, later, her charities were for real, and she divested herself of all but those diamonds that were given her by her husbands. I thank Richard Burton for that. He taught her love, she couldn't go back, not by living but by dying, for real, the only thing in the world she couldn't afford, the man who loved her until the day he died.

258.
She never stopped loving him, but he was gone, not in my lifetime, but I knew his heart, he was my brother's son. Same deal, sad mother, or silent adoption, father always knew and usually told her later. Mother's love rarely fades. He was older than he seemed, he'd spent his teens in jail. Irish, not Wales. Didn't bomb, but was bombed at the wrong bar when the sirens wailed.

259.
THE SWEETHEART
Itty bitty pretty one. That's how I thought of her. Sandra Dee, helpful, loving and as kind as can be. But with a junkie father she learned to write ‘cuz she’d flee to the library when he was loaded and angry at night. This wasn't the first time an actress could write. Shelley Winters wrote 'In Cold Blood' on her Saturday nights. Sandra wrote monster movies, which impressed all the boys, but led her up against you know who and all her crappy movies. SO I taught her how to play a man, and introduced her through my political party as an auteur named Val Lewton, his films were well received, the public, largely kids, thought they were borring.

260.
THE DREAM
Facing DISASTER Liz had a plan, to distribute her diamonds via a James Bond film. So she drafted Jill St. John to do a striptease switcheroo and for quite awhile she was not blue. We tried chasing all over Europe, but what could we do. Europe has diamond merchants like the sky has blue. Still we caught a couple shipments after the quake, (1972). For awhile diamonds were hot, then I introduced earthtones, with macramé, earthmother, and green goddess salad dressing. Emeralds, topaz and amethyst became valuable, and sweet Cassie, my bride, sold red and orange spinels. She made $400,000 dollars before I told her "That's all you can sell." It has a small market, a rare gem with little stock, but inexpensive prices for there is not enough of them to advertise. I didn't want Liz to hear in the trade papers about our shared disguise, and the local merchants were starting to get wise. So she sold pretty pearl tiaras, for SoCal quinceñeras.

261.
THE TASK FORCE
As Liz's sales took off, we (Cassie and I) recruited several FBI agents with motile faces, we bought jewelry stores, staked out her agents, flooded her markets, and dished out counterfeit diamonds. This last one caught her flat-footed for she only had a few skilled appraisers, and every one she tried to connect with was wearing a wire. She had to move her West Coast operations to the East Coast at a loss. That was the primary cause of "Lizzie the Cat's" fall. Cuz we tapped every phone she tried to install. Our task force was simple, we'd wait in Cleveland for a call, Then Johnny would fly us in his ride "The Zip-a-dee-doo-dah”. Some prayed I would invest in a bullet train due to his stomach churning flying.

262.
With easy delivery the money she sought was all worth the effort, but with us 'dogs of the law' on her all the time, the profit margin was non-existant, so she went back to cosmetics, perfumes, winin' and dinin'. Then it was the perfect time for our 'ace in the hole' to strike. Julia Child and the Concorde also pulled money out of Liz's pocket. She couldn't afford to leave NYC with all of her diamonds. So she tried to get fine jewelry into the duty-free stores but we filled them up with more commercial names.

263.
Mystery Date
One day back in the 50s, Mickey and Judy had just made peace and they both got drunk and Hokey Smokeys, Cassie was made. They couldn't get along the next day. But for me, most men, and my son, that was a wonderful day. It's easy to relate when you can forget the past and don't fear the future.

264.
So some of you are like, so you're Abraham Lincoln's son and Dracula's mom and Superman and Wex Woo-four and John the Baptis’ in a seekrit mask wit' Mexican food, and I'm like yeh? So I'm Hoodini watch me get out of that one. NEXT CHAPTER!

265.
I'm really just Abraham Lincoln's son, check out the Honker on me!

266.
And I'm Dwacula's Mom too! KIDDING!!!

267.
One time Jonny was flying over a barren Midwest field and in his fake laconic Chuck Yeagar drawl he said, "An' that there is the field where Buddy Holly died," and just then the engine starts sputtering. He says, "Hold on everybody!" We start to dive steeply. Then the engine catches and we level off to his usual idiot bazooms around the sky. I'd helped him install an extra gas tank the week before.

268.
In the morning after that little stunt my whole team, Johnny included woke me up to a sock party, with socks in their sock saps. All chanting ESPECIALLY Johnny. No More Johnny Airlines! No more Johnny Airlines I stood up angrily. OK You guys got it. From now on.... and I "think" OK. Aunt Blabby Charters it is. And they start hitting Johnny.

269.
It was his idea.

270.
DOT + MICKEY
Mickey always called 'Dorothy' Dot, it wasn't to belittle her. It's that he genuinely had affection for her. She had liked him too, at first, before he got pushy about paying despite knowing in detail her financial state. He really thought she'd cave, his women usually went that way. A few drinks and they actually made peace for a few hours, a few more and they were pawing each other and humping in a corner of a small dive of Mickeys, a few more and they were screaming at each other and both their goon squads left before shooting started. That's the last time I saw Mickey. One week later, he got whacked. 1 month later, Judy cried harder than I'd ever seen anyone cry. I cried too. I'd always thought that they'd both reach a separate peace. In a way, they did. Judy usta go talk at his original burial site. Where he was eventually buried beneath his headstone. She talked about how their daughter was doing with her adopted parents, and how smart and how funny she is. Then, she'd kiss the ground he was buried under and drive home.

271.
MYSTERY TRAIN II
"I won't play that song on my station until I've done his rotten corpse just like his men." She said that during her hateful rant as I drove her home in Palm Springs. "He's as rotten as ever." I thought the same about her. "Thou shalt not murder," I repeated to her. "Oh Fiddley Diddley, just drop me off at the liquor store. I'll call a cab." I bid her goodnight and drove to the Montecito for a Roman bath and sauna.

272.
Yes, he was Liz. He sold junk from her re-cuttings as diamond chipped medallions. He didn't die when she did, because Rose McGowan loved him so and learned songwriting as Kurt Cobain. We kept the "Children of God' under tight wraps because they were abused as children, but Rosie wished to pursue happiness, so we gave her roles. We told her we'll only give him hits if you pay back the monies you grifted plus interest. He had several hits indeed.

273.
FIRESIGN THEATRE
Everytime the Grateful Dead needed money for a tour, they'd record some stuff as The Firesign Theatre, those goofy cats had mad literary skills, but they eventually learned to songwrite so except for occasional personal appearances faded away.

274.
Now you've learned the way, watch the way we play. Liz was over. She still has work and knows not to act like a jerk. Steve was gone. Probably for good. But I still had accounting to do. Mucking through white collar crime and their books back to 1943.

275.
I believe in people. Sometimes foolhardily. But the truth of the matter is most people are good. Like take Tuesday Weld. As kind as could be, but addicted to more substances than you have in your philosophy. Our days together were that of father and child, not that she was or playing it, but when you're 70 years old, everyone seems a child. Tuesday was a Sunset Blvd. child, drinkin' smokin, tokin, and smokin'. She nearly got snared by the most dangerous villain, a drug dealing songster named Jim Morrison.

276.
His modus operandi was nothing new, have a party at his house and deal drugs from it. The bad thing though is that he launched boats to an offshore platform and sold large quantities to upcoming starlets. Tuesday was one. She smoked it all on a yacht she had rented from me. Then I found out that Jim was one-a Mickey's kids, and he was trying to bust me. So I got him fired from The Whisky, and as Charles Manson he tried to kill me.

277.
He was a savvy booger, the kind with a good family, who knew how to function, but didn' wanna. He'd get all wasted, and puke on the stage. He got onto me, when he found my old ways after seeing a picture of me dressed as a dead director's wife. I played his wife, he was played by Bess til' he 'died'. Then with fake spiritualists and mediums I tried to contact 'him' on the other side. Not one was successful as my wife was still alive, but for the price of a new car, plenty of them lied. I called them up later to prove they were fakes, but at UCLA Morrison saw my pictures, so nothing was jake. He also figured out what I smelled like, so things got really hard. He was my greatest nemesis, a murderer/rapist terrorist who killed at will.

278.
My dream of the quiet life after I retired, was shattered one night when he killed several of my friends, including the original Tuesday Weld when she was playing Sharon Tate. Sandra Dee took over, but you didn't see her much. She blames the holes in her memory on short-term memory loss, like Rita Hayworth II but she used 'Alzheimer's' as her crutch.

279.
Ronald Reagan is Jimmy Stewart.

280.
THE GUN
When I was born, someone shot a gun off, 5 guys scrambled out the door. My dad looked up from his cigar and said 'Blanken stupid Rebs, he's only a kid.'

281.
ANOTHER DREAM
When I was a kid after I burned my wips, I got into trouble with my folks, just a wittle bit. They told me 'Go to the library and find a magician, and learn all his tricks before you perform any' so I RAN to the library, and found Robert Houdin and then asked my father if he had an electromagnet. He swlapped himself in the face and sed 'O jeez, not that one.' Then he set me down and said 'When I was younger, I did something big, so I'm keeping a low profile, you can learn his card tricks.' Then he gave me $5, a fortune for a kid back in that day. It was worth about $75 in 1980 money. Which in 2016 is worth $125. And then he said, "I forgot we're Hungarian, just go buy some tricks!" So I bought some tricks and learned carpentry and then scaled them so as to 'wow' the fans. My guillotine was the favorite, cuz I had a fwoating marionette head that would 'speak' in tongues.

282.
The moral of that story, is... The secret service has been banned from the New York Public Library System, because I could have hurt myself with all the big books I carried.

283.
THE MASTERPIECE OF PAIN
Someday they'll find the film that jerk made, probably in an impromptu treehouse where he often would hide, so get a doggy with corpse finder skills and have 'em search the air in the trees headed towards Venice, mainly the hills... then drop a restraining order including e-monitoring on Jim Morrison's Paris grave which he tends to stay away from, to stay away from the grandsons of Abraham Lincoln.

284.
THE WINDOW
He is the first person I know of who made an edible windowpane of sugar frosted cocaine, which he would break to drive into fury his attack dogs. Once, they even attacked him. That's why he grew the beard, one savaged his chin.

285.
THE DOGS
They were Rottweilers. Savage since birth, their mom was a monster of unusual girth, he raised them on beef jerky, The Beatles and beer, the massive migraines they suffered increased their fear of him. But with bounteous corn which hung over the fence all year, I balanced their diet and then they attacked him.

286.
HIS MOTHER
You already know her. Not Judy aka Dot. Her then wayward mom. She lived in sun country (as she called it) before her sneaky Golden state ride, where she 'hid out' in a serviceman's bed past her stop. She did a switcheroo with a stillbirth (cuz Mickey had cops) and then got arrested for a train ticket West. Her juvenile delinquency charge (she didn't know the half) was quietly dropped.

287.
STEERS
Somewhere out in Texas. There are several steers that were doped with mescaline. Jim used them to kill his betraying dogs painfully. He was an evil guy. Still is.

288.
THE WIN
So when Jim killed Roman Polanski and his bride, we hid the body so he would think he got me. He wasn't certain Polanski was me, but if it happened on a soundstage it would've been. Then I fled to Switzerland a while later. The 'young girl' I was with was my 19 y.o. soon-to-be bride, Cassie. We did a switcheroo at Heathrow to be married by the queen. And Lon Chaney Jr. flew off as Polanski with a well-disguised Mia Farrow.

289.
THE MONSTERS
That's what he called his gang they consisted of, David Brenner, Kirk Douglas, Jaime Farr and David 'Bowser' Baumann. Brenner and Baumann would play each other. Douglas was the 'moneyman'. Brenner was the sniper. Baumann managed the muscle and Farr was consigliere. Jim handled the rough stuff and sometimes pimped starlets.

290.
THE MYSTERY
Jim invented chicle makeup. It held pockmarks well, which made for some cheap, gritty Westerns. That was while he and George Harrison built American International Pictures up.

291.
George Harrison wasn't a bad guy, just a lover of low-budget film, but he often chose locations where he could easily smoke pot. Ghost-town westerns, Sonora deserts, urban jungles with hard drug problems. Sometimes for explosions small uncharted desert islands.

Jim exploited this. He'd have shipments of movie props made of press'd drugs. His biggest seller was a compact designed to 'powder ' your nose colored with hints of sweet paprika. Once to a Brando flick he brought in 300 of those and sold them to Napa Valley hoteliers.

292.
CHAPLIN
Look. I know you're into that crud Jim Morrison, but something Chaplin invented stopped his rampage. We showed him Chaplin's old fingerweenie trick. Where he unzipped his fly and stuck his finger out through it. We knew that the jerk couldn't resist. So we had several honestly nearsighted cops in the front row so they could snag joints for stings off the stage. His arrest was one of my better days.

293.
MORRISON'S RAGE
He was a slow burn kinda guy. It'd build up and build up into a fatal rage. Usually on an innocent but sometimes on cops. He'd given up chasing me because he thought he MIGHT have got me, and chasing me down was too high profile. Especially AFTER his yogi-impersonation pill-related death. He practiced a lot in his bathtub, and once nearly drowned. Just lowered his pulse and blood pressure to low levels and then would 'wake up' to a tantric massage. Courtesy of his unbeknownst to him sister, Judy Garland who would hang out in Paris as Vincent Price until it was time for her to play his redheaded squeeze. When she found out his heritage, she quit the job and a young woman named Deanna replaced her for a time until Cindy Williams replaced her for good.

294.
THE GRAVE
He liked the free 'stuff he got onstage so he started seeding his grave with joints, cheap wine, and cocaine and stayed rent-free with the groupies or his 'old lady' most of the time.

295.
Here's where Louis Armstrong comes in. 69 years young with a devoted crew in Paree. I asked him to make sure that Jim Morrison's grave was kept clean and then toss down special weed that was hard to miss the smell of. But he got wise and started selling that weed to U.S. Marines who found themselves surrounded by Paris gendarme. They'd set them free with a warning. Stay away from Ze ree-fer or we'll lock you away.

296.
DREAMY JIM
I got to know Timothy Leary pretty well, I thought I might be able to mellow Jim out with a drug that was legal at the time. An entheogen that was making the rounds in psychological communities called MDMA. I usta carpool with Leary between the UCLA Library and our homes in Hemet and Palm Desert. One time I got quite medicated in the stream behind Leary's retreat up 74. I spent 4 hours talking to the trout there in a language only we understood. I figured that any drug that could quell the natural instincts of an avid fisherman such as myself might help with the predatorial instincts of a serial killer who had killed 8 of my best friends. I was horribly wrong. It mellowed him out, isolated him, yet his murderous impulses remained. He had long loved the campfire story 'The Hook'. So he added a modern twist. He would listen for any radio with a couple that was playing oldies from the fifties. Then he would kill them both. Later he got less picky, he'd just kill whoever was listening to oldies, couple or not.

One night he was laying in a pool of blood from his most recent murder, and he 'figgered out' how to bring his murders into the public eye. He was thinking how the Big Dipper looked like 'The Hook' and he looked out the constellation Leo and a light went off in his evil noggin. His eyes gleamed and he sneered "ZODIAC".

297.
“Oh Sheesh!” I thought, “That JERK!” I'd done several sketches of Jim with different haircuts and theatrical facial contortions. I knew just who the cops were showing me. We'll get him. He's bound to get sloppy in his lust to kill. If we can just aggravate him enough to get sloppy. I talked to some of my buds in the film industry about doing a parody of Jim where he was an animalistic monster instead of the poetic rebel he styled himself when he wasn't being an animalistic monster. That film opened up the career of Clint Eastwood beyond bit parts and westerns. Dirty Harry. Too bad Morrison WAS Eastwood.

Kidding!

It worked, we got enough DNA evidence to bust the man. But he got word from his troupe of female officers to 'kill' himself in Paris. We knew he haunted the city. But finding someone in Paris is difficult. Between the Revolution, insurgency against Napoleon and the Free French during World War II. The catacombs, hidey holes and black market elements of 1972, Paris, our chance of finding him unless we could taunt or bait him into making a personal appearance rather than just sending minions to shoot up Congress or do mayhem on campuses with with guns was about as likely as bringing back vaudeville.

298.
DNA evidence? When was the electron microscope invented. Tedious but worth it.

299.
THE VICTOR
So there I was married in Paris, knowing that Jimmy was going to be 15 blocks away. We kept to the pool, the room and the discotheque. A couple of his flunkies showed up, but they weren't anything much. He played in the long game, keeping an eye on us. Watching meetings with the gendarme. Then we drove to Monte Carlo, that was beyond his long arm. She wanted to play Chemin-de-fair just like James Bond. so I call up this cat named Ken Uston, so he could show her how to play. He taught her the tricks of the trade.

So we get to the tables and suddenly she's outta chips so I pass her half of mine and then they're gone too. I'm like "What was Ken teaching you?" Saith she, "I play to lose!" I stared into space, dumbfounded, awestruck, Cassie the Clown had struck again. When I could finally speak, I did my best James Dean and sed "That's what I get for letting you speak to strange men." She put on her angelic face and sed "That's what *I* get for marrying a 100-year-old boob" I sed "I'm not a boob, I'm Superdude!" She: "You sure are honey lemme get your wheelchair." She had me, I gave her my last chip and she gave it to the bellhop. "Please bring the gentleman, his valet for his car." I smiled, knew she would be a star, cuz 'My Wheelchair' is what I always called my car. She just wanted to go drivin'.

[Doc Martian]

300.
MICKEY COHEN'S GRAVE
Headstone read 'Alphonse Capone' One look at both their faces and you too will know until 1976, when Judy thought he might go.

Now think about that, the man she loved and killed having to live much of her life as him. The punishment sure fit the bill. "He' mellowed mainly and dropped into the shadows. She never wore that make-up on the day she killed him.

301.
JIM THE DREAMER
I never complained about the weather with peace in the world it didn't seem clever but when the smog in The Sixties built up very bad, it's more than an understatement to wish that I had. So I got clever again and wrote like a kid and said the smog makes me sick. What did you adults did. Then I wrote in Japanese and said our cars have great mileage. There would be less smog if we ended the Detroit age. My ruse was successful, the smog started to lift. Then I wrote Detroit to go small muscle cars which gave their sales a lift.

That's when he struck. he sabotaged the unions, and their resultant demands brought Detroit down.

302.
IN THE EARLY DAYS
I mocked the cops. The Keystone Cops were my invention. I made them look like pell-mell idiots stumbling over each other. Stealing, being unkind, and harassing heroes. I felt that way about them. I'd had my run-ins. Usually for crazy but legal driving. Not reckless, but jockeying with friends like Ben-Hur chariot races. Doing the speed limit, but still being all over the road. There was no white line. Then about 1917 Dr. June of Indio who had lobbied for white lines, I jumped on the bandwagon. Even painted some of my own. Those things saved millions of lives over the next 80 years and that was just in my lifetime.

303.
THE DREAM
Later, I had a whole fleet of cars, I kept them in top condition. The care I showed for them was just the kind of care I showed in my lobbying efforts, long detailed methodologies and ways to keep people satisfied with life and happy. Usually politicians would find what they could make money on from them, so I would always throw in a profit margin, a way for them to cash in. It worked.

304.
IN THE HONEYMOON DAYS
I usta dream of a society where Equality was the norm. And then I realized that gave nobody anything to strive for. So I invented the concept of Relative Equality where everyone had stuff and lives worth having but trading up was also a possibility. This trade-up didn't come without difficulty, yes mystery lovers, this IS dah boring part. Just skip to dah next chapter if you want dah Jim and the Aliens part.

305.
Hah! Fooled you!

306.
JIM AND THE ALIENS!
Jim didn't believe in aliens, most people didn't back then. Carl Sagan hadn't made the intelligentsia do the math yet. With billions of worlds, the chance of them being all rocks is slim. But back then... people weren't listening to him. His eyes how they twinkled, his fake Areceibo, got people scranblin' and thinkin' War of the Worlds. So they invented the military laser and the neutron bomb. before a face palmin' Sagan told them Areceibo was a fakeout. He said "If this drill had been for real, we all would have lost, because with an interstellar drive they could have knocked the Earth into the Sun.

307.
One night in the 1970s, Jim got suckered by me. I got some guys from 29 Palms to magnetically attach a helicopter to a dark-running jet. Then, we flew the jet at subsonic speeds to where Jim was laying out by Mt. Rubidoux. We then had the lit copter detach about 150 yards over his head while the jet t engine did tight banks to mask the chopper sound with its roar. The chopper also served to modulate the jet's engine, like talking into a fan. We also dazzled his stoned mind by flashing multi-colored strobes in his eyes. By 5 minutes of our goofing him, we got him to flee the Southwest where 'many' sightings (actually just test pilots) had been made. To Paris he went, never to return, and due to happy pooches from kindness and aid, we made sure his occasional murders were of people who were pretty much already dead.

308.
Happy pooches? What? We asked them to bark whenever he came around, and in return we fed, loved and petted them well. They obliged. He couldn't leave a six-block radius without setting up a cry. Near his 'grave' to the store and not much more.

309.
BIRD IS THE WORD
Jim had two renegades to do his dirty work in the states. One had no name or name that is known. The other is Warren Beatty, an outstanding jerk. Warren was the money and The nameless one crushed and killed. You've only seen him once but seen him you have... he wore the penis-face mask in Mos Eiseley in the original Star Wars. We just called him 'The Bird'.

310.
THE BIRD
He was a sniper, he'd kill from afar, not by shooting your body but by clipping a guy wire or blowing out the tire of your car. Once he clipped a hay bale and dropped it from an overpass, murdering the driver below when it dropped through his windowglass. He'd kill five people a week and he usually had the time, we finally got him in 1975.

311.
THE BIRDCAGE
This sniper loved Bowie so we kept him around first producing Iggy, then New York City. We taught him soul moves and other grand stuff, it mellowed him out after his Thin White Duke racist guff. We insisted he get off the cocaine and hooked him up with Studio 54 dance beats and Nile Rodgers.

312.
We knew he hated disco, so we funded it well. Some of his murders were telling us to 'go to hell'. His second favorite band was KISS, we had them go disco as well. He finally hopped a jet and we recognized him well, so we landed the jet in Utah emergency-style. It's where he was from, we knew he'd try and fight, so we landed it in the boonies on a slow commuter night. He knew he was busted, so he did not fuss and fight. He had two aggravated murder counts from before he left there. Six months later they gave him the chair.

313.
The moral of the story of the Bird. Houdini can sucker you across the nation without saying a single solitary word.

314.
HOUDINI OF THE PACIFIC NORTHWEST
No, I'm not talking about me, I'm talking about Doug Henning. His study of my work was quite assiduous. When I saw him doing most of my tricks I thought "ARE YOU SERIOUS!" and then I realized he just had similar boxes; he hadn't reverse-engineered my tricks, he had changed the switcheroos, catches and lockses. His rings and cards were nothing new. Most stage magicians can do those while playing a kazoo.

315.
I never believed a man could fly, but Christopher Reeve knew aerodynamics so I never asked why the Superman or why Clark Kent moved like a pilot. We never met, but he always impressed me.

316.
THE MUPPETS
What hilarity. A vaudeville show to say goodbye. Even a parody of me in disguise. Crazy Harry. It's true. I often looked like that dude.

317.
Kidstuff you say? Well, what brought me in? Fire eaters, Cracker Jack and Edison's Frankenstein. I always kept my eyes on what kids were watching.

318.
THE LIE
One time, I drafted an assistant with his prior knowledge. A 19 year old student from a Riverside college. He hung out with Cassie, who taught him hypnosis and in return he claimed to be father of my youngest who was adopted. Cassie was the mother, but there was another girl who usually filled the role. Thus my final son had 'parents' who were not us.

319.
I was extra paranoid because of Jim, but the government was pushing us to hide the Soviet emigres. So despite the extra danger 'the folks' were aware of, we obliged.

This ruse didn't fool our KGB tails, but it definitely foxed Jim. He was 'certain' all three of us had 'disappeared' so we put on makeup as 'ourselves and returned to Europe and far Cathay on the trail of Mickey Cohen's father Georges Melies aka Marcel Proust. Few great geniuses actually die young.

320.
DISGUST
I know you guys are like 'in Hollywood is everyone related'? My answer 'but there's only 15 of us, just consider us a small family. BTW I'm kidding again, we're a big family!

321.
WHO'S THIS KID
Not the young one but the eldest, Let's just call him Brother James, he started doing the opposite of what I did, scaling tricks mechanical from large to small, he sold them through swap meets, magic stores and sometimes at the mall. I teased him 'Wow, you can make your hamster disappear'. But seriously, I love the kid although now he's an old man, I won't tell you his name, just that of his greatest shill, who happens to be my brother's kid, let's just call him Yurgi Giller, cuz that's how they say it in Russian.

322.
Now you're getting it. We aren't all movie stars, I taught him miniaturization so he could manage my bar. It's one up on a hill just off Franklin Street, the name of my grandfather, Benjamin Franklin. typesetter/railsplitter/escape artist/miniaturizer the firstborns of a family of fake loyalists. This is the first time this wonderful secret has been revealed.

323.
THE IDIOT GENIUS
Now Cassie had an old debt she wanted to repay, one late 1971 night she dropped off a friend. He was a fan of Rita Hayworth, and she actually did say, 'one night on her couch and I'll make you a star in L.A.'. His name was Robin, he was an incredible comedian, one of the few people who could crack her up all day. The next morning a quake, it killed Robin and Rita, she drove over that morning from our little theatre. She called me up sobbing, said "I cannot drive" I picked her up in my Hudson 55. She said, I'm going to his groundlings interview as him, I certainly knew it was more than a whim. Over the next few years she played him often. Her sadness playing him drove her to new heights of performing. Arr Arr Arr was the sound she made crying, Mork was her first starring role. She donated it all to the homeless. The rest is Hollywood Legend, it went mostly to the homeless. She played Rita too. But that didn't make her blue. Robin was special she loved him like mad, he was the only other lover she had had. She met him that night I had met her on Big Sur, he was frying on acid and dressed as a mime.

324.
So between Steve, Liz and Jim I was having a rough time, I knew it wouldn't last forever. The dream that I had that night told me so. I dreampt that I was being wrapped in leather out on a plateau where a land rover sat and far from there out in the distance, I saw a single car packed with clowns dressed in black. Then I saw a star shining overhead and with its spangles and sparkles, I knew it was a flare. The clown car sped up and headed towards me. My body laid there wrapped in leather. The Land Rover drove away... Cassie behind the wheel, and the clown car rolled up playing a Louis Armstrong tune, Louis behind the wheel. Out of the trunk they pulled my old cannonball act from the summer I worked at PT Barnum's circus. They had it rigged with charges, put my helmet on me, neatly rolled Cassie's buffalo hide to give to an infant. Then they stood far back, lit a fuse and ran to the car. Louis Armstrong pulled out his trumpet and you could hear it as they hit the nitrous. Then Darkness and a flash and a bang, feeding to the dingoes the only body I ever had. Louis' trumpet played just like the old days. And thus ended the dream.

325.
I woke with a smile. Louis had not died. All the health issues he'd been facing were yet another ruse. So I'd set him up in Paris, to drive Jimmy nuts, snaking up his doobies and layin' down butts. His dreamin' and schemin' required concentration. The kind that an alkie like him never had.

326.
I dreamed like it was for the first time after my hundredth birthday it was worth the long life. I told Cassie about it, and she spent an hour crying, not from sadness but from joy, she knew I loved Louis Armstrong since I was practically a boy. I heard him on a King Oliver record back in 1920ish. His glissando sang out like an angel in flight.

327.
I just wanna say two words, Gus Grissom, he was my brother's son and he died in a fire in a capsule.

328.
Long dreams take time so please bear with me, there's no way I could put Mickey and Judy's romance on the first page. Neither could I put the lovestory of the century into the middle of a detective story, but I'm sure trying. Are you ready? The easiest thing I ever saw was the chowderheaded romance between Curly Howard and Lucille Ball.

329.
THE WONDER
Yes, I won't leave you hanging. Imagine Jerome Howard (for that was hims name) in love with a redhead whose hair was aflame. He lit her hair on fire. It wasn't actually her hair, just a well padded up-do which had flameproofing. He did it at a USO club, and said, Nah we got enough clowns, you can't get in the show. She cried. He laffed Hoh-hoh-hoh-hoh. And thus was born the character Ricky Ricard-hoh.

330.
Lit her hair on fire. Yeth, wit Cuban rum. Fred Mertz put it out. Also known as Joe Besser with some rubber cement on his eyelids.

331.
THE FAMILY
OK here is a list of their children, Desi and Luci you know but the ones you don't are the original Robin Williams, Jim Carrey and Lisa Lampanelli. All of them were given strong cover as Jim Morrison was already known for murder. Why would we bother, with all the stars around? Because Lucille Ball was my first born-in-exile daughter. Yesss everyone in Hollywood is yer kid Hoo-dini. Nay nay nay nay I say. Only the folks at Columbia or Desilu. I tried to take over Universal but the Barrymores wouldn't sell.

332
TAKEOVER ATTEMPT
The attempt was abortive, but this is nothing new in Hollywood. Sometimes during periods that lack social upheaval we have to employ the lawyers. I knew that the Barrymore wouldn't bite. But I offered them $15 billion one Saturday night. They countered $18 thinking I'd bargain. But Cassie my wife pulled out a $20 bill and said "Get two bucks change" and they left the table insulted. I looked at her, smiled and said "Go buy some cigarettes, Honey." So she bought Winston-Salem for $100 billion dollars. No wonder she outlived me.

333.
THE DREAM
Dreeeeam, dreeam, dreeeam, dreeem, dreeeeam, dreem-dreem-dreem etc.

334.
JOE COCKER
Whatta clown, he'd get up onstage and it'd be like a nervous breakdown. His tunes were like a psychedelic carnival ride. Brought Leon Russell up from the sticks. But when he hooked up with Delaney and Bonnie. I nearly cried. He had a coke habit, which is bad news when you're pretty wide.

335.
LIZ AGAIN
OK she wasn't all shut down. She had some diamonds from a Russian Crown. They were worth billions, although remaining in Moscow were some that looked just the same. They'd been recut, but they had not the historical value. What she did with them is your first clue. She bought them in states (yes, from herself) that I might drive through. This was to fund Highway Patrol who would be alerted to a car that looked like mine.

336.
IN THE VISUAL FIELD
The 70mm was coming into play. Higher building costs from earthquakes required it that way. The old Academy Ratio fell out of play, for tall auditoriums were no longer affordable.

337.
WEET-WEET-WEET
The only thing that ever made me laugh harder than the Barrymores stalking out of the meeting... was when Cassie played 3 roles on Happy Days. Chuck, (who got fired for coke, she left some cornstarch on her nose) a stripper at the grand poobah shindig and of course, Mork from Ork. ABC Television never knew what hit them. She had an easy-in ‘cuz Mrs. Cunningham was played for starters by Judy Garland. Later Cassie took over, ‘cuz Judy was filling in for deceased me as the notable character actor John Forsythe on Dynasty. My last film rides were as Forsythe's voice on Charlie's Angels. Yes, bumpersticker... 'Actresses do it on stilts.'

338.
INDIVIDUAL POWER
I never meant to become powerful. It was just an unhappy accident. I wanted to come home from Europe in 1945 and retire, but there I was as Truman, I knew who to blame, that schemer Judy Garland. She had Congress kinda in her pocket. She knew all the congressional wives, from their delight of her as Dorothy and she knew which congressmen were wifebeaters. More power than I had in my commando assassination.

339.
NOBODY EVER SUSPECTED
Morrison had to split. The Bird was just hassling a little bit. We were sucking his time with a Laverne & Shirley gig. He was always on call, or writing new bits with his partner. Me dressed as Squig. (Please note lawyers, it's been awhile since he had a gig.)

340.
THE PEACENIKS
My favorite ensemble from the Seventies were the folks that portrayed Korean War medicos, Alda and Morgan, Swit and Burghoff, but most of all, my second youngest son with Beth. Wayne Rogers. His muscular bully was based on John Wayne, but his delivery was pure theatre stage James Cagney. He felt like a sidekick and knew he was meant to be, but everytime he had to play Robert Duvall he played 'drunk'.

341.
I never saw my favorite show, but I wrote the whole thing when I worked in San Bernardino. That's when I wrote all the plots for Dragnet. Bess didn't like TV. Called it 'the idiot box' so I rarely watched. Even though it was alright with me. I still got to listen to it on the now-failing radio shows. Jack was a master of deadpan delivery, just like my brother aka Lurch, on the Addams Family. He did a perfect imitation of my father when he delivered his signature line. 'You Rained?' to which he always replied 'Raintree vous.'

342.
It takes forever. Life just does. It isn't a 30 minute sitcom. It's more like a Finnish epic, takes a good long while. But not forever. Like driving towards a mountain to hike, picnic or play in the sun.

343.
EASY PICKINS
Some called him Slim, I called him Hilarious! His coolweather hick was even funnier in the heat. When he'd wipe off his head and he'd pee on his feet. Every couple of days he'd pull that gag. It never got old but his feet shore did smell. They dropped him out of a bomb bay door and told him to 'go to hell'.

344.
THE DREAM
Everybody went to see Babe aka Jerome aka Curly when he was in the convalescent home. Starlets from all over the Blvd. would drop in to stripe his candy. But only one made the grade. A shrewd businesswoman who knew Cuban refugees would be coming in. Her sense was correct. When Communist funding started to hit, Curly 'passed away.' Then, a character I invented to explore Tito Puente's buds became Jerome's full-time. He met with Lucy at a club that wouldn't stop. That night they found love as they helped several homeless people into a shelter. Nothing made them feel better. Except for when he played conga and she would dance for him.

Soon... the first inklings of 'I Love Lucy.'

345.
In the Early days of Hollywood, I helped design its future stages, including most of orange county. I designed elements of the freeway system. Local boroughs, multiplexes, an earthquake-proof San Fernando Valley and best of all the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Every couple years, I'd play Santa Claus in the Hollywood Christmas Parade. Chaplin invented that. He invented toys for Tots too. Sometimes it seemed like there was nothing that cat couldn't do.

I believe that change comes in many forms. Most come from within. Love can also come from without.

346.
When John Ford came back from the war he found a devoted coterie of female magicians ready to ensconce him as mage of the Magic Castle. "What did I do besides Card Tricks to earn this?" Said Mary, Pickford that is, "Your documentary made us feel like we were there in the war." A little light went off in his head, "I wonder where else we can feel like we're there." and he designed a series of newsreels for kids that featured historical events with modern news coverage. That project took him years, but it taught many that history was accessible and even fun. With that John considered his work done. He retired as mage and my son James Randi served his first term. The Amazing Randi he styled himself, but most just called him James. A showman supreme, with fine costumes, he'd even debunk himself as an anti-Christian charlatan. Charming funny, and played it all different ways. I knew he would celebrate a great many days.

347.
FIRE ON THE MOUNTAIN
We once went to Kilauea during a small scale eruption. We flew in a helicopter, and watched the earth light up. About then I realized that the water pressure of my increased shipping was pushing the magma up through the earth. I realized the same thing had built a mountain in Mexico after the war, when American exports are what Asia bought. The same with our imports, our Datsun sports cars. We were causing eruptions around the Ring of Fire. "Imagine that!" says The Cat, "I told the elders about that" I looked back at shipping spikes, and matched them to volcanoes. There was no doubt in my mind that there was a correlation.

348.
There are no reasons why people listen to me. People with better track records have gotten ignored. One was Orson Welles, and he was even given what for, when he figgered out The Atom Bomb when he was driving in his car. It ain't faith, it ain't skill, it's that I'm loud. When I make noise, people hear it whether they want to or not.

349.
I never told anyone about this. My sweet Beth, when I met her she was a mess. Her Dad was a drunkard, his wife was beaten, she had to hide out in the closet and her life I tried to sweeten. We both got evicted, for too much kanoodling, so we ended up in a homeless shelter, with her dressed as a man, we learned to hustle shell game but I played honest, my quick hands and knowledge of vision is all I needed, I'd put it where they weren't looking, then shift it away, and I averaged 3 out of 4 wins, which was enough to build a kit for the stage. We then started our careers of which there is much press, but I still wanted to fess up just in case some of their kids had heard of their parents getting ripped off by Harry Houdini. Sometimes Beth would play and then I'd hide the pea, but that didn't matter cuz all the money would come from me. She'd always ask 'how come you always win' and I'd say 'cuz I always give the money back' and she'd say, 'but I could win double' my response 'but I gave you the whole stack'. Then she'd think for a minute, and finally once she dipped the pea in ink black, and said, 'Try it now, you cheater!' and I said 'only if you give me the money back.' She kissed me hard and I said 'What was that for?' and her response 'Cuz yer gunna give me that money to go to the store.'

350.
SORROW STRIKES
I knew I was dying, I was one hundred and five. Sometimes I had to go to the hospital, just to stay alive, it was stroke, some emphysema and a lot of little things. It had been 9 years since Cassie and I had exchanged diamond rings, she knew it'd come before too long, but was surprised, it took so long. We went to her favorite castle, that one in Transylvania, and I finally told her HE was a remote ancestor. Her eyes brightened up, she knew I wasn't fibbing. Then she asked me if I would do a Bela Lugosi impersonation. I told her, I taught Debra, as my father taught me, and then she smiled, “Then turn into a vampire bat!” and all the locals laughed at me. I said “OK!” and she blinked and that was worth it all, ‘cuz I had a cheesy rubber bat and a regulation baseball. I threw the baseball, and ducked under the table, leaving the bat flapping there on the table. She’d kept her eye on the ball, just like her ‘Dad’ had taught her, and the laughter we made was not very proper.

351.
THE FLIGHT
We flew to Australia, for in the outback time seemed so fleeting. The nights faded fast, a return to 'go camping' the way I used to and my babe with a six-gun, just in case she had to. 2 weeks in the outback, we knew it would do me in, but for those last moments of her we knew it was no sin. We would dance round the campfire, just like Beth and I used to, and when my breath finally faded, we were both kinda ‘camped out’. So finally, I told her "Better drive for that plateau" and the rest, gentle reader, you already know.

352.
When I first got married, it was the 1900s. Women wore hoop skirts and men wore waistcoats. Clip-clopping horses, ice blocks in our icebox, no centrifuges so serums rather than pills. Legal cocaine, legal heroin, legal cannabis but few takers. The patent medicine industry was overrun by fakers. Most were drunkards, everyone went to church and we danced the night long. The world set a gentler pace and many of us had a ball. Work was more heavy, children had to labor, but few ever went hungry and we all knew our neighbors. In the Twentieth Century society got broken by some horrible empires of which Hitler’s was just a token. When I left, the world seemed smaller, gentler and even better. All we needed was the television to show us when lives were better, the things we expect are usually all we see, that's one of the first things I learned as "The Great Houdini".

353.
HARROWING
The windows shattered, the walls crumbled, her body lying covered by the bedside. CYD CHARISSE had met a gruesome end, the bookcase had fallen upon her head. I was angry at Steve, but sadder for Cyd, she was a killer, but that didn't justify what Steve did, It’s sad to see the spattered blood of one who your wife loved dearly. She'd met all of Judy's goons while making the rounds, but Cyd was the one who usta show her around. They both are fine dancers and Cassie’d go drag dancing old movie routines without a single snag. Near Graumann’s, Near Tussaud’s, near the observatory, all over. In nightclubs, In gay bars, wherever Cyd showed her. She was 16 at the time, before I really knew her, she was my wicked friend’s daughter and occasional chauffeur. But now she was a body, her spirit all gone, and I KNEW Cassie was going to carry on her song.

354.
THE WIND
Mr. Fart Joke. Jackie Gleason. He was such a perfectionist. Only Jerry Lewis could please him. He smoked French cigarettes, all the day long and I guarantee you he was a central part of Lucy and Curly’s song. He made the marriage with all of his might by proposing to Lucy one hot August night.

355.
Curly was such a loner, I knew he'd not put a ring on her, so Jackie and I invented a character named Slick Willie. A fast talkin', tie-wearin', slick-hairin' tub of a guy. He took her out twice and got down on his knees. She said, "I'll think about it." and told Curly about it. He got the willies to think he'd lose his girl, so he flew her to Cuba and asked her for real. I knew the man, after that everything was ideal.

356.
THE SOURPUSS
Lucille was a sourpuss, she had bad days but most of the time she was ready to play. She stayed outta the gang war, made money for the studios, made millions laugh but still kinda felt hollow, Curly was a good provider and fun most of the time, but when the chips were down, he sure was a whiner. Sometimes she couldn't help herself and gave false budget reports. He'd start with the kvetching and she'd give him more cash, then he'd go 'Wait a minute,' and she'd flick her ash. ‘Whatta yah want now?’ she'd tease with delight. I thought we pulled in $500 bucks last night. She'd say ‘we did’ and he'd go ‘how come we're broke' 'I just want you to spend less than you smoke!' So he'd light a dollar bill. Look at Washington and say "I never liked that bloke!" That was enough for her. She'd hand him a fiver. Then she'd say "Go buy yourself a good five-dollar cigar. He would, a Havana Torpedo.

357.
THE WINNER
Desi was a winner, he'd fight tooth and nail. But some of his fights nearly landed him in jail. Once he broke a board over somebody's back. George Burns walked stiffly the rest of his life after that. It was basically deserved, he'd stolen Curly's car, thought he could make Mexico without any cop cars. But Curly on a motorcycle with a pistol pulled him over, they scuffled for a bit, then Curly hit him with a 1x2. George had to walk back most of the way from Azusa, ‘cuz Curly tore up his suitcoat so George would look like a loser. The moral of the story is easily understood. Don't mess with a Cadillac, or you'll get it in the back.

358.
IDIOT'S DREAM
I Love Lucy was the story of post-war America. Veteran with an apartment, a darling wife and owning your own business. The capers and hijinks of Lucy and Ethel won over the radio darlings from Fibber McGee and Molly, lines of fudge, vitameatavegamin, getting’ in the show, guest stars like Claude Akins and even Harpo. For 10 years they both entertained and delighted but Lucy wanted to take some time off so her kids wouldn't be delinquents. Desi agreed so they split the program, and brought up a gentle beloved replacement, Andy Griffith.

359.
WINTER IN NEW YORK
The fresh air and clean water of the West Coast thrilled all the veterans. Many headed west to the low overhead Southwest. New York suffered badly, its pre-war boom was gone. As far as old Broadway, the television always had something on. Like Life of Riley, Ozzie and Harriet, The Mickey Mouse Club, Texaco Playhouse starring Milton Berle and also (dramatic pause) The Twilight Zone.

360.
Nobody knows how gentle my brother was. I brought him along on many tours. He took care of the animals, the doves and the snake. Wait! A snake! When did you ever use a snake? A cobra it was, I milked its venom sacs, but it sure scared the heck outta those who messed with my trick stash. On the whole though, my brother smoked too much. So we got him into the hospital in the guise of Rod Serling, a gentle retiring sort who wrote like a demon, but he had stage fright so onscreen, my brother filled in.

[Doc Martian]

361.
There are dreams within dreams and minds within minds. Sometimes people forget about time. Their safety, their soul, their money, their love, they always go through life rushing and shoving. Nobody knows why some folks rush hard but all of us know when we've been pushed too hard. We always try to keep our souls all pinned tight, but few of us complete our laundry on Saturday Nights. There's always something to do, there's always something to see. But to get it right-right it takes more than 1-2-3.

362.
The severity of Jim's crimes led to many new laws. Those of integrity took a backseat to those that were punitive, this mean corruption spread in the seventies until good ole' Jimmy Stewart aka Ronald Reagan came along. His heroism is not unknown, but his integrity through heroism is not unknown. But his integrity through him just shown, not only could I count on him, he was always there to lend a hand. From shoveling sandbags, to feeding the hungry.

363.
ARISE!
The first song I remember is 'The Star Spangled Banner' played at baseball games. My dad was a Dodgers fan. Brooklyn was his home, so every couple-three weeks we'd go catch a game. We didn't have the power of the Yankees, but we sure had the heart of the whole Big Apple. Everything seemed to revolve around baseball when I was a kid. The sandlots, the pick-up games, the players and their scorecards. Rooftops usta holler scores, they'd be echoed like a bucket brigade throughout Brooklyn. I never was very good at it. I could run, I could hit, but there was always someone with more pluck in the outfield. Soon I graduated to bookworm, my nose buried in Tom Sawyer, books about Lincoln, books about pirate treasure, and books about magic tricks. I'd long loved the play I'd had with the toys my father had bought me as a young child. A miniature finger guillotine, a marionette, a small stage for the marionette, aluminum rings, cups and balls, and a deck of tarot cards. I'd seen fire magic toys, but I decided to stay away from them.

364.
PSYCHIC
9 years old. A tarot reader. Not me mind you, but a woman who lived down the street, my mom loved her, friendly expansive, charitable, warm and funny. But some of the more pious among the neighborhood were trying to run her out of town, not for her card reading, but because she was a Jew without a husband. Hers had died in the Civil War and she didn't want to be married. At the time, I kind of felt like ALL adults were married, ‘cuz around me they seemed to be. I liked the lady, went to talk to her about an interesting reading I'd had. It involved an element of life that I didn't understand at the time. The Lover's Card, it was central in it, not the card but the reading, there were two strong females, the Empress and the High Priestess, both pulled at the same time. She said those are diametric opposites, they can't be the same card, or maybe, you'll have two wives. The other cards were complex, there was a transition of the central figure from magician to fool and I knew that represented me but she explained 'That interestingly enough magician is a swell compliment to empress, and fool is auspicious with High Priestess' the other cards were three. I only used the Major Arcana but they read Wheel of Fortune, The Sun, and The Tower struck by lightning. She said you're too young to tell what to make of these three, but remember them, and I did.

365
THE YEARS WERE KIND
Between 1975 and 1979, we gallivanted about the world. Money was no object, but I always worried that one of the powers that had arrayed themselves in opposition to me might find Cassie. So together we built a character that no man in his right mind would mess with. For every man knew here, wanted her and would face nearly all other men's hatred
if they harmed her. That character was charming, sly and fond of what most boys love growing up. Monster movies.

366
We then got most fathers in the L.A. Area watching the channel she would begin on an affordable Los Angeles station named KHJ. Bowling for Dollars and L.A. Lakers games. This one-two cultural punch was hosted by Cassie, in a role I originated and Paul Reubens continued, Chick Hearn. The plan is to unveil Elvira shortly after my death. In the meantime she acquired the catalog of cheesy horror movies she loved as a kid, so she could show some of them to our hyper-intelligent kid that we'd kept an eye on. I kept an eye on all of our kids. but this one being Cassie's I knew he'd be a lulu. You
have no idea whatta goofball is transcribing my relatively sedate psychic biography to keep him out of trouble. He's so funny Cassie is scared, And THAT'S FUNNY!

367
Dad, shut up! I'm writing your boring book so just keep tawkin’ so I can get my money.

368
Boring? You read Grampa Proust and you call ME boring?!?

369
I can't believe it, I write 368 chapters on crap nobody will read that I'm spost to make a movie of with the freaking ghost of Bill Bixby when all I wanna do is blow up the Magic Castle so that doofy old illusionist Randi will finally cede ownership of it to me and I can do magic that isn't just boring old Houdini tricks. I mean what.... you can look those up in any public library. But really, I just wanna blow up The Magic Castle so I can put a vacuum tube under it to zoop myself to Indio, rather than drive your boring old freeways.

370
What kind of magic would you do?

371
Stupid magic. Stupid, Stupid Magic. Better than boring magic.

372
That's what Cassie usta say. Then.... I put her in a Chinese fingertrap and she chipped her tooth trying to get it off!

373
Mommmmm, Dad's bein’ mean to you.

374
Am not

375
Are too

376
Am not

377
Are too

378
I'm not tawkin’ to you.

379
Sheesh. Just cuz I wanna bwoah up your stupid castle. EXEUNT!

380
DAT'S MY BOY!!!!

381
DREAMWALK
Saturday afternoons usta be long and boring, but then Cassie came along and we slept. That way Saturday Night Live was fun and exciting instead of something to drag myself to in the middle of the night. Late night jazz shows usta be like that for me. Especially once 'cool jazz' started. Hot jazz usta jazz me up, but 'cool jazz' laid me out flat snappin' my fingers, cool in my mind. But comedy needs concentration, they gotta be on, you gotta be listenin'. The naps helped. I'm an old man, whatta you want?

382
STRANGE DAYS
There's no way to describe the horror of knowing that the handcrafted work of Georges Melies will be blown up by my idiot son. I only pray that his plan proceeds as designed. For he has proposed a method to preserve the things worth preserving and getting rid of the dusty old walls, booze and cocaine soaked furniture, roach droppings, periodontal stews, rat corpses, and all the other yukky stuff that old buildings accumulate. This pleases my heart. I'm gunna let him blow it up. But i'm not gunna let him put a vacuum tube that goes all the way to Indio. We're putting in a rocket train.

383
But wotta 'bout dah Curly dah Curly? George, tell me about the wabbit!

384.
CURLY JOE
Signs of the times, the gangs owned the streets and with television the stooges were barely making enough to eat. So they hired a guy from Judy's Salon, a true gentleman, though no scholar named Curly Joe DeRita. Movies was their game and not just clip ones. Snow White and the Three Stooges, and the Stooges meet Hercules. Couple of others, not quite as good. ‘Have Wocket Will Twavel’, was the best of that brood. They were moderately successful, but not enough to make it. So they started writing for the Rat Pack to bring home the bacon. Robin and the Seven Hoods and Ocean's Eleven. Both of these movies had an object lesson. Don't mess with the top cats or you'll end up destitute. It was a tongue-in-cheek in-joke, aimed right at Judy, for they had once made her homebrew go kablooie, they filled her garage with carbon monoxide to reduce the pressure and when the bottles started popping they ran for cover. She'd paid them back fully by buying Columbia, ending their short films and confiscatin' their magic boxes. They split for the sticks, Florida mainly which is where Jerome Howard learned to play the conga.

385.
THE MARRIAGE
Often in Hollywood, marriages are repeated, the sweet one in Cuba I will be describing. It was a swank hotel party, a gala affair, people pouring champagne and swingin' from chandeliers. The worst stunts were from Larry, like the mud pie fight, the rootbeer toss, and most of all the ice cream fight, a gallon for everybody, us slingin' it round. But when I hit Lucy in the moosh, she really went to town. She grabbed two gallons, rolled them on the hot ground, then shouted cannonball, and threw them at my crown. One nearly hit me. The other rolled by, but the funniest part, it hit Curly in the eyes, most of a gallon of sloppy ice cream, sploosh in the face, best wedding ever said the whole place.

386.
DREAMERS A DREAM
I never believed I could have so much fun, waterskiing rollerskating, like swimming in a pool. Later it would become a decaying fish cesspool, but for awhile, the Salton Sea was like Heaven to me. It took a few years, after the flood and deaths of the miners, before it became the California Riviera, then for 20-odd years before prevalation of nitrate fertilizers. Everyone and their brother went fishing in the desert. John Wayne, The Marx Brothers, The Beach Boys too. For fun in the summer, they'd do anything. A favorite moment was chilling with their girls, watching ‘The Romance and Sex Life of the Date’ at Shield's Date Garden. It's still there too. Drop in sometime and have a date shake too.

387.
SANITY DODGES
Sometimes we'd have someone hanging out in an institution. During warm loving visits with their 'families', we'd make a substitution. Joey Bishop would go in, Sammy Davis would come out, 3 weeks of bedrest is basically what it was about.

388.
THERE IS A GIANT!
Andre his name. Put Lou Ferrigno AND Schwarzzenegger to shame. At a bar one time they learned his real name. Jerry Garcia Jr., before he put them to shame. A giant of a man, a leader wry solid, he grabbed those two cupcakes and threw them over the bar. He then tossed back a pitcher, and squat-lifted a car. Vince McMahon saw him, do the math for the rest.

389.
THE DIAMOND LANE
Jim would stock bars with flavored Everclear, right near the freeways headin' in and out of here. The drivers would swerve, crash and cause traffic jams, and the road home would be jammed for many an hour. I figured out a method to ease that grief up. With an extra lane people could use it to dodge or escape a traffic jam, so we wouldn't have to dislodge them from their cars. I called it The Diamond Lane and sold it as an environmental dodge to reduce traffic with carpooling and provide a more stylin' trip home. It worked pretty well, sometimes served as a firelane. It cut down the logjams by about 30%.

390.
SILENCE
There's a wind. The El Niño. Southern California's version of a hurricane. It's a gulfstream shift, mainly caused by crop rotation, 2 acre shifts in high moisture areas across the whole nation, cause the breeze to shift and bring in wet tropical weather that coming across land works as an evaporative cooler.

391.
WHY THE WEATHER?
Easy, hard whatever the weather brings, I was getting outside more with Cassie as sure as could be. A flower child, a hippie wearin' her Jesus walkers, not drivin' around and listenin' to the radio. But sometimes a downpour would spoil our picnic or once, In Palm Desert, a giant mudslide.

392.
WILD TIMES
OK, I've got a few things to tell yah. We're getting near the end. But this is just the beginning, the next book involves a society of people who have either influenced me, or been influenced by me. It's called 'Sons of Houdini' and tells the story of a ragtag bunch of misfits who do silly or amazing things. Then a dream. It's about a native American tribe who are deluged by a ragtag band of idiot misfits who are immortal and really stupid. But for now back to Hollywood.

393.
SWORD AND SANDALS
OK, so besides Monster Movies, there was Sword and Sandals, films about Romans and boring people and Romans killing boring people and boring people killing Romans. Sometimes there'd be skeletons or Sinbad but they were Sword and Sandal movies. These movies replaced low-budget westerns as places to train new directors, most of the directors of the Sixties and Seventies were either influenced by Sword and Sandal movies of the Fifties. Not all were schlock. Kirk Douglas' Ulysses was a soon to be classic work of movie making. When he, getting splashed with rain, hollered 'lash me to the mast' audiences applauded. He'd long been second banana in gangster movies, but as Odysseus he won hearts and minds. The first of his great historical roles.

394.
THE WIND BLEW
Jim had chased me nearly to Coachella, he'd picked up my scent at Avenue 42. I'd come in at the airport, piloting Elvis, while he was a-snackin' I drove to Country Club Liquors to see if Fedora was around, I knew Jim was visiting and Frank OWNED this town. A highspeed chase followed past the Montecito and FedMart then I cut down Monroe, smelled Lake Cahuilla and knew his gang was around, flipped around, stopped at Sherman's and DIDN'T use the phone, then hauled tail down 111 to Van Buren and got out of the car, smoked a cigar and left it burning. Then I ducked into the Desert and laid low. I could smell Patton's old hospital where some soldiers had died. Jim pulled up, and started scanning his CB for Yellow Cab rides. My ruse was successful. He thought I called from Sherman's half-an-hour later I cruised down to Mexicali.

395.
NEVER SAY NEVER
So there I am. 3 years later laying 'flowers' on Jim's grave. I'd grafted creosote on to hop root stock. My name for it? Instant Sativa. This grafted product came fine through customs, but when it grew 'Flowers' I had marijuana. Dogs could smell it a mile away, but it wasn't stinky. Made it easy though to track him through Paris. All you home botanists, don't even try this. I made commercial seeds called 'Northern Lights'.

396.
Now imagine that concoction grafted with verbena, and just call it Christmas or Mendocino Purps. And you'll know what Louis Armstrong grew for himself.

397.
NEVER SHALL I EVER
Dream about No one, my heart is in dialogue for a mighty long time. I believe in The Beatles and love The Rolling Stones. Their hours of wiles are notable causes. Helping the Irish build up their lobbyists, they stayed away from the militants and gently subverted the money from The Clash.

398.
That's in the next book so your teeth do not gnash.

399.
FEELS LIKE THE FIRST TIME
Early in time man used his fingers, back in the days before numbers. The 40s brought Grace Admiral a whole new deal, her super-calculator had mad appeal, in offices worldwide computers did spread, but to have fun with them you had to be an egghead. Then Steve Jobs built a cool machine, upper middle-class families could afford them for their kids, the world also got smaller, because of what CompuServe did, picking up the newsgroups that were formerly just college kids. The world changes often, but was enough for me, but in my last years I'm leaving a little network called MTV. The world of the future in only a minute. I was inspired by a video with The Police in it.

400.
Few made as many changes in the world as I did. I was inspired by Jesus, Plato and Leonardo da Vinci. If you solve the world's problems, what's next may not be good but make it public and you'll inspire the people as you should.

401.
DREAMS OF PEACE
I look back at a long life and I believe I've helped minimize strife, I recognized Israel and while that minimized strife it brought up new problems ‘cuz not all Jews were as peaceful as my wife. What could have been a trade-world coup, became a world class squabble with superpower backing. China wasn't worried, their trade routes were strong, but Russia and the U.S. helped their respective partisans along. A muddle, trade tied up inflationary tactics, long-term dissatisfaction with Soviet practices. These obstacles to peace were often funded by Hollywood movies. Yet both sides were working to make everyone feel groovy. Movies like Grease, Corvette Summer and Jaws were funded by me to help move peace along. A nuclear treaty called SALT II brought down most arsenals so the world wouldn't go kaboom. As we're leaving the seventies, things look brighter and I trust Jimmy Stewart to make the world better.

402.
SLEEPY EYES
When we found 'The Bird' he'd caught a shortwave call from Jim. We knew his coordinates but had to prove it's him. So we found his likely target, a powerline near a pool, and we reinforced it so that it'd be OK. Then when he shot, we snagged up the sandy-haired booger, took him to Utah and sent in a new player. Cassie had to play him, and drop Alex Twabek, who was picked up by Paul Reubens, but he liked to play drunk so he lost his game show.

403.
GIANT WIND
We were waiting for old days to maybe return. Vaudeville was missed by those who lived throughout. The plays, the gags, the outstanding physical feats. Slowly I turned and other ancient treats. The stooges, Red Skelton, Miltie and the boys, Bob Hope, Bing Crosby and many other faves. These goofballs would run like idiot geniuses, right across the streets to score cigarettes and liquor.

404.
THE MUPPET SHOW
Finally, Vaudeville to watch with our grand-kids all of the comedy, none of the foible. Sam The Eagle was my favorite, that pious-hearted soul, saluting America by making it dull, Gonzo was funny but his chickens just killed. Ole Fozzie Bear, his weak jokes totally killed, Statler and Waldorf, shouting at him, my favorite hecklers, from over 100 years of loving them. Guest stars from the old days, every one a star, more funnies than ever happened in any clown car.

405.
Wonder Green. It's not easy bein' green, livin' your life, the same color as the leaves. That song filled me so full of joy. I'd felt the outsider since I was a boy like that.... Liiike that. But Green's the color of spring.... and green can be cool and friendly-like... not standin' out like sparkles in the water or stars in the sky. I am green.

406.
It's beautiful, and it's what I wanna be.

407.
DREAM A LITTLE DREAM
A long time ago. Over 30 years. That whole mess in Hollywood between Cohen and Garland. One night in the evening, before a gunfight. I hogtied Judy Garland before I gave her back to her starlets. She'd planned on shooting up the Brown Derby. Where tourists play and their mainly innocence. I'd heard her talking to Mary Pickford about all the headaches Mickey's men had caused her and that she'd gun them down at one's bachelor party, held at The Brown Derby one Saturday night. So I went horsin' around, on a young horse named Trigger, and when I saw her I roped her and dragged her up in the saddle, hog-tied her one-handed, she was too stupefied to struggle. Then I dropped her at Pink's hot dogs and I called Betty Grable, it took her an hour, she didn't roll armed. I then untied Judy and listened to her cuss. She knew the party had ended, so she didn't put up much of a fuss. Her first 'date' with Roy Rogers had saved plenty of trouble. Now you know who I was driving as when I went to Texas, the original was a young movie star who was killed by the Axis. They didn't want a straight-shooter, they wanted more Bogie, cuz his lackadaisical morals seemed safer to those boogers.

408.
P.S. Yes, I tied her mouth shut.

409.
No way. You can't do that one-handed! WRONG! Roy Rogers can do anything.

410.
When I woke up the next morning, I felt bad about it. No woman deserves to be hogtied and hauled to a hot dog stand. I vowed then and there that next time I'd take her to a diner, or perhaps a steakhouse, or I got it! And I invented Bob's Big Boy midway between a steakhouse and a diner. For the middle class, I was always one to vote with the crowd.

411.
Vietnam was a mistake. We had trade superiority, but for a relatively small amount of petroleum off the Asian coast, we embarked in a war that cost us several billion dollars, the freedom of our military and set back our police forces at least 20 years. We lost our educated administrative force, as many of them found their new recruits to be so unruly and bent on using force that they found themselves in the political jungle as wobbyists, polwoticians and in Jimmy Carter's case, Pwesident.

412.
PINK FWOYD
These boys were the Cat's Meow, the constant hypnotic beats, made the queen have a cow. She even funded disco to keep them down. But when they finally attacked the British educational system boy was she down. Their leader, Syd Barrett they dismissed as a clown, and he was, but the Russian Circus wasn't down. So they twaveled and toured, and brought their stage show around, and in honor of lawyers they had pigs fwyin' around. A cop booked them for littering and they had to go underground. Roger Waters Fwed to America and the rest pwedged aweegence to the cwown.

413.
There was a hitch. Once a long time ago a giant star fell. Fatty Arbuckle and his coke bottle. Her death sent him to hell. So he pined away lonely for a couple of years, then started showing his scalp before he moved to Tangiers. A director he became, one of much fame. You'd go out of your mind if I told you his name, but I'll give you a clue. He shows up in all his pics. A two-second cameo is one of his licks. His movies all thrillers are super-duper slick but what do you expect of a director named Hitch.

414.
SHOW TIME!
I found the spear in a film named 'The Robe'. I reverse-engineered it until it was rocks of ore. In the Three Stooges foundry, it smells of USO. Now it's just rocks in a place you all know. Where I dodged Jim, within a hundred yards, and if you walk through the gates the blood of Jesus MAY hold open the door. This is why I reverse-engineered, so that instead of fussing and fighting over something that killed our Lord. We respect his wishes that he be the way through the door. Iron and copper, wood which was burned and aluminum left as bauxite with his blood. I found it in Scotland where the masons hid it, on Paul McCartney's spread out in the far corner. I asked his permission. He said 'that there is yours' and double checked with the Vatican who said, 'We think Finder's Keepers!' Thus the Spear of Longnius now is just rocks, but we checked with the DNA to see if the search was over. With 80% we had enough to prove, that the children of the Hapsburgs indeed had the Divine Right to be kings. So O' HAPPY DAY, you royal frabjous things, you indeed are descendants of the King of Kings.

415.
THE REALM
Our senses are muddled, inside of the cities, we don't smell or hear right amid the odor and rumble. But sometimes when tired our senses go 'haywire' and we get an inkling of why we're home on the range.

416.
Home, home on the range.
Where the deer and the antelope play,
where seldom is heard,
a discouraging word,
and the skies are not cloudy all day.
O' give me a home, where the buffalo roam,
and the skies are not cloudy all day,
where we can drive 55 just to stay alive,
and our smiles are indicative of our pay.

417.
THE FUDGE POT
Latrines worked well once we had chemical disinfectant, so I extended the idea to a latrine made of fiberglass. The porta-pot I thought, but Bess said 'pottie' that way nobody would make up rhymes that were naughty. Rhymes? With pot? Rhymes like 'crotch'. Simple enough, so I changed it to 'pottie'.

418.
DREAM CYCLES
I dreampt of two bicycles, cruising cool, one belonged to a wise man, one belonged to a fool. In their hours of playing, they drank til' they drooled, then you couldn't tell the wise man from his cousin the fool. When they grew older, one rode up the hill and the other did wheelies while smoking cigarettes. Then I woke up and remembered them fondly. Old FDR and his cousin Teddy.

419.
Never tell what someone is thinking, unless of course, you want them to stop drinking, cuz then without a doubt their mind will be blown and the next time they're drinking they'll wonder if pink elephants are next.

420.
With ease and delight; I write. Sometimes I have to chill for the night. With a wind and a sail, I'm Cassie's delight, but Bess liked to go camping. She'd climb up the rocks and at the top she'd always call out, 'I'm Queen of the Rocks' ever since she saw John Ford's movie, 'Mary, Queen of Scots.'

421.
That ain't the way to have funnn, Sonnnn. That was my favorite song. 'Mama told me not to come'. Before that, it was 'Over the Waves' with the lyrics I improvised, Man on the Flying Trapeze, with a collective songwriter identity with other owners of United Artists.

422.
AN OLDER DREAM
Early I found a scam where PGT Beauregard went on the lam, most of a railroad done disappeared. Some over there, some over here, he covered it up, with a new railgauge, Which I thought too soon. It truly was we'd have better luck to wait until WWII. A fresh rail system then would have been a good training ground, for barracks, forming platoons, pounding ground, maintaining camps and utilizing materials. Instead, the Hobo Nation and the unions formed that same experience of building armies for our nation. The Hoboes were the officers, they learned 10 years before, the unions were the squads, pitching grenades through bunker doors. Both formed our armies like baseball in World War I, it took teamwork and dugouts to defeat The Hun.

423.
In the morning my routine was sedate, a cigarette, a cup of coffee, a continental breakfast, sometimes a plate of eggs. At lunch something greasy and fun, tacos, chili dogs that overflow the bun, a chili burger or something you can eat on the run. Dinner I go as long as I can then have a plate like a blue plate special with meat, veggies, potatoes or bread. Fast food changed the American diet and made for a fatter nation. Three meals a day of fat-loaded snacks, led to an upsurge of heart attacks. I countered with the health food even though I couldn't stand the stuff and called it 'Wabbit Food'. It raised consciousnesses though, and brought Asian food into a dominant position. The natural progression of that was exploited by the Republicans and they called it Veganism. My CIA liason was named George Herbert Walker, they hooked me up with him when Jimmy turned out to be a stalker.

424.
EARLY DAYS
In early times, sociology was non-existent then after a strong start it became a statistical thing which lost the thread of its imitators. Like when booze in the twenties became about high-proof rather than delicate or interesting flavor.

425.
EASE OF MIND
Wily times, build wily people, gentle times build gentle people, a mixture of the two is always necessary, or the gentle people are overwhelmed by incipient evil. Like the cabaret culture that the boogers wiped out. Or the abstract artists that got stomped by The Hun. Cain defeats Abel. Nay his blood cries out like the telltale heart, to those of us who believe we were made heart and spark in the image of God.

426.
THE DEATHBED PLEDGE
Bess was at her end. The end of her days she could not forfend. She asked but one thing of me ' That I marry the next gal that danced a schottzie with me.' I accepted this pledge. I knew she did not want me to end my days alone. we'd had that conversation several times in between her moans. 'I figgered she'd talked to some old friend of hers on the phone, and expected a Barrymore or a daughter of Grant to come along some night and we'd dance to an oom-pah band. That night never came til' I was out at Big Sur, and this twinkie of a girl danced me out of this world. It started our courtship, she stalked me all over, and when I saw her, singin' on the corner dressed as Joan Baez, with a flower in her hair. It was all over, right then and there. Her eyes they twinkled, her face was so fair. I asked her to marry me right then and there. The rest of the story you know very well, except that Cassie told me, 'Your wife told me you'd be swell.'

427.
Here's what she was singin'.
“If you were a carpenter, and I was your lady,
I'd marry you anyway, and have your baby.
If you were a manatee, and I was a sailor,
I'd jump overboard, and you'd do me a favor,
If I was Joan Baez, and you weren't Houdini,
you'd give me a dollar, and I'd call you a weenie.”

So I dug in my pocket and I pulled out a dollar and I folded it into a ring with a tab on the corner, and I got down on my knees, and I sang out quite clearly. “I'm The Great Houdini, will you be my baby.” She threw guitar over her shoulder, it broke into pieces. She leapt in my arms and said “Oh yes, Jesus!”

428.
Thus life sometimes changes when you're walking down the street. You gotta fall to your knees when you're standin' on your feet. But God always makes sure that it's so darn sweet. That you're gunna be hummin' Jackie Wilson's ‘Reet Petite’ then you live a little better, once you're back on your feet, and all you can say is ‘So where do we eat?’

429.
You never can believe, just where I'VE been but ask yourself that in your life when did you ever find yourself bereft of your kin. Just know that I'd trade all the wonders through which I've been for that 20 years back with my family and friends.

430.
CHAPLIN AGAIN
When he first came to town he sometimes rode the rails. The one thing is certain, he never did fail, he had the King's blessing, for clearing the jails, by reminding the British populace, that even a little tramp is a man without fail.

431.
WITH NO TIME
Time out of mind, wind in the sails, me and Cassie sailin’ in the coast on her afternoon off, delighted in mind and watchin' the swells. Nothing like the wind as we're sailin’ along. Only the evening, ending the song, we've got to Ventura in a slip with our boat and have us some tacos, before we ride home for the night. In the morning, I'll take another ride, while she's playin' Chick Hearn. Then tomorrow night another windsong we will learn. Sometimes to the USO, sometimes to Venice, once as far as Santa Barbara, before returning by cab to San Clemente.

432.
Once I was wondering how far I could yell, so I put a parabolic reflector on the Magic Castle. I aimed my holler, and they heard me in Alameda, but with my boosted microphone I could hear it in San Pedro. 108 dB (decibels) is what my local meter read. And that was yelling so loud that it hurt my head. I figured at 120 dB the dolphins could hear me. So I invented the airhorn. So I could signal them. When I started doin' it, they followed along on our nighttime cruise. Hoppin' and jumpin' once even over our prow. I'd toss them little mackeral and sometimes salmon too; but that isn't why they would do that do. It was for love of the chase, and in play we were the 'game'. Some of them I even learned their names. There was cheater, meanie, dancer and Dave, each one would answer with a chitter or a splash. Their simple joys are such I could not dissuade, splashing me and Cassie with well-directed waves. Cassie teased me, you're one hundred and five, they're sayin' goodbye. And I said 'Put your top on, they just think you have mutated eyes.' She splashed me then and so did the 'fish'. They chittered, she laughed and I got my wish. They were laughing so hard they all stopped splashing me. And I opened a Dr. Pepper bottle and sprayed them all back. The moral of this story, for you know there is one... is don't run with the dolphins when your wife is sunning her jugs.

433.
NOBODY KNOWS
Where the morning comes from. But that cool drink-a water after the sun comes up is Ease.

434.
I've never seen a day without wonder, to delight from the masses that saw my escape artist thunder. Like rain from the skies that are expected to be dry, I smile and smile, wait for awhile and expect that something new will penetrate my little isle. This isle called man, a thinking reed that smiles.

435.
EARLY IN THE DAY...
I dream of a way to send love via the airwaves but I want no monopoly or power plays, so I invent it twice, once as Philo Farnsworth, and once as Thomas Edison in disguise. The television, my gift to humaity or as my wife called it once Uncle Miltie came on. 'The Idiot Box'. I said 'but that idiot's my son!' and she said 'please don't remind me. I was in labor for 15 hours with him, most painful delivery ever.' I saith, 'Well now he's entertaining you on TV.' She said, 'Turn the stupid thing off!' and I said 'Miltie or the TV?' She smiled, 'Turn the TV off, but leave Miltie on.' I goggled, 'How do I do that?' She said 'Unplug it!' I said 'Miltie or the TV?' She stared at me and said 'Shut up!' I responded 'OK, as long as I can watch Miltie on TV.' and she threw the newspaper at me. I get that a lot.

436.
I dream of a world free of suffering, free of quick solutions that make dirty business, free of tired eyes, free of sad souls, free of lonely people, free of solvents that hurt people, free of old ways that should be no more, free of those who are always driven to succeed, these days (The Seventies) we're getting there, but there's always a backslide to where people do the wrong things of the old days.

437.
TOO DEEP FOR THE WATER
It's like a wind in your sails, everyday where everything's perfect for the third day. Where you feel like Paul McCartney every single day, then it's time to give it all back. Cuz otherwise, you'll be bored, and want to get out of town.

438.
WONDER TIME
With all of the wonders that have come into this world. The one I love most is you, my readers for without you, I would be alone with my mind and as I'm an idiot I wouldn't be having a very good time. So here's to the reader, thank you folks, please hoist a flask or a glass and cheer 'To Elvis' cuz he invented the paperback, which brought literacy to the masses, for about half the price. Elvis we hardly knew ye. Cuz you spent most of your time as Judy.

439.
This is one-line. 'Come up an' read me some time.'

440.
WITH A WONDER
In the wind, I wave at a song and spin around and rollerskate down the hill. It's not a steep one but I'm going at a breakneck pace, and I stop and start applauding myself as if I'd just won a race. These antics are especially great when the Secret Service is chasing me on rollerskates. You know I hired no clowns that are second-rate so they catch me, snag my wallet and make me chase them instead.

441.
ALWAYS WALKIN', ALWAYS RUNNING
I take time wandering around, when I usta go drivin' this is because of the adage, No Man is an Island. I believe that by not using gas, or running my engine. I'll help make 'This Island Earth' a better place to live. So instead of a runabout, I have some people-powered gadabout.

442.
OWLS
They fly, they flap, they hunt at night. Like Diana, when she found me in Germany on tour. It was the middle of the night. I was so wiped out I couldn't even walk. So was she, she was so tired she just sat there dozing into space. And then I smelled my wife, her violet sachet. I was so delighted that we fell asleep in each other's arms, and I woke knowing (if you know what I mean) that she was doing no harm. It proceeded the way it usually did, I was delighted, disarmed, the morning we made Steve McQueen, I was with Diana Barrymore.

443.
EARLY DAYS
Ours and hours, they both passed so easily, days and ways with John Wayne on his flying launch. Just after Stagecoach, I was in town and we caught some sea bass when I was feeling down. The evening proceeded, we barbecued and chowed down. A hearty feast with tortillas and salsa from town. So if you're ever out fishing with John Wayne, be sure and be down, or you'll have to water-ski behind his boat all the way back to town. He was gunna do that to me, until I said 'those fish I caught set them free and I'll swim with them back to town.' He said 'Hold on there, pilgrim. I'll give you a ride in. Cuz I don't want to be BBQin' my boat trim.'

444.
Between 1926 and 1950, there were only four people besides my wife and I who knew I wasn't dead. 2 were Ethel and through her Diana Barrymore, one was John Wayne, and the other was Charles Chaplin. Charlie was my liason to the British Empire, and John was the USC student who'd socked me. I couldn't let him go through life thinking he'd killed me, so I rode by him the next day in a ten-gallon hat and tipped him a wink. No dummy he. His grin widened and that's all, so over the next thirty years the three of us had a ball.

445.
Ethel because my wife needed a confidant too.

446.
EARLY BECOMES LATE
In the sixties, I watched a lot of friends die, most knew I was still alive by then. Some wondered where I'd been, but they'd been through WWII so they knew better than to need to know. The hardest one to watch pass was 'The Duke' himself, a lung pulled out, general bad health and THEN I realized he was 'playin' cuz he faced death a few too many times to be 'really' dyin. Mo stayed married to him, and sometimes he'd make an appearance, but after he'd trained their son Ron Howard, he made his TRUE disappearance.

447.
DREAM ANGELS
Charlie's Angels. The idea was mine, I gave it to my wife as a Valentine, One of her favorite characters was a drinkin' gal named Jaclyn Smith. She'd 'wear' her at the five-and-dime, or at cowboy bars. For the other two roles, she brought in the now reformed Liz Taylor as Farrah, and Kate Jackson portrayed by her mom. Judy Garland. It gave Judy a female role so she could play house not dressed as a male. And with her pill habit she could be snapped up and sent to jail if she went back to her old ways.

448.
A WHOLE LOTTA LOVE
Hours and hours listenin' to Led Zeppelin's roar I gave Cassie plenty of ideas what those records could be used for. But what amazed her the most was when one of my slogans went Hogwild. I made myself a t-shirt that said 'Disco Sucks' wore it to the CBGB and soon the phrase was in vogue. My favorite part? The bonfire of all of Cassie's favorite disco groups. When the stadium was filled by a Disco Sucks night. I didn't really mind disco but I sure loved teasin' Cassie but I sure do agree the slogan was déclassé, she usta wear an 'I'm with stupid' shirt to repartee with me.

449.
WAYS AND MEANIES
The final days of Liz Taylor's illegal collections ended in the mid-70s, but she still had to divest her holdings, so I suggested the SALT II talks and we bribed evenly both sides. Over 5 billion dollars to private citizens; it came in the form of land deals and inexpensive to obtain small businesses. She was emotionally invested, quite scared of nuclear war; but when I promised her, her violet diamonds back she was completely on-board. You see, I'd sunk a filter, they weren't really gone forever, now you know the only reason I'll admit to of why this book is fiction. Schrodinger's violet diamonds is what I call this literary dodge. Either I'm a reliable narrator or I'm not and if I'm unreliable, then Houdini died in 1926 and none of these stories or observations are true. And if I'm reliable, then my story of finding the hidden Nazi Gold should sure intrigue some of you.

Most will think me unreliable, and I might as well concur. Especially by saving til' the next book how I became Doug Henning's chauffeur.

450.
There are few loose ends left and only one big one, how the heck did Diana Barrymore convince Beth to give her that Violet sachet. If I told you about it, you wouldn't be 'No way!' But to hear it from her own pen, will probably be a delight.

451.
I was an idiot, I was an idiot, I was an idiot until I found God. I was an idiot, I was an idiot I was an idiot til' I found God.

452.
Reams of paper, used to accompany books. This one my green friends only filled 2 college notebooks. The digital form won't used much paper either. But with my apologies to the trees, later there will be some for the libraries.

453.
I don't believe that our paths will ever meet, after all, I died in 1980. However should in the future we run into each other just remember, remember, I saved more servicemen than any platoon of Marines.

454.
And Lo, in Riverside, by the river an idiot was born. His cries alerted a nurse because the infant beside him had SUDDENLY stopped crying. Thus did this child save his first life.

Please read 'The Sons of Houdini', available shortly.

Coda
The Loose End

Dear Miss Barrymore,

I agree with your legal analysis. Your ruse to open the way for ½ Jewish immigrants from the Nazi Government SHOULD successfully allow a couple hundred thousand pregnant women to emigrate. After our visit to Rabbi Jameson, you will be Harry's concubine and able to bear a non-bastard child. We will provide a mother-in-need to raise the child
as her own.

I will also provide a well-worn violet-scented sachet to indicate to Harry and his phenomenal nose that you are actually me.

While I hold the sacrament of marriage sacrosanct, the likely enslavement of the women you are freeing to emigrate is worth leaving the bounds of modern social mores, to acceptable elements of Mosaic Law.

Lovingly,
Bess