Hero Worship
Turnout sucked, which sucked for the touring bands, but Sid and his friends had the time of their lives. The next day, Julia asked Sid how it went, and he said, "It was the greatest night of my life." So yeah, it cost me, but it was still cheaper than if we'd driven somewhere to see the show. All in all, win/win.
Back in the early 90s when I first ventured into writing novels, I read a book called Sherwood by Parke Godwin. This book is an alternate spin on the Robin Hood story, and is probably my favorite version. What struck me most, and something I've held ever since, was the way the villain was portrayed. In Godwin's version of the story, Robin's nemesis is a Norman knight named Ralf FitzGerald in the role of the Sheriff of Nottingham. What Godwin captured so perfectly was in portraying FitzGerald not so much as a supremely evil opponent with no redeeming qualities, but as a culturally-different man whose ideas about how things are, and should be, were opposed to Robin's. The overriding story played as a clash between the culture and values of the conquering Normans with those of the resident Saxons. It was so much more compelling than the standard black hat vs. white hat that we so often see. Nothing is ever so simple, and I'd have to say that this book, more than anything else, ruined my willingness to accept poorly drawn villains in any medium of storytelling. As bad as he was, most of us were pulling for Darth Vader by the time Return of the Jedi rolled the credits, to say nothing of the irascible Al Swearengen in Deadwood. Al was an asshole and a killer, but we sure didn't want to see him come up short when Hearst rolled into town.
Tyson's side of the story is told in a fascinating new documentary called Tyson, from director James Toback. Julia and I ventured out to The Wilma the other night to see it, and we both enjoyed it. It was interesting to see other sides to the story; Tyson's candor in light of his behavior, the betrayals that led to horrible decisions on his part, the headbutts from Holyfield that caused Tyson to snap in the ring and retaliate in brutal fashion; just the whole, imperfect train wreck of his life. It was compelling filmmaking, and while Tyson certainly deserves much of the ire directed at him, we also see a side of him that the media certainly didn't show us when the events discussed originally occurred. For me, in my current mode of "seeing the world like I'd want to write it," his story was a perfect, real world example of how the most despicable villain will also have qualities that can touch your heart, and make one say, "If only he had just done this instead. . . . " A writer could do far worse that create a villain as multi-faceted and interesting as the real world Iron Mike Tyson.
For the first time in longer than I can remember I just finished a book that really did nothing for me. It is a series Western, a type of book I don't think I've ever read before, that I picked up on a whim. It's called Riders From Long Pines, by Ralph Cotton. Parts of it were fun enough -- I finished it, so it couldn't have been that bad -- but at times I was scratching my head in wonder that it was even published. I suspect it just fits a formula that gives a certain demographic exactly what they want. What surprised me most is that the book is actually the 22nd installment of a series by Cotton that focuses on Arizona Ranger Sam Burrack and his (hot) shotgun-toting partner, Maria. The surprise is that these are a couple of the most wooden characters I've ever read. But hey, the guy's published a shit-ton of books, so who am I to judge.
I first became aware of writer Joshua Dysart a couple years ago because he was working on a miniseries from Dark Horse Comics called Conan and the Midnight God. At the time I was almost exclusively buying Conan stuff, so I was all over its. I enjoyed the series, and actually exchanged a few messages with Joshua via our MySpace accounts. We also talked a little bit about an upcoming project (which I believe is still in process) he would be writing, the graphic novelization of Neil Young's Greendale album/story. While we didn't discuss it, I was well aware that many of Dysart's MySpace "friends" were of a political bent very similar to mine, and I was pleased.
When you roll in the front door, the first thing you see at the end of the hall is the huge plaster sculpture of James Earle Fraser's The End of the Trail. I've never been a real fan of the image, to be honest, but this sculpture is impressive. It's big -- 18 feet tall and 4 tons!
Another Fraser sculpture was at the end of the west hallway; not nearly as big, but still cool enough, if you're into that sort of thing.
Finally, this mountain lion was also huge. According to the little guide thing they give you when you pay your $10 admission:Canyon Princess: This 18-foot tall, 16,000 pound white cougar is carved from a single block of Colorado yule marble.That's a whole lotta cougar.
There were a number of other bronze, roughly life-sized statues of various cowboys like John Wayne, etc. I didn't see a Clint Eastwood statue, which was bullshit (I'm no fan of John Wayne). There were also a number of busts of important looking white dudes, which I mostly ignored. I did say hello to this jackass when the opportunity presented itself.
The museum was actually pretty cool. A good part of it was given over to Western art; lots of paintings of cowboys, Indians, landscapes and horses. Plenty of smaller sculptures too. I like the big paintings best -- the ones you see from the other side of the room and kind of gasp. Of course no cameras are allowed in those areas. I looked around once to determine if the coast was clear -- which it seemed to be -- because I wanted to shoot a painting of the Oklahoma Land Rush that I thought was particularly cool, if only to show how freakin' big it was, but the simple beep! of my camera turning on summoned a uniformed guard who shut me down. She was about 95 years old and unarmed, so I was pretty sure I could have taken her . . . but I let it slide. The painting was along the lines of this picture, only with the rush coming at the viewer, and way more awesome.
Besides the art, there were different rooms given over to different themes, including the following:
The garden areas were pretty. If I'd had time and could get beyond the traffic noise from the nearby highway, the humidity, and all the "Keep off the Grass," "Keep off the Rocks," and "Please Refrain from Having Fun" signs, I would have found it relaxing. There were numerous ponds full of lazy fish, and other little statues here and there. Also a few horse graves and remembrances.
The last big statue I photographed was of Buffalo Bill. This is the one that has big lights aimed at it, visible from the highway. I'm sure it's mighty impressive at night.
I spent a couple hours at the museum, and certainly could have spent more if I'd had the time. I didn't want to risk missing my flight home. I do have mixed feelings overall. I find the "Old West" interesting, and it is certainly relevant to where I live. But I also understand that the "Opening of the West", for all its talk of freedom and opportunity and open spaces was also an invitation to genocide and ecological catastrophe, situations which we tend to not spend a lot of time talking about or educating our young about. That is depressing.
I got to Tulsa but didn't feel like going anywhere once I got there, so I holed up in my hotel room. It was the Ramada Inn right at the airport. I had this absolutely stunning view out my window of the long term parking lot. High class!
I read a little, turned on the TV on a whim, and this is the first thing I saw:
Who the hell watches this shit? No wonder Americans are so goddamn dumb. I shut it off and went high brow; I watched this awesome piece of celluloid greatness on my laptop instead (I'd rented it before I left and brought it with me):
The next day I headed to the work site. I took this picture just down the street from where I was working.
I spent the bulk of the next two working days with my ass planted right here:
Except, of course for when I was sneaking over to this spot they were stupid enough to tell me I could visit whenever I wanted to:
Besides the liquor store, once clear of a couple blocks of industrial parks the locale I was working in was dominated by churches and bbq joints. We went to Big Daddy's BBQ for lunch the first day. It was actually pretty damn good, in a bbq-sauce-on-wonder-bread kind of way.
I know I talk a lot about how my days are filled with danger, and that I live a laugh-at-death kind of life . . . by now this post alone should show you that there is no bullshit being invoked when I say that. James Bond's job has nothing on mine, he just goes about his in a much more metrosexual fashion than I do.
I did manage to get out and visit a couple bookstores. In addition to two separate comic shops (which I didn't photograph), I stopped by two new/used bookstores. The first was called Steve's Books and Magazines (shitty cell phone pic, taken into the bright sun):
It was a cool shop. While there I learned that just a couple months ago some of the movie version (a remake, I haven't seen the original) of The Killer Inside Me by Jim Thompson was shot there. That's an awesome book; I hope they don't screw up the movie. Jessica Alba is apparently in it; that doesn't bode too well.
The other place I visited was called Gardner's Used Books; it was much bigger, kind of musty and ramshackle, but also awesome.
And dig what was waiting just inside the front door. And for sale too! It was $2700 or something like that. If I'd had the money and could have gotten it through baggage check, I'd have bought the goddamn thing:
I also swooned over these three boxes. I didn't even look through them -- I can't! If I did, I'd have wanted to buy all of them. So I just sighed and took a picture.
I did score a copy of Captain America #601, the black and white variant. This thing is awesome. It just came out a few weeks ago, but this variant has been very hard to find. It was drawn by the legendary Gene Colan, who is/was 82 freakin' years old when he drew this book. Fantastic.
Since I have both versions -- this one, which is just the pencils, and the other one, which includes the ink and color, it's very interesting to see the difference as the art evolves. Very cool.
By the time I was ready to leave, HULK was getting a little tiresome. I had to put him in his place.
That's enough awesome for one session. Tomorrow -- the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum!
In the backyard, the apples still have a way to go, though.
Looking at this sign on our back porch (which, thanks to the goddamn dogs, you don't have to stretch your imagination too far to understand why we refer to it as the "poop deck"), you may wonder what it means:
It's because coming through the front door, this is what you will be faced with (the 4th little beast had already popped outside to see what was going on while I was readying the camera; it was garbage day, so she was making sure that big truck stayed the hell away):
After messing around in the front, I mowed the backyard. A couple weeks ago, Julia was commenting on how big the hornets' nest in one of the bushes was getting. I didn't note it at the time, and had long forgotten about it by yesterday. I finally made its acquaintance when I banged the mower off the bush the damn thing is occupying, though.
So one moment I'm blissfully mowing away, thinking my pure thoughts (you know, the usual things like unicorns, Jesus, rainbows and [other people's] puppies), and the next I'm in a cloud of buzzing, stinging insects.
Still, it was one of those events I would have preferred to experience anecdotaly.
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