The Luthier

            I took my acoustic electric guitar to a luthier. It needed to be re-wired. The guitar was broken, no good, useless as far as being able to use it with an amp. I had to use a microphone when I performed and stand in a fixed position to be heard. I'm not very good at standing in a fixed position. I get a little antsy. I felt like a robot when I played.
            Sometimes I'd lose track of where the microphone was and bang my guitar into it mid-song, or pull away from the mic and have the sound of the guitar disappear. I'm glad the guitar's finally fixed. Now, if I want to break into a flat foot in between verses I can. 
            The luthier has his own line of guitars called Marble Head Guitars. When I communicate with him via email I use the heading "Dear Marble Head." It cracks me up every time. I'm not sure why, it just does. The luthier does have a round head. Wolf pup. 

The Way Things Work

          I've been watching late night documentaries of iconic historical figures- Stalin, Chairman Mao, Mussolini, Rockefeller, the Vanderbilt's, the Rothschild's, J.P. Morgan. I'd rather be a banker or a businessman than an autocrat. Stalin died in a puddle of his own urine, the victim of a suspected poisoning. Chairman Mao, some suspect, suffered the same fate. And Mussolini, he was shot to death, then hung upside down before being spat upon and dragged through the streets. Being a tyrannical leader just doesn't pay.
          The bankers have it figured. They go unnoticed. They finance the winners and the losers. The system of governance doesn't really matter to them. All that matters is that the government is stable so they're making money. The loan and the bond, the two most powerful things in the world. Loans and bonds turn people and governments into dependents. Dependency is the byproduct of power. Bombastic tyrants serve as distractions for financiers. It's all too familiar and overly cliche. But sadly, that's how it works. There. I said it, I meant it, and that's the way it is. 

Blood Moon

          I hiked to Kite Hill to get a good look at the blood moon. It's a hilltop with a panoramic view of the city. It wasn't exactly an original idea. There were people parked and waiting for the eclipse when I got there. Some people were sitting on lounge chairs and others were sitting on the hoods of their cars. There was a lot of activity. There were the sounds of radios and people talking loudly. I overheard a woman tell her friend, "I don't want to make love, I want to fuck and have a baby." A part of me wanted to stand next to her, but I looked toward Pasadena instead. 

          More and more people were showing up and I was getting overstimulated, so I decided to find a new spot. I walked down the hill some and found a spot that had a view of downtown and the moon. I heard a mockingbird singing in the valley and there was a gentle wind blowing. There was nobody around but me. I had the whole moon to myself. 

Marlon Brando

          I frequent an establishment where the proprietor is a mumbler. I'm a mumbler too, so you can imagine the conversations we have. I was talking to the proprietor the other day and I realized I had no idea what he was saying. You can't ask a mumbler to repeat every sentence. If you do, they tend to freeze up and get irritated. So I pretended to understand what the mumbler was saying.                   
          Somehow we got on the topic of mustaches, but to what extent I didn't know. The proprietor seemed to be saying that he could use his mustache as a weapon. I wasn't sure how to respond. If I guessed wrong and was off topic, he'd be offended. I just laughed and waited for more clues. 
          The proprietor became more animated. I still wasn't sure what he was saying. I studied him while he talked. He was smiling. He was telling a joke of some kind. He started to laugh. I laughed and put my arms up in the air as if I was holding the handlebars to a chopper. I made the sound of a motorcycle. Vroom-vroom! The proprietor had a confused look on his face, but laughed anyway. 

The House Next Door

            The house next door is being worked on. There's a scraggly looking older guy who comes in the morning. He sits in his car until his boss shows up. I've seen him sit there for hours. It's not the best use of time, but it's none of my business. When the boss shows up, that's when the work begins. The men have taken four weeks to do a two week job. The job's winding down now. The older man with the scraggily hair is gone and now it's just the boss that shows up.
            It's quiet now that the job is over. There's an eerie silence and it gives me an empty feeling inside. I got used to the sound of the men working, the hammering and the sawing.
            The boss came by later in the afternoon to finish things up. He worked into the night. I heard a huge racket. He was cutting something with a saw in the dark. It started to bother me. Then it dawned on me, the boss liked it here too. 

The Actor Problem

            A friend of mine is an independent filmmaker. He was approached by a woman who wanted to be in one of his movies. She was a persistent young actress without a hint of name recognition. She downright pestered my friend until he finally relented and gave her a small part. It was a simple scene; a conversation with Hitler.
            They shot the scene and all indications were that she was excited to do it. But a few days after the shoot my friend received a call from the actress. She demanded to be removed from the movie. My friend asked why? The actress said it was because the industry was run by Jews and she didn't want to ruin her career. My friend told her he couldn't re-shoot the scene, but that he'd change her name in the credits if that made her happy. The actress didn't go for that; she wanted to be removed completely. Fifty-three emails later and the threat of a lawsuit, the issue was finally resolved, with the actress somehow remaining in the film. 
            I'm having trouble remembering the punch line to this one, or the moral to this story. Maybe it's be careful what you ask for, you just might end up in a movie with Hitler. 

The Confidence Artist

 Victor Lustig sold the Eiffel Tower to a scrap metal dealer, twice.

Here's a set of instructions known as the "Ten Commandments for Con Men" attributed to Lustig:

• Be a patient listener (it is this, not fast talking, that gets a con man his coups).
• Never look bored.
• Wait for the other person to reveal any political opinions, then agree with them.
• Let the other person reveal religious views, then have the same ones.
• Hint at sex talk, but don't follow it up unless the other person shows a strong interest.
• Never discuss illness, unless some special concern is shown.
• Never pry into a person's personal circumstances (they'll tell you all eventually).
• Never boast - just let your importance be quietly obvious.
• Never be untidy.
• Never get drunk.

These techniques are remarkably similar to those I've employed over the years as a writer, with the exception of "never get drunk."