Planet Proctor # 30

"O, possessor of good breeding, learn the essence of writing, for writing is the only adornment of the well bred."
Marc Chagall, 1914

AND I QUOTE

Dear avatars, this orbit is dedicated to things other people have said, because it seems to be in the ether. . . or . . . not. So, thanks in advance to contributors Dolly Garlo, Kerry Millerick and Erik Villesvick.

L.A. TODAY

This week in LALA, I got another job as an art dealer in "Brotherly Love." I tape it early December, and I’ll let you know when it "airs." (What an interesting turn of phrase, considering the nature of most TV today.) Not "BroLo", however, which is produced by a good friend named Jim Vallely, who has a deep history as an actor/writer of surreal comedy.

Nonetheless, his week was marked by many reported incidents of agents giving the wrong call-times to their actor-clients for readings -- and even jobs. My wife Melinda was a victim of a wrong audition call, and my mix-up occurred when two Oldsmobile radio spots I was to record on Thursday were delayed an hour because two other actors had been mistakenly booked by their agent for Friday! The head of the production house told me that it was the first time this had ever happened. Anything similar happen to youse this week? Skeptical minds want to know.

ON HOLD

That same day, I heard a great L.A. story at an audition.

My friend David Prince, whose voice you would recognize, but is perhaps better known as a writer/producer of hip radio campaigns for his company "Radiology," was behind a car that refused to make a turn when the light changed.

Finally, he pulled up alongside the driver and saw that she had a cellular phone to her ear. She then turned at him and said, "Can’t you see I’m making a call!?"

IF YOUR MIDDLE NAME IS WAYNE - GO TO JAIL!

"I don’t feel we did wrong in taking this great country away from them. There were great numbers of people who needed new land, and the Indians were selfishly trying to keep it for themselves." (John Wayne)

RIDE ‘EM COWBOY?

From Steve "That’s Hot" Bortko and Kerry "Funny People" Millerick:

Three cowboys are sitting around a campfire, out on a lonesome prairie, each with the bravado for which cowboys are famous. A night of tall tales begins.

The first one says, "I must be the meanest, toughest cowboy there is. Why, just the other day a bull got loose in the corral and gored six men before I wrestled it to the ground by the horns with my bare hands."

The second cowboy can’t stand to be bested. "Why that’s nothing. I was walking down the trail yesterday and a fifteen-foot rattlesnake slid out from under a rock and made a move for me. I grabbed that snake with my my bare hands, bit its head off and sucked the poison down in one gulp. and I’m still here today."

The third cowboy remained silent, silently stirring the coals with his penis.

HOW MANY DAZE TIL XMAS?

From the Hammacher Schlemmer catalogue, more gifts for that someone who needs nothing: "Snuggly Yawning, Snoring Honey Bear, Electronic Quadrant-timing Sonic Toothbrush, Dancing Elvis Presley Telephone Gyrates to Jail House Rock, Original Waxed Dog Jacket, Heated Pet Bed, Correct Posture Dog Feeder and Feline Drinking Fountain; English Handmade Leopard Rocker, Musical Gumball Bank and Snowglobe, French Parlor ‘Puff’ Billiards Board, Remote-Controlled Automatic Gas Barbecue, Levitating Anti-Gravity Top, and of course, the Only Electric, Non-Piercing Can Opener."

("You can’t have everything. Where would you put it?" Steven Wright.)

THE HILLS ARE ALIVE

"Karate is a form of martial arts in which people who have had years and years of training can, using only their hands and feet, make some of the worst movies in the history of the world." -- Dave Barry

In Vanity Fair, a verbatim one-page interview with Hong Kong kicker Jackie Chan offers some enlightening insights:

"Jackie Chan is always police, police, police. But now, in my last film, I’m a cooker, a chef. A chef, of course, who can fight. When I was younger, I stole from Hollywood films. I stole from Buster Keaton, Harold Lloyd, Gene Kelly . . .The Sound of Music. I’ve watched it 7 times. No other movie have I ever watched 7 times. Not even The Godfather. I cannot speak very good English. Even Chinese I can’t read or write. I can read but I cannot write. I’m in training right now."

Since I once played Rolf Gruber, the singing Nazi on Broadway when I was 17 going on 18 -- it feels like he stole from me, too.

FIRESIDE THEATRE NEWS

Phil Austin and Peter Bergman "took a meeting" with ex-Tickster Hank Tucker at HBO, to discuss an "Every Thing You Know Is Wrong" adult-oriented cartoon series. HBO has requested that Pete and Phil return the meeting as soon as possible.

Elayne "FireChief" Wechsler-Chaput in the final issue of the Four Alarm FireSignal reminded us: "I’m still selling the Abkhazian Groucho Marx/John Lennon stamp sets at $10 each ppd." Contact her at firehead@panix.com, and look for her name in future comics’ credits!!!

Or -- if you want to wear the provocative stamp on your chest, you can order one from bulletproof Timothy Tuffield at ttuffiel@orednet.org. (I remind you of this, because I gave the wrong e-dress several orbits ago!!)

And finally -- for now -- the new Lodestone Media catalogue just arrived from Rich Fish et al in Bloomington featuring Firesign product including our latest Blast From The Past , a cassette entitled "THE PINK HOTEL BURNS DOWN!" For more info, or to order a catalogue, visit the web page at http://www.lodestone-media.com. I’ve heard it -- and it’s damn funny. Who were those guys, anyway?

MORE BUMP HER, SLICKERS

"Time is the greatest teacher, unfortunately it kills all its students."

"Your kid may an honor student, but you’re still an idiot."

"If we’re not supposed to eat animals, why are they made of meat?"

PROFESSOR BACKWARDS?

From Kire Kivselliv, who wrote, co-produced and acted in his own funny radio play "Not Another Talk Show (starring your unobedient servant and featuring Melinda and Bonnie Peterson):

"About 12 or so years ago a friend and I tried to find the various Satanic and other backwards stuff alleged over the years. We weren’t too successful (there ain’t shit in "Stairway to Heaven"), but I continued to play around with it. I listened to a lot of music backwards and did find lots of little phrases. The only one I can remember was Hank Williams "You Win Again", which repeated "Make me weak" backwards. Having found all sorts of stuff backwards, I assumed that the phonetic and syllabic breakdown of English must mathematically allow for sound combinations that sound legible backwards on a regular basis.

"I continued to toy around with the idea by listening to any phrase backwards, memorizing and mimicking the sounds, recording them and then playing them backwards to create weird ‘alien voices’ saying the original phrase. For a while I had a goal of writing the first truly palendromic poem, with meaning forward and backward. Fortunately, I returned to earth and took up more useful pursuits."

Nmad! That would have been very gnitseretni!

WRIGHT ON!

I have a map of the United States, life size. 1 mile equals 1 mile. It’s a bitch to fold. Right now I’m having amnesia and deja-vu at the same time. I think I’ve forgotten this before. Sponges grow in the ocean. That amazes me. I wonder how much deeper the oceans would be if that didn’t happen. I stayed up all night playing poker with tarot cards. I got a full house and four people died. I used to work in a fire hydrant factory. You couldn’t park anywhere near the place. If you were going to shoot a mime, would you use a silencer? When I was a kid I had a friend who worked in a radio station. Whenever we walked under a bridge, you couldn’t hear what he was saying. I parked in a tow-away zone, and when I got back, the entire neighborhood was gone. I spilled spot remover on my dog. Now he’s gone. I opened the refrigerator and the only thing there was a packet of instant water. I didn’t know what to add. I was trying to daydream but my mind kept wandering. I have a microwave fireplace in my house. The other night I relaxed in front of the fire for the evening in ten minutes. In my house there’s this light switch that doesn’t do anything. Every so often I would flick it on and off just to check. Yesterday, I got a call from a woman in Germany. She said "Cut it out." I have two very rare photographs. One is a picture of Houdini locking his keys in his car. The other is a rare photograph of Norman Rockwell beating up a child. Yesterday I saw a chicken crossing the road. I asked it why. It told me it was none of my business. I put my air conditioner in backwards. It got cold outside. The weatherman on TV was confused. He said "It was supposed to be hot today." I have the world’s largest collection of seashells. I keep it on all the beaches of the world. Perhaps you’ve seen it. I’m writing an unauthorized autobiography. I saw a subliminal advertising executive but it was only a glimpse. I put instant coffee in a microwave and went back in time. When I was crossing the border into Canada, they asked if I had any firearms with me. I said "Well, what do you need?" I planted some bird seed. A bird grew. Now I don’t know what to feed it. I bought a million lottery tickets. I won a dollar. I got a dog and named him ‘Stay’. Now I go "Come here, Stay." After a while the dog went insane and wouldn’t move at all. I got pulled over by a cop and he said "Do you know the speed limit here is 55 miles per hour?" So I said "Oh, that’s OK, I’m not going that far." Cross country skiing is great if you live in a small country. (Like Norway!!) I’m not afraid of heights. I’m afraid of widths. I went to San Francisco. I found someone’s heart. When I turned two I was really anxious, because I’d doubled my age in a year. I thought, if this keeps up, by the time I’m six I’ll be ninety. What’s another word for Thesaurus? I have an answering machine in my car. It says "I’m home now. But leave a message and I’ll call when I’m out." I can remember the first time I had to go to sleep. Mom said "Steven, time to go to sleep." I said "But I don’t know how." She said "It’s real easy. Just go down to the end of tired and hang a left." So I went down to the end of tired and, just out of curiosity, I hung a right. My mother was there and she said "I thought I told you to go to sleep." (From Dolly Garlo.)

I’m sleepy too -- meet you at the corner of drowsy and snore,

Phil "don’t quote me" Proctor

Published 11/15/96