MacArthur Foundation Slops Money To Brains

The John D. And Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation which bestows money on pitiful and unremarked upon geniuses stewing in their own brilliant juices waiting for some ship to come in, or to kill themselves, has ladled out another 12 1/2 million dollars to 25 new MacArthur Fellows for 2007.

These are men and women, mostly operating in obscurity who range from a molecular biologist to a fisherman who futzes around with lobsters and such to a violin maker living in a pile of human excrement and who really needed some bucks (and probably the love of a good woman).

These are all worthy pursuits (I suppose...Who really gives a damn unless I get mine) and the great thing about these grants is the people who get them, get them with no strings attached! Golly Jesus! These people can take their half a mil and blow it on crack, whores, candy and other fine things and the MacArthur Foundation people won't come down on them.

These grants are, once bestowed, free and easy money for good times and easy sex. It is interesting to see the breadth of types that get this sweet sack of swag. I'm sure all of these great minds deserve what they get, but I think if the folks up there with the money ever see me deliver newspapers, we could change the whole paradigm of who gets this grease. I fold them, stick them in bags, then hang them on hotel room doors, all without asking for your pity or money (not that I'm not asking). AND all without interrupting the perfectly sexy sounds I hear as I pass the rooms.

What goes on in a private hotel room is none of my business. But I sure would like to see some of it. I listen with my ear to the door, and imagine the fine action happening between what I know to be UNMARRIED couples jointly engaging. That's OK. I just hop scotch from room to room, hither and thither, leaving papers at each door, all the while getting a nice earful of audio sex twixt men and women. And who knows? Some of that is probably lesbian and homo too, but I'm much too polite to listen in on illegal sex.

Doesn't all that deserve at least a consideration for a half million from these rich fucks? I work hard, and it would be nice to have some appreciation for all that. It's not like I toodle my trash can full of papers every night to hotels all over Norfolk for my health. After all. I gotta eat too.

Joe

Room Cleaning Day

I'm cleaning my room today. That is my bedroom, as I don't want to give you the impression I live in one room. I actually have two rooms, my bedroom AND my living room. But the bedroom is where I live, and the living room (where there is more stuff!) is my walk-through.Cleaning is both a cleansing and dirtying process. Cleansing in that I get a little workout and I find and throw away all my great junk I've often thought about, but never turned the mattress to look for. Who the hell turns mattress', anyway.

Other than these spectacular cleaning fits I go on, the only time I turned my mattress was when I could no longer fit my butt around the coil that's been springing from it for the last few years. And dirtying, since I am such a slob, I foul myself with things I long ago forgot I lost.I found five spoons under my mattress. Since I don't eat under my mattress and the spoons can't eat without me, how they traversed from top to bottom will remain a mystery. Sure there are crumbs there. But that's part of the underbelly of mattress life. Crumbs migrating, I understand. Spoons, no.

May God forgive me, but I found a bug. He was in a corner of the room I haven't visited lately, so what he was doing there (dead) is a question. There was nothing to eat. You'd think that if five spoons can get what must be five or six miles (in spoon measure) from the top of my mattress to the bottom, a once live bug could scarf out those same crumbs. Maybe he was just too stupid. He died for his dopiness. Too bad for him. Good for me.I really should give serious and careful thought to at some point in the future, after deliberating the subject, and considering the alternatives, to stop eating in my bedroom. It ain't such a good idea.

And I've been lucky so far. I would hate to wake up one morning sharing my bed with a rat, who having been told of the good eats under Joe's bed, instead is contenting himself with suckling at my teat for nourishment.Well, back to cleaning!


Joe

Mime Legend Marcel Marceau Dies

The Price Is Right!

As Drew Carey prepares for the chance of a lifetime to make his showbiz bones and take the helm of "The Price Is Right", I thought some of you sexy ladies might want to read an account of my own true life experience with Drew, back in 2005. If not, keep reading your "Family Circle" ( what is it now, $1.14?).

PLOTZ NOT CREAM

I was slinging my papers this morning on the route, when I got to the Hilton (by the way, this is a classy hotel...Their stalls are 25 cents just for regular!). The night clerk told me some celebrities were staying in the hotel, and at first, I think, he was a little reluctant to tell me who they were, but finally he said that Drew Carey and his crew were staying there and were to make a personal appearance later today in Norfolk.

I plotzed. I'll leave it to you to figure out exactly what that Jewish word means, but I can say this; that it is better for a man to plotz for Drew Carey than it is to cream for him. That I did not! But as soon as the clerk told me that I could deliver his paper to him PERSONALLY (if I could figure out what room he was in), I thought for a minute I would cream. But I plotzed, and that was good enough.

I wanted to see if Drew was like most stars (Dorothy Kilgallen, many others) who sleep naked, except for that little night mask, like the one Miss Kilgallen wore on "What's My Line" and was killed in. I realize the bigger they are, the more rest they need , and that neat little mask keeps the light out real good.

I skedaddled upstairs, not sure what room Drew was in, but luckily I saw one of the old night watchmen, who likes me, and has a great deal of pity for me (thank God) and after I shook him a few times and offered him a bite of my candy bar, he gave up the room number. I Shan't reveal it here, on the internet, in order to honor Drew's privacy.

I knocked on Mr. Carey's door ever so nicely, with a gentle swing and sway of my arm, so as not to wake him. But then the night watchmen suggested that if I didn't knock loud enough to wake him up, that it would take a long time for him to get to the door, probably not until he woke up naturally.

I kicked on the door with my boot then, and it wasn't thirty seconds until the one and only Drew Carey was there in the flesh, indeed wearing only his Dorothy Kilgallen mask, otherwise totally unveiled. I was a little disappointed and started to cry.

Drew Carey, being one of the nicer people in Hollywood, took me in his arms and caressed me (as only two heterosexual men can) and explained that he was sorry that his body was not as buff as it could be, asked me why it mattered to me, then unhinged from my hold, closed the door and said goodnight.

When I got down to the van and left for my next hotel, I realized that it takes a pretty big man to sleep in the raw, except for the Kilgallen mask, open up your hotel door to greet the paper boy in the raw, and then cuddle him in a manly way when he starts to cry over your inadequacies.

And this is my famous person story.

Joe Postove

The Doors!

The best doors are the automatic kind. In these days of doors of confusion, it is nice to have the door do most of the work.

Certainly, I am aware the door will not get you from room to room. Those of us who can walk will need to do that ourselves, and our handicapped will have to heave-ho through the openings.

I'm writing about doors today, because as the days and the news and the world become so confusing to a straightforward mind like mine, it is nice to have helpful doors.

The old time regular ones, the ones that go in, or go out, or slip sideways, or even are pulled up or down, are a drudge in the 21st century, when at the minimum I want my doors to open themselves, What they do after I scoot into or out of whatever space I was in, is the doorkeepers business and I don't care.

So on this, the first day of the Jewish New Year (La Shana Tova to my brethren) please remember our auto devices, particularly our doors, which enable us, so well, to go from room to room.

Joe

Was Someone Killed Today?

I was walking into the post office this afternoon when an escapee hanging out at the boxes asked me if someone was killed today.

Certainly there was, but I doubt my friend and I would have in common dead friends. Then I noticed the flag in front of the building was at half staff, and remembered what I had been remembering all day.

I told the man that today is 9/11. He shook his head, and said "oh yeah, damn".

I knew it was 9/11 all day today, and indeed had been anticipating through the last of August till now how our national mourning would manifest itself once the day came. I checked the web this morning. The news was the same, different people, different places, and some of the news sites mentioned that several notable observances would take place in New York, Washington, and Pennsylvania.

Then I got dressed, went to work, listened to NPR recapitulate what we all knew, and were all thinking. And I thought about it during the day, here and there, along with what's for lunch, did I take my pill, and the day as she came.

And then the man at the mail box asked me if someone had been killed today.

Joe

Black Women And Joy

I walked into the 7/11 this afternoon for a roll and coffee, and came upon something I rarely see, and don't know if I have ever really had. Three Black women were behind the counter (as opposed to the usual convicts and morons) and they were huddled together, like children conspiring to rule the world and loving each other. Joyously oblivious that their happiness seems so odd, not only nowadays, but to me, always.

Odd, but beautiful. Something I can see and admire, and never possess. It is only inside their own African-American, even colored lady world, that is closed to all but those in the same skin. I have no idea what was up, but how I envy their so easy happiness. Their black delight comes to them, like darkness comes to me.

Clack, clack, is what it sounded like. But the laughter...The true sound of helpless, unrestricted love; for oneself, each other, and the life they live, was a weird noise, but unambiguously elegant . Even as they trudge through the clerkiness of 7/11's backwardness, they find the time for "girlfriend" love, even there.

I wish I could do that with my white skin.

Joe

Eats

Dearest Friends,

I went out to eat with my cousins last night and had pizza. I also has a clam dish (the sauce was like a hot slurpy...I mean that in a good way). I also had a salad and several diet Cokes.

Right now I am alone, so I don't know what to eat. I thought about going to the store for Corn Pops (oh...but getting fully dressed, going down to the van, starting it with the key, steering the wheel several times until the van gets to the store, looking for a parking place (plain old pull in parking, not parallel parking of which I am master of my domain) parking, getting out of the van, stepping onto the ground, walking the steps to the door (which does open automatically, but sometimes I have to wait a sec) getting into the store, asking one of the former convicts who work there where the Corn Pops are, walking to the Corn Pops aisle, reaching to where they are and putting the box into my hands, then going to the checkout aisle, naked, to pay for the crap, then having the convict ask me paper or plastic (and I can never decide!...I mean I want to save the trees, but can't they just put it into something and not ask me? I tire so easily these days!) and then reaching into my pocket to find some money to pay for what it was I am buying (I forgot what it was) and then having to hold my hand out for the change and smile at the checkout boob is just too much.

And then having to do all the other stuff in reverse to get back home (or else go sleep on the meats in the back) is just too much for me.

I guess I'll starve. Or I could slurp up what's in the fridge.

Joe Postove

Homosexual Pokey

You Put Your Right Shoe In

You Put Your Left Shoe Out

You Rub Against A Copper

And You Shake It All About

You Do The Homo-Pokey

And You Turn Yourself Around

That's What It's All About!

John Dingle should have been in on this one! Oh...the "gay don't drop the soap" opera continues, as Senator Craig now says he's not poof. I may have to call in my own doctor to test Mr. Craig's male hyman (oy vey) to see if there has been unauthorized activity in the #2 slide.

Here's the test senator. If your winkie goes past 45 degrees in an upward sweep motion when you see a man in hot pants (parts one AND two), then you're gay.

If it it just sits there, even if I were to run naked right in front of you on the way to the ice box to gather my goodies for the evening...yes, even me, then you're straight.

One more thing. Just to be on the safe side; shit standing up.

joe

COKE ZERO

I was in the 7/11 this afternoon gathering my lunch bucket, when I noticed a new product. I'm not one to try many of the new products (I still have my original Thom McCann "Twist" shoes and my Nixon extra large emergency pee cup from the '68 campaign) so I'm not really up on what's hep.

But when I was about to fetch my Diet Pepsi, God took hold of my eyes, one at a time, and moved them 3/4 of an inch to the right, where I saw COKE ZERO for the first time. I'm glad I saw it now, because I was unaware that they were going to start numbering the Cokes, and I like being on the ground floor. But I'm not sure that zero is a number. Like I don't know if white is a color. This could be problem for the Coke people, if they start numbering their products at zero and zero turns out not to be a number at all. What do they do then? Where will they go with their soft drink line?

They would have to trash the whole concept and wiggle it back up to the drawing board for the the experts to reconsider.Capitalism can be cutthroat. Oh. Coke Zero tastes exactly the same as Diet Coke. And Diet Pepsi, for that matter. But I don't think they were concerned with the taste as much as they were with getting the numbers right. Good luck, Coca-Cola!

Joe Postove