The cautionary tale of the magic muffin.

I had a strange and vivid dream.

My friend Aaron and I decided to cross the country on vintage Vespa scooters.
After a few days on the road, we were stopped at an old time gas station in a small town.
The station attendant filled our tanks.
"That's twelve dollars" he told us, returning the hose and nozzle to the gas pump.
I fished around in my pocket, but came up with about thirty cents in change
I nodded to Aaron, "Dude, you got any cash?"
"naw, I thought you had it…"
The attendant looked at us over his glasses. "problem?"
"yeah," I said, "we're a little short"
He nodded. "Well, there's a college over across the street, I hear that if you give a motivational speech, they will pay you about twelve bucks"
I thought about it for a moment, "I can do that"
So soon enough I found myself on a large stage in a cavernous auditorium.
As the hall slowly filled, I sat at the back of the stage thinking, what I should talk about?
Then it hit me.
I would tell the cautionary tale of the magic muffin.

When the hall was full I approached the podium and the crowd fell silent.
murmering was replace by polite shuffling as the lights dimmed.
I looked out across the room, cleared my throat, and began my speech:

"Once upon a time there was a baker.
He baked all sorts of delicious treats.
Cookies, cakes, pastries, tortes. But his favorite thing to create, was muffins.
One day he decided to make the best muffins ever.
 So he went about gathering all the best, rarest and most delicious ingredients, then baked them at his favorite temperature, for the perfect amount of time, and thought only happy thoughts while they baked.
When the timer chimed, he opened the oven, but to his great surprise there was only one very large muffin, and, even more surprising, it seemed to be alive.
It emerged from the oven, politely bowed to the baker, and then went about cleaning the kitchen.
      Once the kitchen was gleaming and spotless, the muffin cooked the baker a dinner that was so delicious, that the baker actually wept.
As time went on, it became apparent that the muffins sole joy was in serving the baker.
As long as the muffin was cooking or cleaning or serving, it was a happy muffin.
      For a long time the baker told no one, because first of all he was afraid no one would believe him, and second of all, he had no way to explain how the muffin did all these things because, although it was magic,  it was after all, still just a muffin and as such, had no arms or legs.
     One day the baker could keep his secret no longer, and invited his best friend over for dinner. He told his friend the story, and the friend watched in amazement as the muffin made a meal so spectacular that it brought tears to their eyes, and caused his friend to exclaim, "That is indeed the most magical of muffins!"

I  stop telling the story for a moment because I notice Aaron waving urgently from a doorway at the side of the stage.
He taps his watch, and whispers loudly "We gotta go man!"

I look back over the audience.

 " uh, so... long story short, they ate him, because he was after all, a delicious muffin. Thank you."

I leave via the side door, we climb onto our scooters and ride off into the night.

Red Nose Day

    So one Thursday, we were driving from Los Angeles, California to Albuquerque, New Mexico for a gig. We had in our possession a bag of red foam noses, the type generally associated with clowns.
Now first you must know that the majority of us in the van have a particular aversion to clowns, and will in general avoid all association.
   However, this was trumped by our desire to cause mischief, and so we all donned the noses, fixed our faces in deadpan expressions, and had a great time watching the  the faces of passengers in adjacent cars as we headed down the freeway. Before too long we had to make a pit stop, and found ourselves at a truck stop-store-cafe out in the Arizona desert.
      As we parked, Aaron said that the rule was, anyone getting out of the van had to wear a red nose. Turk didn't even hesitate, and was soon across the parking lot and inside the little store. "Gotta do what ya gotta do" I said, and slid out of the van into the bright Arizona Sun. As I neared the door, I could hear people muttering to one and other
"Check this one out..."
"Whoa, here comes another one..."
"I wonder what's going on ?"
I made my way inside and took care of business, then went and got a cold drink.
The lady at the counter gave my the up and down.
"What's with the get-up?"
She was regarding my outfit. Shorts, Hawaiian shirt, fedora, mirrored aviator shades and big red foam nose.
I handed her money for the drink.
"Boss says we gotta wear the nose when we're out in public" I dead-pan
"The Boss?"
"Yep"
apperently this made sense to her. "Well, OK then..."
I grabbed my change and left.
Back at the Van, Turk arrives, but sans nose.
"Where's your nose?" Aaron asks.
"Gave it to the lady at the counter. When I walked up she asked, "Where do i get a nose?" So I gave it to her.  Then she asked if I would get in trouble with the boss. I told her I'd deal with it"
I nod, "Nice"
As we are getting into the van, a couple guys  next to a big truck towing jet skis are giving us the eye.
Here it comes, I'm thinking.
A guy in wrap around sunglasses and a stretched out tank top motions to us, "What's with the noses?"
Aaron reaches into a bag and produces one, "Red nose day tomorrow, we're gettin' ready"
He lobs it like a softball and the guy catches it, a huge grin blossoming on his face.
"Right on!" the guy says.
We pile into the van and depart.
Sometimes it just happens like that.

TALES FROM THE HELL HOUSE #4

       One night we were sitting in Klutch's room, and as usual, drinking beer and watching T.V.
   I guess the television was a little too loud, because our upstairs neighbor started pounding on the floor. We turned the volume down a bit and continued watching.
    Again came the pounding, so the volume went down another couple clicks.
We thought it was pretty quiet, but it seems our neighbor didn't because again she pounded on the floor.
"What the hell?" Klutch asked, looking up towards the ceiling as a light rain of plaster dust filtered down.
Dave shook his head, "just turn it down a little more"
We turned the volume down to a level so low that we were literally all huddled inches from the T.V. just to hear it.
     Then the pounding started again, and then turned into stomping, Then Jumping up and down.
Then came the scream. It was like an air raid siren. it started as a low howl, and grew in pitch and volume, culminating in stomps that accented the words "SHUT-UP, SHUT-UP, SHUT-UP.....SHUT- THE -FUCK- UP!" It was so violent that the light fixture in the ceiling came loose and fell to the floor behind us, shattering on impact and spraying the room with glass shards.
    The crash of the light fixture was followed moments later by a muffled scream from upstairs,
accompanied by frantic pounding foot steps that went in a sort of marching run from room to room, while she continued screaming.
"fuck" Dave muttered. we looked at each other silently. The next move was unclear.
     We were cleaning up the broken glass when there was a pounding on the back door.
    We answered it, and found our up-stairs neighbor standing there in tears, pulling her hair, babbling about no sleep and too much noise and no one understanding about how hard she tried to be friends but how she had to work tomorrow…
her eyes were wide and slightly crossed, a mix of anger, confusion, crazy...

I smirked, “you want to hit me, don't you?”

It was a taunt, not an offer, but she took it.
she stept into an oddly theatrical martial arts pose,  and swiftly punched me in the stomach.
I stumbled backwards and collapsed on the kitchen floor holding my gut.
     All of the stress drained from her face, and was replaced by an odd serene look and a slight smile.

“Thanks” she said, heading back up the stairs to her flat.

Klutch and Dave nodded and smiled nervously as she went back upstairs, but after shutting the door  we huddled for a quick house meeting. It was evident that she had gone insane, but the question was should we call someone? a hospital? the cops?
    We finally decided it would be best to just torture her in our own special way.
  So we gave her a few minutes, then crept up the stairs with some fireworks, squirt guns and water balloons.
    A battle ensued, and by the end of it we were all soaked, sitting in her destroyed kitchen singing songs and taking turns bare knuckle boxing her refrigerator door.
    Aside from the broken light, our swollen knuckles, and taking a punch to the gut, it was a pretty good night.
The next evening she showed up at our back door again, this time looking very sheepish and holding a six-pack of beer. Her knuckles were wrapped in a bandage.
     "So…?" Dave started to ask.
      She cut us off and apologized, then went on to explain that the night before she had been on some kind of heavy duty mind and reality altering drugs, and she remembered almost nothing about it.
But she said it looked like she had gotten a little crazy in her apartment, and was sorry if she made too much noise. 

“I didn’t… do anything… did I?”   She was holding the beer like an offering, her eyes pleading for us to say no.

 “Nope” I said, “I mean nothing really. You did come and asked us to keep it down, 'cause you had to work or something, but…”
She looked relived. "thanks," she said.
I smiled and took the beer.
"Anytime"

doodle-oodle-ooo!

    So, let me start by telling you, I am not a particularly superstitious person.
However,  I have found that superstitions, luck, religion, karma, and all things otherworldly or unexplainable do not seen to care whether you believe in them or not.
 I have seen the impossible happen without a care for my believing, and I have seen a sure thing suddenly and inexplicably evaporate, as though it were the impossible all along.
  So, I have come to believe that it is a good idea to respect the idea that sometimes things happen whether you believe they will or not.
Because the truth is, you just never know.
    Case in point: The Brady Bunch Tiki.
When I still owned my tiki and Ukulele store, almost everyday a person would come into my shop and, regarding the Tiki necklaces, say:
"These are exactly like that Brady Bunch episode! where Greg finds the Tiki! Did you ever see that one?"
    I used to explain that yes, I have seen it, but no, none of my necklaces are "exactly like" that particular Tiki.
    I used to tell them that I do not make that design, but they would usually cut me off, calling to their friend, "Hey look, they have those Tiki's like on the Brady Bunch!"
    Now I smile and laugh, as thought it is the first time I have hear that one, and neither confirm nor deny, because although what follows actually happened to me, I really can't offer a rational explanation as to why, other than to repeat my previous statement.
    Sometimes things happen whether you believe they will or not.
  
   In the very early 90's I was watching a recording of a tongue-in-cheek, Ken Burns style "documentary" about the Brady Bunch. Part of this documentary was a segment titled "Taboo" in which they talked about the afore mentioned Tiki. They even showed a short still  close up of the Tiki hanging around Peter Bradys neck.
I was stoked.
Ever since I started my business Tiki King, I was always being asked if I made that Tiki, I always chuckled, "No way man! It's TABOO! Doodle-oodle-O!" But this documentary was like a sign. It was time to make that Tiki.
So, which Tiki was it?
I really don't know for sure, but it's true origin was most likely a Hawaiian souvenir shop. It looks much like the many mass produced Tikis of the mid seventies, made by Coco Joe, or maybe H.I.P. It is vaguely Ku shaped,  and more than likely cast resin, or permastone. It is said to be currently in the possession of Barry Williams, (who played Greg Brady on the show) He claims to have "rescued" it from a prop room a couple years ago, while producing "Growing Up Brady" at Paramount, and says that he wears it while on tour.
      So the big question, is it really taboo?
The logical person would say of course not. It was a hunk of resin, or a chunk of plaster. It was a TV show prop. It was not sacred, it had no manna. There was no reason that it should, or could, cause anything to happen, and it certainly was not really Taboo.
     But, Sometimes things happen whether you believe they will or not.
    So on my day off, I began sketching out the design, using the video as a guide.
That night I was riding my Vespa, and got a Flat tire. Not too big of a deal, the Vespa has a spare tire with it. But it was odd. I had actually never had a flat before. But as luck would have it, it happened in a parking lot and it only took a few minutes to swap the tire over.  It was a minor inconvenience, and being a scooter mechanic, I was able to get the tire patched up the next day, and all was right again.
As I said, It was a minor inconvenience
    So a week later, on my next day off, I finished the sketch and transferred the design to a piece of wood.
That night as I was taking a short cut through the tenderloin, one of the worst parts of town, the engine coughed and sputtered, and then cut out.
    Much to my surprise, I was out of gas. This was a surprise, because one, I had  never run out of gas before. And two, the Vespa has a reserve tank to keep this sort of thing from happening. Somehow, the switch was on reserve already and so I was forced to push it to the nearest gas station, which was about three blocks away, UP HILL! and we were late getting somewhere already. So as I am pushing the Vespa along, trying to ignore the prostitutes, pushers, addicts and other denizens of the back alleys,  I say to my wife, "Man, I must have angered the gods, or carved the wrong Tiki or something..."
"It's that Brady Tiki" she laughed, "It's Tabooooo! doodle-oodle-oooo!"
      So I stopped working on the Tiki for a couple weeks, and mulled it over.
     But, eventually logic won over. I decided that surely, the flat tire and running out of gas were simply co-incidences, and the Tiki certainly could not really be "Taboo"
So one fine day at work, there was a lull in the action, so I got out the piece of wood, the sketch, and picked up my knife.
      No sooner had I shaved off a few chips of wood when I heard a scream. My boss was yelling frantically for me to come up to the front, and as I got to the door that separated the showroom from the repair shop, I was met by a wall of muddy water. I stood there trying to make sense of the fact that a river was now in our show room, and soon I was standing in a swirling mess of murky water about two feet deep.
   Apparently,  directly in front of our shop, a water main from 1906 had decided it was time to burst, and was now sending up a ten foot geyser of water, sand, mud and cobble stones.
   We ran to and fro, trying to move things to the tops of counters and tables, and did all we could to get
things to higher ground.
Oddly enough the flood hardly touched the two stores next to us, but filled ours with about two feet of water. The result was about several weeks of lost business, thousands of dollars in damaged merchandise, and gruesome cleanup ( the place had to be gutted, all the drywall removed. It was a mess)
      I told my boss about the Tiki, and although we were in agreement that it was most likely simple co-incidence, we also were in agreement that sometimes things happen whether you believe they will or not, and that the Tiki had to go.
    So we ceremoniously burned the drawing, asking the gods for forgivness, and tossed the unfinished Tiki into the storm drain. As we stood in a moment of silence, a man walked up.
     "So how much did you loose?" he asked.
We didn't really know. $10,000, $20,000, it would be weeks before we added it up.
     He then introduced himself as a representative of the city, and told us that we would be reimbursed for ALL of our losses. We simply needed to fill out some forms and send them in once we had totaled it up, and he assured us that everything would be made right.
 Here is the thing. Like I said, I am not particularly superstitious.
But,  1st , a flat tire.
Then, being late and running out of gas in a bad area,
Then the flood.
 Each incident progressively much worse than the previous.
Then, after destroying it, all is promised to be made whole.
     So is that Tiki Taboo? Would I ever consider giving it another try?
No.
Because I have come to believe that it is a good idea to respect that sometimes things happen whether you believe they will or not, and I  do not intend on finding out what would happen next

Because the truth is, you just never know.

TALES FROM THE HELL HOUSE. #2

The clock said 3:30 am
It's red numbers had a slight twitch, a blur.
They would shift sideways, then back.
 I closed my eyes for what seemed like hours, concentrating on breathing slowly.
3:31 am
“Fuck it”
I decided retaliation was in order.
Earlier that night we were drinking espresso, and Dave came up with the idea to add “Vivarin” caffeine tablets to the espresso pot, because before the espresso, we had been drinking "Schuss Boomers", an odd concoction of hot Dr. Pepper and rum, and Dave said the rum was making him too sleepy.
I admit, it seemed like a good idea at the time.
But now I was lying in bed twitching and having strange tunnel vision hallucinations.

“Fuck it”

  I turned on the light and fished around on the top of my dresser until I struck pay-dirt.
A bundle of bottle rockets,  a pack of "Black Cat" fire crackers, and a half a pack of "Old Gold" cigarettes.
 I unwrapped the pack of fire crackers, unbraided two and set them aside. I took the remainder with me as I crept down the hall with a cigarette dangling from my mouth, and an aluminum baseball bat in my hands because, well, you never know.
Outside Dave's door I crouched down, quietly setting the bat on the floor.
Working carefully, I took the fire crackers and untwisted the main fuse, brushing away some of the black powder to slow the burn.
 Then I slowly slid the pack under Daves door until only the tissue paper fuse remained outside.
I lit it with my cigarette, grabbed the bat, and retreated to my room.
The click of the deadbolt on my door was followed by the staccato raping of the fire crackers, and then a few seconds later, Dave was beating on my door accusing me of being some kind of fucker.
I thought it was rude of him to beat on my door in the middle of the night, so I began launching bottle rockets out under the door,  and then listened to Dave scream and run away, presumably back to his room.
    After a while I figured justice had been mostly served, But we still needed a random element.
So I took the two remaining fire crackers and crept quietly into the kitchen.
I placed them on the stove burner under the coffee pot, which had been set up before we went to bed so that whoever woke up first need only turn on the burner to start the coffee.

Satisfied, I went back to my room and laid down.
Then I reached over and shut off my twitching alarm clock.
I didn't think I'd need it.

I dozed, having odd uneasy dreams until, right on schedule,
BANG!.....BANG!

Time for coffee!

TALES FROM THE HELL HOUSE #1

     The Hellhouse was the bottom flat of an old Victorian in San Francisco, on Ashbury St, half a block up from Haight.  it was next door to Janis Joplins old flat. I moved into the Hell house after being politely kicked out of my sisters flat upstairs.  My "room" was actually a closet under the stairs. It was slightly larger than a bed, but was cool in it’s own right. My new housemates were Klutch, Dave, and a Hawaiian guy who was never there. This was in the 80's. I was a punk rocker and a bike messenger. Full of energy and bad ideas. The hell house was perfect for me.
    TALES FROM THE HELL HOUSE are some of the things that went on there.

TALES FROM THE HELL HOUSE #1

 We were sitting in the kitchen on a Saturday afternoon drinking beer when I got an idea.
I chugged down the last of my beer, and then went down the hall and out to the front door. Our door bell had never worked, at least not in the time I had lived there. Knocks often went unnoticed, as we spent a lot of time in the kitchen, which was at the back of the flat.
     I decided it was time to fix this problem,  so I carefully pried the little black button out of the door bell housing and looked inside. The contacts were blueish green with corrosion.
I knew just what to do.
 I then slid out the little sign that said "Bell" and changed it to say "Hell",  and tossed the button aside, replacing it with a thumb tack facing point out.
     I then went back into the kitchen and cracked open another beer. When I told my housemates what I had done, and they both asked “why?”

“This way we’ll know when someone is here” I assured them.

“how do you figure?” they asked

Almost on cue, we heard a scream  and then a string of obscenities coming form the vicinity of the front door.

"Someone is here," I said.

I answered the door  to find friend standing on the porch rubbing his thumb. Cradled in his other arm were some fantastic offerings.
Booze, and Lawn Darts.

    Dangerous game for drunks with no lawn. 

    But then again, I think that applied to most everything we did. 

    Croquet seems fairly tame until you played our version, with a golf style swing in the narrow hallway of our flat. Instead of wickets, we set up a ramp and a series of targets. The only real rule was that the players had to be drunk, and the object was to hit the ball down the hall and up the ramp so that it flew through the air and hit one of the targets. If the target hit was the globe, the reward was to drink a tasty cold beer. Sometimes a player would miss the targets, and the hard wooden ball would careen into the kitchen and destroy something in there. If this were to happen, the penalty was to drink a tasty cold beer. It was a good game. 

     Bowling is pretty safe, unless the pins are replaced by a television set, and you are "bowling" from the third floor balcony. 

     This once lead to the idea of "bowling shots" 

It goes like this:  The "bowler" stands on the third floor balcony, and the "pin boy" on the ground below. The "score keeper" fills the three holes with vodka, then the "bowler" rotates the ball, spilling out the vodka, counts to three and releases the ball. The "pin boy" attempts to catch the vodka, but not the ball, in his mouth. 

     Lucky for us, we argued too long about the scoring system, (if you should gain or lose points for being hit with the ball) and by the time we were drunk enough to do it, no one was able to climb the stairs with the ball. 

    We invented another game called "Ceiling fan pool". The idea was to throw an (empty) egg carton up into the air so that it was hit by the fan, and landed somewhere interesting. This would be met by cheers, and toasts, and more beer. One night, as the hours wore on into morning, the game mutated into "Wadded up newspaper pool", then "Empty beer can pool", then "Full beer can pool", and finally "Anything in your grasp pool".
Interesting note: a ceiling fan missing a blade becomes highly unstable, and will eventually rip itself from the ceiling and even catch on fire.
     The funny thing is that the bowling ball, the croquet set, the ceiling fan, these were all gifts.
From People who knew us. 
From people who should have known better!
Maybe they did it for their own amusement.

One housemate was (god only knows why) given a gas powered weed whacker for his birthday.
Later in a drunken frenzy he "cleaned" his room with it.
Aluminum baseball bats, fireworks, bowling balls, Lawn darts, weed whackers...
Dangerous gifts for dangerous games.
For dangerous people.
Gifts from people who should have known better...
Then again, Maybe they did.

Gnome Roast

   My friend Kenny asked for this tale.  He knows it already 'cause he was there, but I'll tell it now, for you.

It goes like this.
     In the late 80's and early 90s I was a mechanic. I mostly worked on old Vespa scooters, but also "modern" ones like the Yamaha Rivas, Jogs, Zumas, etc. I worked for one of San Francisco's few Scooter shops at the time, which I will not name because, well, you never know.
    Work as a mechanic can be somewhat feast or famine. Many days went by with hardly a break from the wrench, other days were a waiting game. On these slow days, we would amuse ourselves by doing things that were not specifically repair oriented. My supervisor was an English guy who raced motorcycles and drove a hearse. He wore all black, and listened to nine inch nails. He didn't mind our antics, and in fact, he encouraged them. Some times when there was no work to be done, he would shout from his desk, "Oi! Tiki... Blow something up!"
    He was my boss, and  I was obliged to comply.
    Now and then the shock waves from our improvised fireworks would summon the general manager from the front of the building. He would come running back, wild eyed, waving his arms and pleading for us to make it stop.  But for the most part we were able to feign ignorance and blame it on a back-fire or a blow-out.
  Now, the part about the blow-out was not entirely untrue, as we had discovered that in the absence of material more volatile,  you could lock the air compressor hose to the valve stem of an old inner tube, and it will inflate to point of bursting, which, if this were to happen, say in the elevator shaft, creates a quite satisfying "boom" which would cause the sweat shop manager from upstairs to come running down, wild eyed, waving her arms and pleading for us to make it stop.
     One of our proud moments was when we discovered, quite by accident, that our tennis ball canon, modified to accept a lag bolt, was capable of propelling said bolt clean through the cinderblock wall, leaving a cartoon like hole in the perfect shape of the bolt.
     Good times.
      Our general manager was an unaware catalyst to our mayhem. We always seemed to be able to persuade him to buy things that ultimately would be put to bad use.
     One particularly slow day we convinced him that we needed a garden gnome as a mascot, for good luck and to boost moral. We must have seemed sincere, as he went out and bought a us fine concrete garden gnome.
     He placed it at the back entrance to the shop where it sat on its cement barrel, swigging from a mug of beer,  sure to attract a flood of customers.
     As luck would have it, it was also around this time that we discovered that a degreasing gun, properly modified, became a fairly impressive Flame thrower.
      One fine afternoon, our manager came out back to check on the source of shouting and cheering. He came around the corner asking "So, how's our gnome doing...."  and was greeted with this....

So there you have it.
The gnome disappeared shortly after this, and our general manager never would tell us what happened to it.