Today we found a man's flip-flop in the backyard, and the back gate open.

Wolf Dog has thus far refused to comment.

If you know who owns this shoe, I'd be interesting in talking to him. Or to whatever's left of him. Me, I'm checking the corners of the backyard for freshly turned earth.

today's spanish lesson comes courtesy of the U.S. Postal Service, specifically a lobby poster I had lots of time to translate while one clerk served 15 customers:

Ponga su bienestar en buenos manos.

I'll admit that at first, I was fooled.  I was thinking "dialect," and mistook ponga su for a reference to Ritchie Valens' adaptation of Buddy Holly's hit Peggy Sue, which peaked at #4 on the Uruguayan Top 40 in 1958.

But the rest of the words didn't match up, so I studied the visuals for context: Three young people gathered affectionately around a matron. They appeared to be getting ready to take her somewhere. That's it!

Put your grandmother in good hands.

The caption included details on how to pack your grandmother for shipping.  Foam peanuts only, as the bubble wrap tends to suffocate.  Be sure to use ZIP Code (9 digits) and no string, which snags on machinery. Insurance? Delivery confirmation? (Suggestive selling?) All right here, for nominal additional cost.

The Post Office also hosted a couple who must have dressed each other. They'd settled on black athletic shoes, black (now gray) socks, shorts, and black concert T-shirts. Between them they carried about 150 lbs. extra of road-hugging weight. One of the T-shirts listed the European and American tour cities for Styx, with the graffito classic rock my ass! scrawled across them.

I guess no one ever dressed up to visit the Post Office, so no particular tradition was broken, or established, here.

The mention of Styx will always cue the single "Babe" in my head, from when they began to sound more and more like the Partridge Family. In my junior-high years, specifically 1979, you had to like Styx. No, really: You had to like Styx, and it went without saying. You could like all sorts of bands, but Styx? Duh. Even the self-identified rednecks put Styx at the top of their list. This trend culminated with the band's 1979 tour. The Monday after that concert defined your junior-high status. If you showed up in the correctly dated, brand-new T-shirt, you stood about one foot above the commoners. And no, you could not have gotten someone else to buy a shirt for you. You'd be found out for that lie, and shamed.

One hardy soul appeared wearing a knock-off T-shirt, which could only be bought outside the stadium, and that effort counted for something. It meant he'd risked getting mugged on the grounds of Houston's Summit just to pay $6 for a souvenir whose silkscreen wouldn't survive two launderings. Whether he actually got in to see the band was secondary. He tried, and at least that meant his Mom was cool enough to let him be out late.

If you didn't like Styx in those days, you were wise not to say anything. Not liking Styx was worse for your status than liking Styx was good for it. Not liking Styx put you in active opposition to those who did, and implied they had poor taste. Junior-high elites could not tolerate criticism.

in other spottings today, I saw a car exit the freeway with "$4,800" blazing across its windshield in three colors. I guess he'd just bought it. I'd have certainly "bought it" trying to drive with that much paint blocking my windscreen. Whose responsibility is it to scrape that stuff off once the car has been sold? Does the dealer leave it there to remind the purchaser of his monthly payments? Or did the proud new owner leave it in place until the next heavy rain, to show his neighbors he'd bought a "new" car?

There was a time when actual new cars were well within the reach of the middle class. Dad brought it home and parked it at the end of the driveway so all the neighbors could see. New cars came with stickers -- still do -- and even if you had a convertible (top down for display), you'd leave that window up so everyone could see what you'd paid for it. I suppose that was more dignified than having the price on the windshield, but it achieved the same end.

anyway, back to styx: By 1982, Styx had become a penny stock, reduced to opening for the Rolling Stones on their first "last tour." The crowd at the Astrodome, waiting hours for the 'Stones to appear, could not have cared less about the "rock opera" Styx was staging for their benefit. I don't know what the junior-high crowd was listening to by then. But nobody cared about Styx anymore.

And now, you can only find their fans at the U.S. Post Office.

still wondering about who owns that shoe. Wolf Dog, however, seems nonplussed.

update: Found the other shoe.

Posted by: Michael Rittenhouse at 05:15 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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