Pair marvel at shrunken cream

 


Pair marvel at shrunken cream


    This one is just a little snapshot of life in the drug confused but colorful days of the mid-1970's.  After the Midvale experiment Zeke and I had a good run at a terrific apartment at Veteran and Ohio near the old Federal building in West LA. The place was deluxe in almost every way except the fact the owners were getting ready to sell the valuable property so huge mega-blights could replace this old-fashioned luxury dwelling. When we lived there the large front room was full of Value Village furniture including two couches and a couple of easy chairs where friends would get high and sip suds or cheap wine. There was no stove and all meals were prepared out of an electric frying pan. No one had girlfriends for pretty good reasons and most of our time was spent hanging out together. One of the traditions of the dead-end lifestyle was getting drunk-stoned and then satisfying raging munchies by eating sweets or junk food in many forms. Mostly it was VandeKamp cookies or mini-pies and all manner of ice cream. We were young and believed we were just going to live forever so caution was thrown from the second floor of the building. One night we got very stoned and had dramatic munchies. We were broke and needed junk food or sweets. Still extraordinarily stoned we located an old quart of ice cream in the back of the freezer and pulled open the top and found an ice cap and remnants of what had been a dessert product. Greg and I stood in stoned amazemnt at the useless confection and remembered the moment later as a scene from a painting called "Pair marvel at shrunken cream" You kind of had to be there but I always swore when I retired I was going to create a series of oil paintings and one would be "Pair Marvel at Shrunken Cream." 



Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Athletic Club Flower shop

Image
  Athletic Club Flower shop      This phrase is actually the telephone greeting at Greg's uncle Johnny Tassano's flower shop at 808 W. 8th street near Flower street in downtown L.A. Greg loved the place and culled many a story and line from his experiences at a place he worked and visited fondly. Even when he wasn't employed he drove around with cousin Kent (Kevin Smith) and they had a ball observing the absurdities of modern living in the Southland. The phone was answered by different employees and each had a unique turn of "Athletic Club...flowershopppp" There was owner John Tassano, right-hand man Ronald P. Lord, "Speed," a delivery man, and Carmen who cut flowers and told odd anecdotes such as the origin of pizza. I believe Greg and Kevin could go on for weeks about the people they met on their deliveries as they set forth across the city of the angels to spread floral joy. This might include places to eat, fascinating neighborhoods, cemeteries, lone...
Read more

Oil and gas crowd

Image
  Oil and gas crowd       This one comes from cousin  Kevin's bold political action volunteering for the Fred Harris presidential campaign in 1976. Kevin got a terrific piece on the campaign published as an editorial in the Los Angeles Times and also developed an imitation of the candidates speaking voice. Fred Harris was everything you would want in a public servant  and had come close to being asked to be Vice President but his brand was not widely known. Despite representing Oklahoma as a senator Harris managed to be an admirable liberal who favored the Great Society and economic democracy. Way ahead of his time Fred wanted to wrest control away from corporations and millionaires. He travelled in a recreation vehicle wth young Smith aboard to cut down on costs and was as grass roots as it gets. Fred was married to native-american LaDonna and to this day we have buttons stating "LaDonna for First Lady." Kevin would repeat the phrase from Fred's speeches a...
Read more

alright mother

Image
  alright mother- “You can find poetry in your everyday life, your memory, in what people say on the bus, in the news, or just what’s in your heart.” —Carol Ann Duffy  Greg was always delighted by a story told by his mother in law about a "sortie" dinner party attended by a Doctor "Putty" Putnam who had been forced to attend an opera by his wife. When asked by a clueless guest if he enjoyed the opera, his response was  "fuck you!" When I was visiting Bear Cove and sitting next to the matriarch Greg goaded her into telling the tale. But a rum n' coke had loosened "Minnie's" tongue and when she got to Putty's answer she blurted a rather hard FUCK YOU!  Roy, hearing his bride curse thusly said across the table "Alright mother!"
Read more