DAY 59: THE GOONIES

HEY YOU GUUUYS! 

1985 was 365 red letter days for a young cinephile. I think I went to the theater more that year than I had in all my previous 14 years: Rambo, Rocky, Fletch, A View to a Kill, Breakfast Club, Weird Science, Real Genius, Fandango, Pee Wee's Big Adventure, Mad Max, Commando, Teen Wolf, Silverado, Elm St 2, Fright Night, Day of the Dead, Return of the Living Dead (Braaaains), Year of the Dragon (MICKEY!), The Last Dragon (NOT MICKEY!), Ladyhawke, Cocoon, The Sure Thing, Young Sherlock Holmes, Brazil, Legend, Pale Rider, and the have to be seen to be believed Gymkata. Don't even get me started on Remo Williams and Just One of the Guys! You know what I'm talkin' about.


That's just scratching the celluloid surface and I saw 'em all! Yep, '85 was a banner year my friends, and after multiple viewings of both The New Kids, and Tuff Turf, I decided that I wanted to be a slick as shit badass prick like James Spader, the star of these unheralded gems.


To me his slimeball arrogance and pompous aloofness oozed confidence. His villainous caricatures conveyed not menace but an attractive sense of danger, a certain 'je ne sais don't fuck with me'. The charisma Spader exuded was second only to Mr. Rourke's, and even when he lost he won because he was motherfucking James Spader.


To that end whenever I found myself in a sticky predicament, let's just say like nervously struggling with the decision of whether or not I should go for an under the shirt fumbling braille reading with Melanie Huddert in the balcony of the Palm Theater during The Goonies, my mantra became "What would James Spader do?". 


I remember watching the rest of the movie in silence, alone, thinking it was ironic that the Goonies were following the directions of a pirate named One-Eyed Willy and it lead them into nothing but trouble, and here I was alone with a soda soaked crotch, licking blood from my split and increasingly swelling lip. 


I was also thinking I was pretty sure Martha Plimpton had a penis.

A week later I called Melanie like nothing had happened and told her that she bored me and I was hoping she could give me her best friends phone number. Instead of providing the digits she paid for us to go see Back to the Future and insisted on under the shirt shenanigans.

WWJSD indeed.

BABY RUUUTH!

DAY 58: DAREDEVIL

In the kingdom of the blind the one-eyed man is king.

Of course he has zero depth perception and knocks over his goblet every time he reaches for it, but thats ok because no-one ever sees him do it. 


And what's with an entire kingdom of blind people? What are the odds? 

I bet there was an eclipse.

DAY 57: STAR WARS

Star Wars went from being "just a movie" to Phenomenon with alarming expedience. I was 6 and I saw it 4 times in a month. As my father was quick to remind us he wasn't made of money, money didn't grow on trees, and that if you didn't quit your crying he'd give you something to cry about. I was never clear on this last point as it seemed self defeating but I never challenged it as I was sure his explanation would be non-verbal. So, I was on my own to raise funds for these repeat viewings of Lucas' seminal masterpiece.


Being a resourceful lad, I decided to take a page from the Old Man's book and get into sales. My first venture involved a garage sale, something I was quite familiar with, as my mother used to drag me around the neighborhood junk circuit with painful frequency. She would map out a route using the Classifieds like she was Magellan in a beehive and crepe soled shoes. "One man's trash is another man's treasure" was her motto. Other pearls she would impart included "Waste not want not" and vague references to starving children in Africa. The Holiday favourite "Wait til your father gets home" was much less vague when she discovered my unsanctioned garage sale included her new Hoover, my father's golf clubs, and my chubby brother's summer wardrobe. I didn't get it, I thought the Old Man would be proud that I had grasped the core fundamentals of sales at such a tender age. Without spending a dime of my own funds on overhead I had managed to make a tidy profit for myself: two whole dollars! I was promptly subject to a hostile takeover, losing all proceeds and access to inventory, not to mention the hiding of a lifetime.

Not one to be disheartened by this fiscal setback I set out again immediately with a new enterprise: newspaper delivery. Not being of age to gain employment from one of the major corporations I struck out on my own as an Independent. I called my organization "Yesterday's News". Lacking in capital, I scoured the neighboring surveys on garbage day and loaded my brother's Radio Flyer with the communities discarded news publications, making detailed mental note of who subscribed to what, and then went door to door trying to sell last weeks Globe to the house that read the Star, the Star to the Sun reader, and so on. Following this was a failed attempt at a landscaping contract, however every time I ran over someone's extension cord with the electric mower they seemed reticent to release payment for partial services rendered. At one point I even made a detailed plan for bank heist, detailed being 3 green plastic army men, an empty toilet paper roll, and a toy Ford Gran Torino from Starsky and Hutch. Having neither a Starsky nor a Hutch as a getaway driver became problematic and the plan was scrapped.

Then one day, watching my mother don the rubber gloves to clean up the mud I had tracked into the kitchen when I had "claimed" a dog from the forest behind my school (that's another story altogether. I named him Jack), inspiration hit me like a slap across the face with a stack of wet five dollar bills: Sanitation Engineering. Using my brother's school pencil crayons, I selected the then politically correct and widely accepted Flesh and Indian Red and hastily made some homemade business cards and left them in the mailboxes of a dozen carefully selected senior citizens from the neighboring blocks.


And then I waited. 
And waited. 
And on the third day, it being a Sunday, I rose, extra early, and carefully cradling a carton of eggs under one arm I peddled back to the 'old folks' part of town and drive-by egged every Lincoln and Caddy on the street, and was home in time for The Hilarious House of Frightenstein.

And so Handy Dandy Spic and Span Car Washing Inc. was born. 


And that's how I funded 4 outings to a galaxy far, far away.

DAY 56: DONKEY KONG

I'm pretty sure I invented the Eighties.

You're welcome.

DAY 55: AQUAMAN

Where does one find a seahorse that big? 


This is a point that's always creased me. For some reason I can suspend disbelief when it comes to a guy talking and breathing underwater and telepathically communicating with starfish, but I've never accepted the idea of a 9 foot seahorse. A 9 foot seahorse named Storm (Junior's was named Imp, FYI). Why a seahorse? Why not something cool like a Great White, or practical like a Hammerhead? We never heard mention of other mega-seahorse, no roving schools of hippocampus gigantus. 


Maybe my ire stems from my utter and total fear of being in the water with wildlife the same size as me or bigger. It doesn't matter if it is a fish that is undeniably harmless, has a bushy bunny tail and blows rainbow kisses, if I can't pick it up with one hand its to be treated as a clear and present danger. 


There was a legend of a monster carp in the creek my friend Theodore and I used to fish in before school. Several times a week and every weekend we'd meet at a quarter to six a.m. for an hour or so of fishing. Just two 11 year old boys chomping on 59 cent Century Sam cigars, lightheartedly cajoling each other about being attacked by "Ol' Samson", as this fresh water behemoth was known by the locals. 


Until the chill Saturday morning he struck and legend became reality. 


While crossing the creek to get to the aptly named Bug Island, waist deep in brackish crick water, something bumped me. Not brushed. Bumped, nearly knocking me over. The sun was just cresting the treetops, long shadows eerily playing across the still black water, Ted was on the other side of the creek, out of earshot and opportunity of assclownery. I was alone. My fear of water beasts began creating probabilities of Canadian fresh water gators and mutated Leech Men. 


It might have been my urine that caused Samson to surface, it might just have been his whimsy to make his presence known, I'll never know, but when Ol' Samson broke the stillness of that black creek less than 3 feet in front of me I knew both fear and awe. 


A carp is nothing more than an overgrown goldfish, but this...thing...was something else. Something old, something sentient, something not to be trifled with. My cheap cigar clamped firmly between clenched teeth I continued to quietly sully my hand-me-down Levi's orange tabs. I marveled at its nearly 4 and a half foot long body, the rising sun glinting off its ruddy brown scales, realizing I wasn't much bigger than it, suddenly feeling somewhat less signifigant. And it just sat there on the surface, completely still other than its slowly undulating tail, staring. At me. Its cold, wet, black eyes were like two stagnant pools of hatred, probing my soul and finding it wanting. Eyes that calmly told me everything I needed to know. "Booooooy. This is my domain boy. You are not welcome here. Get. Out. Boy". I don't remember telling my legs to move but move they did, and out I got, with one last look over my shoulder to see the leviathan slowly, almost leisurely, descending back into the murky depths from whence it came.

Or maybe it just creases me that Aquaman named his pet walrus Tusky. 


Tusky? Really?

DAY 54: KIX

Nuthin' says nuclear devastation like Crispy Corn Puffs.

Just months after the United States dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima, effectively destroying the city and directly killing an estimated 80,000 people, Kix cereal offered an Atomic Bomb Ring in exchange for a box top and 15 cents.

Seriously. 

Look it up.

"Little Boy" tested, mother approved.

DAY 53: BATMAN AND ROBIN

I recently wore this shirt to my local. The bar is a far cry from Mos Eisley, but you are not going to find anything served with a side of citrus either. It reminds me of the inside of a lung: it is dark and nicotine stained, and on a Saturday night it could be described as "phlegmy", but you know, in the good way. Not unlike the blind date my mother set up for me in twelfth grade with the niece of the deli-counter girls friends neighbor: it has "a great personality and character", and after a few beers I had a good time, but it ain't much to look at. 


As my 2 cohorts, the Intrepid Shapiro and Fearless O'Toole, split up in search of suitable seating and suitably intoxicated Little People respectively (it's his thing, I don't judge), I ordered us a round of beers from the weathered and cragged barmaid tending the only just slightly less weathered and cragged bar. As I patiently awaited the foamy nectar of the gods to be slowly poured from the tap by the bitter yet buxom single mother of 2, this rumpled heap slouched in the corner, with one eye closed and the other powerfully squinted in my direction, slurred "Robin is a dick". 


What was confusing was he said this like he was expecting me to debate this point. This is a widely regarded given, Robin is indeed a dick. "Yes, yes he is. You're quite right" I smiled and politely replied, ensuring I didn't make eye-contact. I read somewhere once that maintaining direct eye contact with a feral beast is considered an act of aggression. "What did you call me?" Popeye quietly spat through gritted yellowing teeth. I stood my ground. This was done less out of stalwart manly manliness and more so due to the fact that my beer had yet to arrive in my sweaty slightly trembling hand. In an unwise attempt to establish dominance I turned to face the drunken puddle. And that's when this abhorration of nature unfurled himself. My neck craned as I followed his ascent to his full 6'4" and he clenched his fists. Jesus, even his ragged fingernails had muscles! 


Taking in his calloused knuckles, sloping brow, and absence of a neck I quickly determined that this man suffered from a decided imbalance of hormone. I was certain the address on his NRA card simply declared "Up A Tree". 


I quickly surveyed my situation, summing up this drunken monolith of a man and noticing for the first time that this particular model came with 3 interchangeable toadies skulking in his ginormous shadow. "What did you call me, pussy?" he stupidly asked again. I scanned for backup, but the Intrepid Shapiro and Fearless O'Toole were nowhere to be seen. Of course. Discretion being the better part of valor I thought maybe to give him the benefit of the doubt: it was loud, he was drunk, maybe he didn't hear me properly. I'm an affable fellow, I don't consciously offend big men like this. I opened my cotton mouth, intending to quell the situation with an offer to buy the giant and his motley crew a round of fermented hops and barley, but Kong cut me off, shoving a hairy sausage-link like digit in my face, "Robin is a dick and so are you and Batfag". Bat...Fag? Was this neandrathal actually trying to antagonize me by hurling slings and arrows about fictional comicbook characters? Batfag? BATFAG!  Much louder and much much slower I succinctly clarified what I was trying to say originally: "You. Are. A. Huge. Douchebag". I may be affable but I tend to consistently err on the side of umsmart.

The madness and mayhem that ensued defies description. Well at least by me as I was somewhat preoccupied. Shapiro and O'Toole seemed to be engaging in a running commentary as they casually supped upon the beer that I had procured for us, starting up the chant "Two men enter, one man leaves!"

Afterwards, as they dusted me off...actually mopped me up would be more accurate...they defended their inaction thusly: 1) Shapiro- someone had to guard the beer, and 2)O'Toole- what did I think was going to happen when I decided to sport a bright orange shirt prominently featuring Robin in mid-pirouette.

After much discourse and deliberation, and many fine ales, I came to the conclusion that both were very valid and acceptable points.


Robin actually is a Dick.