Indiana Jones and the Lost Café at Borders

With many of us eagerly awaiting the return of Harrison Ford as Han Solo in the upcoming Star Wars sequel, some have come to wonder if we'll ever see Harrison Ford again in his other great iconic film role. Well, who knows?Here's a taste of what such a movie might be like as Harrison Ford once again essays the role of Indiana Jones in ... 

Indiana Jones and the Lost Cafe at Borders! 

As Indiana Jones wraps up a class he is teaching at Marshall College, his friend and colleague Marcus Brody approaches him.

Marcus:   I see you’re back none the worse for wear, Indiana.  I hear your latest escapade is being referred to as Indiana Jones and the Lost Car Keys of Murray Blitzstein.

Indy:  Yes, Marcus, the keys had been missing for almost three days.  The Nazis were already there at Blitzstein’s home jumping at the chance to steal a Studebaker from a member of the Jewish faith, and I had to tangle with Belloq in the kitchen and the hall bath to find them.

Marcus:  How did you locate the keys, Indy?

Indy: In the morning rays of the sun at precisely 5:42 A.M., I saw the glint of the keys in the left back pocket of Blitzstein’s seersucker suit pants.  He had accidentally placed them there, normally being a front right pocket man.

Marcus:  Brilliant, as usual, Indiana.  Did you restore the keys to Mr. Blitzstein?

Indy:  No, Marcus, the Lost Car Keys of Murray Blitzstein belong in a museum. Blitzstein will have to buy himself an Edsel.

Marcus:  Indy, there’s another important matter I need to discuss with you.  Have you ever heard of Borders?

Indy:  Indeed.  It was a book store, a chain of book stores, which proliferated in North America prior to the rise of the Amazons.  The fossil record is unclear, but we believe they were destroyed either by a natural catastrophe, climate change, or some woman named E.L. James.

Marcus:  That's right, Indiana.  And what we have learned is that inside each Borders was a hidden sanctuary called a café where people drank coffee and lattes, ate muffins and scones, and thought and talked about intelligent things, like would Henry David Thoreau have written more about throwing up in Walden Pond had he hung out with Charles Bukowski.

Indy:  But what does this have to do with me?

Marcus:  Legend has it that the awesome power that gave rise to this intellectual conversation was in the scones! Your old friend Belloq is intent on being the first to discover the Lost Café at Borders, acquire the wisdom of the scones, and use it to clone Hitler, but this time with a much better mustache!

We next see a map plotting Indy’s route by car from Marshall College in Western PA to Bala-Cynwyd PA where one of the Borders is reputed to have been located. The route stops in Altoona PA where Indy purchases a Slurpee from Seven Eleven and then proceeds to Bala-Cynwyd.

Sallah:  Indy!  I knew you’d be here.  Look, Belloq’s got full excavation going already! And Marion’s here now too.

Indy:  Marion?  Belloq?

Sallah: No, that’s two people, Indy, one named Marion and one named Belloq. Not Marion Belloq.

Indy: What do you know about the Lost Café at Borders, Sallah?

Sallah:  I know one thing.  They are digging in the wrong place!

Indy:  How can you tell?

Sallah:  See the two Starbucks Coffee Shops 100 yards apart from each other?  I believe the book store was called Borders because it was usually bordered on both sides by a Starbucks.  Belloq, the fool, is digging by the Bed, Bath, & Beyond!

Digging a make-shift shaft, Indy lowers himself down into the inner chamber of the ruins of Borders.

Sallah:  Indy!  What do you see?

Indy:  Books everywhere!  Magazines.  CDs of all kinds!  This would be a great place to browse on a Saturday afternoon!  Make a note of that.

Sallah: Any snakes down there?

Indy:  Just Belloq.  And he’s got Marion!

Belloq:  Hello, Dr. Jones.  I was in one of the two Starbucks 100 yards apart trying to get Marion drunk on espresso when I heard you underfoot and knew where to dig.  And I’ve got the intellectual scones too!

Marion:  Indy, if he eats one, he’ll be able to make another Hitler, this one with a mustache even bigger than Stalin’s!

Belloq:  Soon, Dr. Jones, you will see that I have acquired all the wisdom of the Lost Café at Borders!

Belloq brings a dry scone to his mouth and makes a face.

Belloq:  I think I’d rather open a lost ark.

Indy:  You think that thing’s dry now, you should have had one when it was fresh!

Belloq eats the scone.   

Belloq:  Yes, I feel the power of the scones coming over me now, Jones!  Sweeping over every pore of my body!  It’s beautiful!

Marion: Kind of predictable, isn’t he?

Belloq:  Now … If you get your Borders ticket punched five times, you will get a free latte in the cafe! All Joni Mitchell records 50% off with purchase of a cappuccino! Buy three dry scones and take 25% off Jonathan Franzen’s latest book! What is this?  This isn’t the wisdom of the Lost Café at Borders!

Indy:  No, but it is the wisdom of managing the Lost Café at Borders.

Belloq:  And we have the finest Judaica section in Bala-Cynwyd too!  Every book by Elie Wiesel!! And don’t forget Schindler’s List in videos!!!

Belloq screams, shrieks something about free wrapping in the mezzanine, and thereupon his head gruesomely explodes.

Marion: Shall we take a look at some of the books here before we leave, Indy?  Maybe one by E.L. James?

Indy:  No, I think we’ve done enough with anachronisms already today, Marion.

Marion: Where to next, Indy?  

Indy:  Off to discuss the next Indiana Jones sequel with Steven Spielberg.   I’d like to get it wrapped before I’m 80.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A Day Without Cursing

A day without cursing?  Could I do it?

I wanted to say 'fuck yeah!' but that would have blown it already. And I was determined.

We live in a schizophrenic society.  Put on cable television any hour night or day and seldom is heard a non-four letter word unless you're watching a Frozen marathon.  But out in the real world, you are wise to use four-letter words in reasonable proportion to other lettered ones lest you be judged an ill mannered lout, sex offender, or even worse, comedian Bob Saget. 

My proportions had become anything but proportionate.  The 'f' word and 's' words had begun to rule my vocabulary the way Coca-Cola and coffee rule my taste buds. The situation had reached its apotheosis the other day when I endeavored to help a sweet little old day across the street with the words "Need assistance crossing the fucking street, miss?" which did not particularly find favor with her.

Something had to be done to develop a  way to put the four letter words in their place --- which was in my mouth --- but in my mouth far less frequently.

And I came up with the solution:  Spend one whole day without cursing. If I could do that, I could certainly learn to curse with discretion and judgment all the other days, especially the ones that I wasn't being fired from a job or dumped from a relationship. 

The night before the day selected I read six stories by Charles Bukowski to get the nasty words out of my system, then watched the first chapter of Anne of Green Gables all the way through, making sure to cry at every appropriate moment. 

I was ready. 

Showering and shaving the next morning were uneventful. Then on my way to locating my shoes to put them on, I smashed my foot against a bureau.  It hurt.

"You mother ...." I began. 

 And stopped.

"You mother lode of misery!" I yowled.  

Challenge No. 1 met and overcome. Points for creativity too.

Settling behind the wheel of my car, I noticed that I needed gas to get to my destination.  I was annoying, because as usual I was late.

"Oh, shi..."  I started.

And "Oh, shine on, shine on havest moon!"  I finished.

So far, so good.  But the mother lode of all challenges was yet to face me.  
Later in the day I was involved in a small fender bender. 

"You asshole!  You fucking asshole!" the other driver bellowed.

"Now let's not be hasty or rude," I countered.

"Asshole!  Fucking asshole!"  he replied. 

I could take no more!

"You, sir," I fired back, "are a fink."

" A fink? I'm a fink?"

"You are!  A dirty rotten fink."

And he stopped in his tracks. "Oh, what the heck, buddy, it's just a scratch anyway."

Challenge No. 3 and Victory! Day virtually complete, I returned home and the next day returned to cursing. But maybe from now on I do have a bit of control over the words that issue forth from my lips.  Maybe I can take the high road every once in a while. 

Know what?

Fink yeah!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Shocking Newsical about Seussical

And Fenced It Through Detroit!

The Original Cover of a Classic.

Not often does a bombshell hit the literary world like the one that exploded late last week! 

Especially when it comes shortly before the March 2 birthday observance for one of  the most beloved authors of our time and the one upon whom the bombshell squarely landed.

According to his recently disclosed  private papers, Theodor Geisel --- much better known to the world as Dr. Seuss --- was in truth a  hedonistic nihilist who believed that life had no purpose, the only logical response to which was to indulge the pleasures of the body with an endless barrage of alcohol, drugs, and sex. 

"Make no mistake," said the author's nephew Lamont "Gus" Geisel, "this guy had more tail than a petting zoo!" 

Just surfaced last week and fully catalogued by Gus Geisel,  the "Dr. Seuss Papers " reveal A Portrait of the Artist as a Scunge Man whose major literary influences were Charles Bukowski, Henry Miller, and the Marquis deSade.  (Geisel Listing 41-15j).   His original sex-drenched illustrated books were carefully edited and expurgated by his publisher Rancid Press, however,  when even Bukowski threw up after reading them.

The author's life tale is a lurid one.  Expelled from public school for flunking home room,  14-year-old Ted Geisel left his native Massachusetts for a journey of  personal discovery and exploration which took him to Buenos Aires,  Rio de Janeiro, and El Segundo CA with only occasional trips back to Massachusetts for clean socks.

Geisel  rejected Christianity early on because "Jesus loves me, but I want to see other people" (Geisel Listing 79-5z),  and turned to Judaism but rejected it as well when he bit into his first piece of Hanukkah Gelt and discovered --- as all Jewish children must --- that the gilt packaging is far tastier than the chocolate inside itself. 

Young Geisel next began a four (4) year exploration of the Baha'i Faith, quitting in disgust with the words "Four long years and I've only met Seals,  never Crofts!" (Geisel Listing 143-9z)

From then on, Geisel embarked on a lifelong nine (9) continent spree of alcohol and drug-ridden debauchery and perversion,  and no, that wasn't a typo, an entire new continent  had to be invented to fully house Seuss' massive profligacy,  the sheer magnitude of which caused Keith Richards to famously utter "Has the man no shame?" (Geisel Listing 03-9n)

Taking the name Dr. Seuss because he had handled so many drugs he had come  to  actually believe he was a doctor, the author penned the original versions of many of his best loved works,  including The Cat with the Hat in His Lap, How the Grinch Stole Christmas and Fenced It Through Detroit, and Horton Humps a Who.  To his dismay, all were dramatically altered by Rancid Press.

"My uncle was especially upset that the cannibalism theme was wholly omitted from  How the Grinch Stole Christmas and Fenced It Through Detroit," commented Gus Geisel, "as was the sudden acute myocardial infarction suffered by the Grinch when his heart suddenly grew three sizes that day." (Geisel Listing 67-3p)

A rare copy of Dr. Seuss' unedited masterpiece Oh, the Lame Places You'll Go is believed to exist and is driving Gus Geisel crazy that he can't catalogue it under his annoying system. "The manuscript will likely be sold at auction for millions," remarked Gus Geisel, "unless the owner is some incredible moron who's stupid enough to post it for free on the Internet!"  

Etched on Dr. Seuss' tombstone are the following words from his classic Green Eggs and Ham and the Board of Health:

"Could you, would you
with a goat?

I would not,
 I could not, with  a goat!"

Ironically, those words actually did make it into the final version of the book Green Eggs and Ham. (at pages 42-43)

"My uncle," reflected Gus Geisel, "would have been pleased."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
 And Happy Upcoming Birthday to the real Dr. Seuss!  

(Sorry about this, Mr. Geisel.   I am, I am!)