Monthly Archives: October 2023

We don’t get all shook up around hot surfaces, our Elvis oven mitt still keeps us from becoming a hunka hunka burning love.  I don’t how we acquired this memento of the first pop icon postage stamp, but I do remember that we were living in Virginia when everyone started “itching like a man on a fuzzy tree” for the Elvis stamp.  Roman Mars and the good folks at 99 Percent Invisible brought me back to that time with this story.  Also thanks to my mother for my earliest Elvis memories, and for taking me and my sister to see him in concert.  Happy birthday Mom!

There are names that my grandparents knew that were forgotten by the time I was born, and someday all the pop culture references I know will fade into obscurity.  I’m not sure how many of my co-workers were familiar with the name I chose for my Chipotle order– but that’s ok.  I did it for myself.  As I took it from the group I started to sing “I knew a man Bojangles and he ate my lunch…”

His eyes wouldn’t stay open, but he couldn’t keep them closed either. He looked like a sleepwalking senior zombie without the drool. His brothers were gone, his friends were on hospice, it was late at night, and Groucho Marx couldn’t sleep again. The last time he had insomnia, he called Alice Cooper, who lived a few blocks away. Most nights when Groucho would go walking after dark around the neighborhood he saw Alice’s lights on. Alice didn’t go to bed until sunrise.  Groucho got his number from a friend and called him when he got back home.  Alice grabbed a six-pack of beer on his way over to Groucho’s house.  They watched a couple of Robert Mitchum movies and made short work of the beer.  Halfway through ‘Night of the Hunter’ Alice realized that Groucho had fallen asleep.  He threw away the empty beer cans and tip-toed out the back door.  Two nights later when Groucho couldn’t sleep, he called Alice again. 

-this is what went through my imagination when I read that Groucho Marx and Alice Cooper used to hang out together after midnight.