No time at the moment to resume my narrative. We're doing two-a-days up here this week, and I've got to get showered and presentable in time for dinner with the Master Trainer.
But I did take a moment or two to respond to some messages from the Fan Club (see below — by the way, it seems like Burping Squid has fallen off the radar: maybe he/she went out and got a job). Keep the faith, Brother/Sister, and keep those comments and criticisms flowing in.
After all, everything I do — I do for you.
I may steal some time tonight to write. If not, take pity on me. The Master was talking about surprising us with evening strength training sometime this week.
Tuesday, October 11, 2005
Monday, October 10, 2005
To the Mountains
As the aforementioned Aeropuerto Hiltòn did not, in fact, exist, I had to take a cab into the city early Thursday morning to find accommodations. It was 1:30 a.m. by the time I arrived at the Best Western Embajadores, which — if I know my Spanish — means "Impregnators." An odd name for a hotel, but I've always been a big fan of the Best Western hotel chain, which is at this point a clear front-runner for Official Hotel Chain of the Phutatorian World-Empire (though I won't yet rule out Motel 6 until I've reviewed their bid).
Reception was closing at the Best Western Impregnators, but the good people at the counter not only gave me a room — they offered me a discounted "Tarifa Super-Embajador." It may be that something is lost in the translation, and it's really "Super Manly-Man Rate," or something like that. Or word is out about my affair with President Arroyo (in that last AP photo, she did look a bit rotund in the belly).
Anyway, it took most of Thursday morning — and about thirty phone calls to the airport — to get my wheelie-bag released from Security. After the Other Phutatorius knocked me out, a security guard had approached my bag and called out to nearby patrons to claim it. As I was lying on the floor unconscious — and in plain view — some thirty feet away, I was not in a position to respond to these solicitations, and so the guard confiscated it. They weren't exactly in a hurry to resolve the misunderstanding — I had to go up the chain to a supervisor, then patch in the U.S. Ambassador's assistant before they would release the bag. And then they wanted to stick me with the cost of delivering the bag downtown! That didn't fly, Brother/Sister. There are some things on which a traveler has to take a stand.
The bag arrived in my room at around four o'clock in the afternoon. I dropped a three-peso tip on the bellman who brought it, then dumped its contents out on the floor to take an inventory. This for two reasons: (1) to make sure none of these confiscation-happy Seguridaddies had made off with my electric shaver, and (2) to verify that they hadn't planted illegal drugs in any of the side pockets. It would be just like these bastards to pick a fight with me on the phone, then kick down the door and arrest me on a trumped-up possession charge. And once you get a record down here, that shit gets in the Interpol database, and your hopes and dreams of world domination are pretty much dashed.
I went through the pile of belongings on the floor — everything seemed to be there, which was a plus. As for what Airport Security might have planted — none of the usual bags of incriminating white powder. But in the top front pocket of the bag I did find a manila envelope — ah, Manila! What a night we had together, Gloria! — sealed and addressed to me.
I opened it.
Inside was a rental-car voucher and a marked-up road map of southern Peru. A Stickie on the map read, ¡FOLLOW THIS ROUTE! Within the hour I was standing in front of the Hertz counter at Jorge Chavez (would you believe they have a special Impregnator Line there, too?), wondering aloud why you can't get a rental car with a cassette deck anywhere on Earth. I have this iPod tape-adaptor, you see, and I never get to use it on a road trip. Anyway, by sunset I was on the road into the mountains, rocking out to Jimmy Atahualpa's Quechuan interpretation of "Stairway to Heaven" on rural Peruvian AM radio —
Oh! The master's coming down the hall. I can tell his footsteps by the clogs he wears — from a kick-line he can whip one though the air, knock an enemy senseless with it from fifty yards. Saw him do it to a crash-test dummy in a class demo. Pretty freakin' sweet. I'll learn that in the eighth week. In the meantime, the students go barefoot.
Anyway, gotta go!
Reception was closing at the Best Western Impregnators, but the good people at the counter not only gave me a room — they offered me a discounted "Tarifa Super-Embajador." It may be that something is lost in the translation, and it's really "Super Manly-Man Rate," or something like that. Or word is out about my affair with President Arroyo (in that last AP photo, she did look a bit rotund in the belly).
Anyway, it took most of Thursday morning — and about thirty phone calls to the airport — to get my wheelie-bag released from Security. After the Other Phutatorius knocked me out, a security guard had approached my bag and called out to nearby patrons to claim it. As I was lying on the floor unconscious — and in plain view — some thirty feet away, I was not in a position to respond to these solicitations, and so the guard confiscated it. They weren't exactly in a hurry to resolve the misunderstanding — I had to go up the chain to a supervisor, then patch in the U.S. Ambassador's assistant before they would release the bag. And then they wanted to stick me with the cost of delivering the bag downtown! That didn't fly, Brother/Sister. There are some things on which a traveler has to take a stand.
The bag arrived in my room at around four o'clock in the afternoon. I dropped a three-peso tip on the bellman who brought it, then dumped its contents out on the floor to take an inventory. This for two reasons: (1) to make sure none of these confiscation-happy Seguridaddies had made off with my electric shaver, and (2) to verify that they hadn't planted illegal drugs in any of the side pockets. It would be just like these bastards to pick a fight with me on the phone, then kick down the door and arrest me on a trumped-up possession charge. And once you get a record down here, that shit gets in the Interpol database, and your hopes and dreams of world domination are pretty much dashed.
I went through the pile of belongings on the floor — everything seemed to be there, which was a plus. As for what Airport Security might have planted — none of the usual bags of incriminating white powder. But in the top front pocket of the bag I did find a manila envelope — ah, Manila! What a night we had together, Gloria! — sealed and addressed to me.
I opened it.
Inside was a rental-car voucher and a marked-up road map of southern Peru. A Stickie on the map read, ¡FOLLOW THIS ROUTE! Within the hour I was standing in front of the Hertz counter at Jorge Chavez (would you believe they have a special Impregnator Line there, too?), wondering aloud why you can't get a rental car with a cassette deck anywhere on Earth. I have this iPod tape-adaptor, you see, and I never get to use it on a road trip. Anyway, by sunset I was on the road into the mountains, rocking out to Jimmy Atahualpa's Quechuan interpretation of "Stairway to Heaven" on rural Peruvian AM radio —
Oh! The master's coming down the hall. I can tell his footsteps by the clogs he wears — from a kick-line he can whip one though the air, knock an enemy senseless with it from fifty yards. Saw him do it to a crash-test dummy in a class demo. Pretty freakin' sweet. I'll learn that in the eighth week. In the meantime, the students go barefoot.
Anyway, gotta go!
Sunday, October 09, 2005
Un Otro Phutatorius
The last few days have been a whirlwind, Brother/Sister — what with the flight down, the car rental, the trip up here to the secret mountain redoubt, all these orientation meetings . . . and then there was the actual whirlwind. What a son-of-a-bitch weather condition that was!
I should say, starting off, that I don't think I'll be able to get caught up with just this one post, and so I will have to borrow against your patience over the next few days. But as you have always been a willing lender, Brother/Sister — and over the years I have given you no reason to begrudge me credit — I don't foresee a problem in making steady, periodic payment in installments, until such time as I get you entirely up to speed.
Bear in mind, while you wait, that (1) Internet access is spotty at best up here in the Andes; (2) most of my waking hours will be devoted to (a) learning the secret, ancient art of ceremonial Peruvian dance-fighting and (b) exploring the prospects for romance in the local villages; and (3) I can only use my master-trainer's super-secret satellite Internet connection when he's not in his office.
It sounds to me, Phutatorius, that you're playing fast and loose with all these "secrets" — SECRET mountain redoubt, SECRET art of dance-fighting —
Please, Brother/Sister. Did I not just spell out the terms of our agreement? Show some patience, and I promise you, I will explain to your satisfaction why I think it appropriate to reveal, here in the Great Wide Open of the blogosphere, some of the centuries-old secrets contained on pain of death within the elite membership of this heretofore underground group of Andean warrior-assassins —
but I realize I'm raising more questions than I'm answering. So let's just get on with this chronologically, starting with a rewind to Wednesday night, at around midnight, when I landed at Jorge Chavez. To this point the trip had been, for the most part, uneventful. The in-flight movie on the Houston-Lima leg was Monster-in-Law, a romantic comedy placing Jane Fonda opposite the still-ubiquitous, but somewhat less densely-positioned (these days) Jennifer Lopez. When the fasten-seatbelt sign went off, I traveled up the aisle and informally surveyed the Latin passengers on the plane. By a three-to-one margin, they hate J-Lo, too.
I promise to address this J-Lo Situation, Hermano/Hermana, after I consolidate my power.
We landed on schedule at 11:40 p.m. Lima-time. I collected my black wheelie-bag at the Reclamo de Equipaje, then proceeded through Customs (nada a declarar, Hermano) to the terminal. At this point I had no real plan as to where I would go. I figured that my resourceful sponsors would find a way to contact me — and if they didn't, I would shack up at the Aeropuerto Hiltón, or its equivalent, until they did.
But as I passed out of the terminal's secured area, I was pleased (but not surprised) to find a smartly-dressed limo driver standing at attention, with a sign in his hand bearing my name. I approached the man. He wore a pin that designated him as the property of "Lima Limo."
"That's me," I told him.
"¿Que?" The driver seemed confused.
"PHUTATORIUS. That's me." I pointed at the sign.
The driver shook his head at me.
Oh, Christ, I thought. Am I going to have to rummage in my bag for my Spanish dictionary? Now bear in mind, Brother/Sister, that when I am on the road, I am not normally averse to addressing my service-industry contacts in their native languages. I am not that Americano feo who insists that everyone in the world — including the poor limo driver who makes his living chauffeuring visiting dignitaries — speak English.
The problem was that I was tired, I'd been traveling all day, I was dehydrated from the half-bucket of fried chicken I'd eaten during the Houston layover — and I didn't think the point I had tried to make to this gentleman was quite so complicated as to get lost in translation.
I threw up my hands.
"You," the limo driver said, incredulous. "You come from Sao Paolo?"
"From Boston," I corrected. Duh. As I said, I was in a bit of a mood, so cut me some slack, Brother/Sister.
"Is possible you may be different Phutatorius? I get here Phutatorius from Sao Paolo."
"Trust me, signore. There is only one Phutatorius. So this must be some kind of mistake. Why don't you call back your Central Command Center and check on that?"
The limo driver snapped open his mobile phone. He continued to hold up his sign, while he dialed. He was on the line with his dispatcher when a third gentleman emerged from Customs to join our party.
"¿Auto para Phutatorius?," this Third Gentleman said.
"WHO ARE YOU?" I demanded. I kicked my wheelie-bag, sent it rolling off down the terminal. Again, I was tired, dehydrated, etc., etc.
I could belabor what happened next, which is best described, in terms Phutatorian, as an Incident, but I'd rather not. In brief, it turns out (1) there is more than one Phutatorius; (2) this fellow is, too, a purported Internet personality; (3) this Other Phutatorius was traveling to Peru on the same day I was, and weeks ago he had reserved a car with Lima Limo; and (4) when he can finally land it, he has a wicked left hook.
Needless to say, I was required to eat some crow from that limo driver, once I came to. When I get back to the States, I'll be contacting my trademark lawyer. And my personal injury specialist, too.
More tomorrow.
I should say, starting off, that I don't think I'll be able to get caught up with just this one post, and so I will have to borrow against your patience over the next few days. But as you have always been a willing lender, Brother/Sister — and over the years I have given you no reason to begrudge me credit — I don't foresee a problem in making steady, periodic payment in installments, until such time as I get you entirely up to speed.
Bear in mind, while you wait, that (1) Internet access is spotty at best up here in the Andes; (2) most of my waking hours will be devoted to (a) learning the secret, ancient art of ceremonial Peruvian dance-fighting and (b) exploring the prospects for romance in the local villages; and (3) I can only use my master-trainer's super-secret satellite Internet connection when he's not in his office.
It sounds to me, Phutatorius, that you're playing fast and loose with all these "secrets" — SECRET mountain redoubt, SECRET art of dance-fighting —
Please, Brother/Sister. Did I not just spell out the terms of our agreement? Show some patience, and I promise you, I will explain to your satisfaction why I think it appropriate to reveal, here in the Great Wide Open of the blogosphere, some of the centuries-old secrets contained on pain of death within the elite membership of this heretofore underground group of Andean warrior-assassins —
but I realize I'm raising more questions than I'm answering. So let's just get on with this chronologically, starting with a rewind to Wednesday night, at around midnight, when I landed at Jorge Chavez. To this point the trip had been, for the most part, uneventful. The in-flight movie on the Houston-Lima leg was Monster-in-Law, a romantic comedy placing Jane Fonda opposite the still-ubiquitous, but somewhat less densely-positioned (these days) Jennifer Lopez. When the fasten-seatbelt sign went off, I traveled up the aisle and informally surveyed the Latin passengers on the plane. By a three-to-one margin, they hate J-Lo, too.
I promise to address this J-Lo Situation, Hermano/Hermana, after I consolidate my power.
We landed on schedule at 11:40 p.m. Lima-time. I collected my black wheelie-bag at the Reclamo de Equipaje, then proceeded through Customs (nada a declarar, Hermano) to the terminal. At this point I had no real plan as to where I would go. I figured that my resourceful sponsors would find a way to contact me — and if they didn't, I would shack up at the Aeropuerto Hiltón, or its equivalent, until they did.
But as I passed out of the terminal's secured area, I was pleased (but not surprised) to find a smartly-dressed limo driver standing at attention, with a sign in his hand bearing my name. I approached the man. He wore a pin that designated him as the property of "Lima Limo."
"That's me," I told him.
"¿Que?" The driver seemed confused.
"PHUTATORIUS. That's me." I pointed at the sign.
The driver shook his head at me.
Oh, Christ, I thought. Am I going to have to rummage in my bag for my Spanish dictionary? Now bear in mind, Brother/Sister, that when I am on the road, I am not normally averse to addressing my service-industry contacts in their native languages. I am not that Americano feo who insists that everyone in the world — including the poor limo driver who makes his living chauffeuring visiting dignitaries — speak English.
The problem was that I was tired, I'd been traveling all day, I was dehydrated from the half-bucket of fried chicken I'd eaten during the Houston layover — and I didn't think the point I had tried to make to this gentleman was quite so complicated as to get lost in translation.
I threw up my hands.
"You," the limo driver said, incredulous. "You come from Sao Paolo?"
"From Boston," I corrected. Duh. As I said, I was in a bit of a mood, so cut me some slack, Brother/Sister.
"Is possible you may be different Phutatorius? I get here Phutatorius from Sao Paolo."
"Trust me, signore. There is only one Phutatorius. So this must be some kind of mistake. Why don't you call back your Central Command Center and check on that?"
The limo driver snapped open his mobile phone. He continued to hold up his sign, while he dialed. He was on the line with his dispatcher when a third gentleman emerged from Customs to join our party.
"¿Auto para Phutatorius?," this Third Gentleman said.
"WHO ARE YOU?" I demanded. I kicked my wheelie-bag, sent it rolling off down the terminal. Again, I was tired, dehydrated, etc., etc.
I could belabor what happened next, which is best described, in terms Phutatorian, as an Incident, but I'd rather not. In brief, it turns out (1) there is more than one Phutatorius; (2) this fellow is, too, a purported Internet personality; (3) this Other Phutatorius was traveling to Peru on the same day I was, and weeks ago he had reserved a car with Lima Limo; and (4) when he can finally land it, he has a wicked left hook.
Needless to say, I was required to eat some crow from that limo driver, once I came to. When I get back to the States, I'll be contacting my trademark lawyer. And my personal injury specialist, too.
More tomorrow.
Wednesday, October 05, 2005
Now Boarding . . .
Well, here I am at Logan Airport's Terminal C (which Google mislabeled as "D" — stay your hand, Brother/Sister, I've written them about it), waiting for the boarding call and availing myself of the Logan Wi-Fi service to write up this morning's thoughts —
What's that you say, B/S? You think I'm foolish? Impetuous? Just because I accepted a one-way plane ticket to Lima from a set of mysterious limousine kidnappers?
One way, Phutatorius? ONE WAY?
Oh. Yes, right. I did forget to mention that the ticket was paid for the flight down only. That doesn't mean I'll be murdered or held for ransom once I'm down there. It only means I have an open-ended return date — and that my shady sponsors may not spot me for the flight back to Boston.
But no matter. I've sequestered $500 into savings for just that eventuality, and I can pay my own way home.
Look, Brother/Sister — you can say what you want, but the last time an anonymous benefactor booked me on a one-way international flight, I totally ended up hooking up with Philippine President Gloria Arroyo, and she was fantastic. So I know what I'm doing here, and I can take care of myself.
Oops! They're calling all rows, so I'd better wrap this up. Now where did I put my boarding pass?
(More from Houston, if I get a minute. The layover looks to be kinda tight.)
What's that you say, B/S? You think I'm foolish? Impetuous? Just because I accepted a one-way plane ticket to Lima from a set of mysterious limousine kidnappers?
One way, Phutatorius? ONE WAY?
Oh. Yes, right. I did forget to mention that the ticket was paid for the flight down only. That doesn't mean I'll be murdered or held for ransom once I'm down there. It only means I have an open-ended return date — and that my shady sponsors may not spot me for the flight back to Boston.
But no matter. I've sequestered $500 into savings for just that eventuality, and I can pay my own way home.
Look, Brother/Sister — you can say what you want, but the last time an anonymous benefactor booked me on a one-way international flight, I totally ended up hooking up with Philippine President Gloria Arroyo, and she was fantastic. So I know what I'm doing here, and I can take care of myself.
Oops! They're calling all rows, so I'd better wrap this up. Now where did I put my boarding pass?
(More from Houston, if I get a minute. The layover looks to be kinda tight.)
Tuesday, October 04, 2005
Mysterious Ways
Well, blow me up and down, Brother/Sister. Life sure can turn on a dime. One minute, you're grimly resigned to your mild-mannered pre-Moment existence. Then — WHAM-O! (click that link, Brother/Sister, and another dime drops into Phutsie's World Domination Fund) — Life pulls up on the curb in a black rented limo and calls your name.
Some setting of the scene would be desirable, Phutatorius.
Right you are, Brother/Sister. Right you are. And so, it was around 11 p.m. last night, the U2 concert (set list here) had just let out, and I had just tumbled down several hundred escalators from my Section 303 balcony seat to the sidewalk outside the BankNorth Garden. I rounded the corner onto Merrimac Street, and a black limousine with livery plates pulled up along the sidewalk. A rear window powered down, and a man called my name.
"Yoo-hoo! Phutatorius!" (For the sake of accuracy, I should say that the person in the limo did not, in fact, cry "Yoo-hoo! Phutatorius!" Nor did I, as you will read below, get into this car voluntarily. As it happened, I was grabbed from behind by a big bruiser of a man who cuffed my hands behind my back, pulled a hood over my head, and tossed me headfirst through the open car door into the back seat. But the facts don't cross-promote quite as well as the Yoo-hoo story does — and helicopter gunships don't come cheap, Brother/Sister.)
I approached the car with the intention of looking through the window crack at who was inside. The window powered up to about 95% closed, leaving only a slit that admitted very little light.
"Who's in there?" I demanded to know.
"Why don't you get in and find out?" asked my Yoo-hooer.
Well, this was a no-brainer. The circumstances here — long black car pulling up after a concert, back-seat passenger playing coy — were identical to those presented to me back in July 2005 when I took the Limo Plunge outside the Middle East with the result that I totally hooked up with the lead singer for Bow Wow Wow. (She had liked what I wrote about her band in my last novel.) Based on that experience, I calculated even odds that Bono or the Edge was in the back seat of the stretch in front of me. Not that I had it in mind to hook up with either of them. But I figured U2 and I could talk over coffee about the geopoliticus, and maybe they could put me in touch with some African freedom fighters I might be able to hire away and mold into some kind of Republican Guard. You know, since this Peru thing had fallen through . . .
Long story short, I got in the car, and it sped off downtown, I think toward Congress Street. With the sack on my head, I couldn't see where we were going. Nor could I see who was in the car with me. We sat in silence together for a long, tedious minute, until I decided to try to break the ice.
"Great show back there," I said. If it were Bono next to me, he'd eat that up. If it weren't, it was harmless conversation. "Finishing with '40' like that. Old school, you know?"
"I didn't have a ticket," said the man next to me, soberly. AHA! I thought. He DIDN'T say he didn't go to the concert. He just said he didn't have a ticket. Oh, Bono — you sure know how to play it cool!
We sat in silence for another minute.
"I should introduce myself," Bono said, in what was obviously not an Irish accent. "My name is —" and the person I was increasingly thinking was not Bono embarked on a string of fourteen or more alien syllables.
"Can you repeat that?" I asked, when he finished.
"That was my Quechuan name," [Unpronounceable] said. "Why don't you just call me Frankie?"
"I used to date a girl named Frankie," I said. "It ended badly, with guilt and recriminations. She bit the hood ornament off my car."
[Pending Frankie] may have cocked an eyebrow. With the sack on my head, I couldn't tell.
"So how about I call you Ed?"
"Ed works."
"You're my connection through Jimmy Atahualpa?"
"I am," Ed confirmed.
"You never called me," I said. "How did you manage to find me?"
"We never intended to contact you over the phone. We were using your cell phone to track your movements."
"You can do that?"
"Haven't you seen 24?"
"Wait — you work for the Counter Terrorist Unit?"
"No," Ed said, in a voice indicating strained patience. "But it's a common tracking method. We had a bead on you for several days. We just didn't have an opportunity to get hold of you. Then Sunday night you fell off our radar."
"My charger plug's broke," I offered, by way of explanation. "I had to turn the phone off to conserve the battery."
"Then you cropped up inside the Fleet Center tonight," Ed said. "But just for a few minutes."
"BankNorth Garden," was my correction. "They just changed the name." Per the instructions of the guy two seats down from me — "What you do is, you turn it on and wave the lit display up in the air, like you used to do with cigarette lighters in the 70s" — I had expended my phone's last five minutes of battery life during U2's encores. "So what do you want with me?" I asked.
"Nothing," Ed said. "We just wanted to give you a ride home." The car pulled to a stop. The passenger's side door opened, and strong arms lifted me out of the back seat and held me steady while somebody's keys unlocked my cuffs. By the time I pulled the hood off my head, the limo was down the road. I was standing outside my apartment.
Well, I said to myself. Now that didn't make any goddam sense at all. All that drama just to get me in a car to drive me home? I hadn't learned anything, no arrangement had been made for a second meeting. I didn't get it. Ah well, I shrugged. At least I saved train fare home.
Then I reached into my jacket pocket to pull out my keys, and I found a plane ticket. Made out in my name, for a Wednesday morning departure. Continental Airlines to Lima, Peru.
Hm.
Some setting of the scene would be desirable, Phutatorius.
Right you are, Brother/Sister. Right you are. And so, it was around 11 p.m. last night, the U2 concert (set list here) had just let out, and I had just tumbled down several hundred escalators from my Section 303 balcony seat to the sidewalk outside the BankNorth Garden. I rounded the corner onto Merrimac Street, and a black limousine with livery plates pulled up along the sidewalk. A rear window powered down, and a man called my name.
"Yoo-hoo! Phutatorius!" (For the sake of accuracy, I should say that the person in the limo did not, in fact, cry "Yoo-hoo! Phutatorius!" Nor did I, as you will read below, get into this car voluntarily. As it happened, I was grabbed from behind by a big bruiser of a man who cuffed my hands behind my back, pulled a hood over my head, and tossed me headfirst through the open car door into the back seat. But the facts don't cross-promote quite as well as the Yoo-hoo story does — and helicopter gunships don't come cheap, Brother/Sister.)
I approached the car with the intention of looking through the window crack at who was inside. The window powered up to about 95% closed, leaving only a slit that admitted very little light.
"Who's in there?" I demanded to know.
"Why don't you get in and find out?" asked my Yoo-hooer.
Well, this was a no-brainer. The circumstances here — long black car pulling up after a concert, back-seat passenger playing coy — were identical to those presented to me back in July 2005 when I took the Limo Plunge outside the Middle East with the result that I totally hooked up with the lead singer for Bow Wow Wow. (She had liked what I wrote about her band in my last novel.) Based on that experience, I calculated even odds that Bono or the Edge was in the back seat of the stretch in front of me. Not that I had it in mind to hook up with either of them. But I figured U2 and I could talk over coffee about the geopoliticus, and maybe they could put me in touch with some African freedom fighters I might be able to hire away and mold into some kind of Republican Guard. You know, since this Peru thing had fallen through . . .
Long story short, I got in the car, and it sped off downtown, I think toward Congress Street. With the sack on my head, I couldn't see where we were going. Nor could I see who was in the car with me. We sat in silence together for a long, tedious minute, until I decided to try to break the ice.
"Great show back there," I said. If it were Bono next to me, he'd eat that up. If it weren't, it was harmless conversation. "Finishing with '40' like that. Old school, you know?"
"I didn't have a ticket," said the man next to me, soberly. AHA! I thought. He DIDN'T say he didn't go to the concert. He just said he didn't have a ticket. Oh, Bono — you sure know how to play it cool!
We sat in silence for another minute.
"I should introduce myself," Bono said, in what was obviously not an Irish accent. "My name is —" and the person I was increasingly thinking was not Bono embarked on a string of fourteen or more alien syllables.
"Can you repeat that?" I asked, when he finished.
"That was my Quechuan name," [Unpronounceable] said. "Why don't you just call me Frankie?"
"I used to date a girl named Frankie," I said. "It ended badly, with guilt and recriminations. She bit the hood ornament off my car."
[Pending Frankie] may have cocked an eyebrow. With the sack on my head, I couldn't tell.
"So how about I call you Ed?"
"Ed works."
"You're my connection through Jimmy Atahualpa?"
"I am," Ed confirmed.
"You never called me," I said. "How did you manage to find me?"
"We never intended to contact you over the phone. We were using your cell phone to track your movements."
"You can do that?"
"Haven't you seen 24?"
"Wait — you work for the Counter Terrorist Unit?"
"No," Ed said, in a voice indicating strained patience. "But it's a common tracking method. We had a bead on you for several days. We just didn't have an opportunity to get hold of you. Then Sunday night you fell off our radar."
"My charger plug's broke," I offered, by way of explanation. "I had to turn the phone off to conserve the battery."
"Then you cropped up inside the Fleet Center tonight," Ed said. "But just for a few minutes."
"BankNorth Garden," was my correction. "They just changed the name." Per the instructions of the guy two seats down from me — "What you do is, you turn it on and wave the lit display up in the air, like you used to do with cigarette lighters in the 70s" — I had expended my phone's last five minutes of battery life during U2's encores. "So what do you want with me?" I asked.
"Nothing," Ed said. "We just wanted to give you a ride home." The car pulled to a stop. The passenger's side door opened, and strong arms lifted me out of the back seat and held me steady while somebody's keys unlocked my cuffs. By the time I pulled the hood off my head, the limo was down the road. I was standing outside my apartment.
Well, I said to myself. Now that didn't make any goddam sense at all. All that drama just to get me in a car to drive me home? I hadn't learned anything, no arrangement had been made for a second meeting. I didn't get it. Ah well, I shrugged. At least I saved train fare home.
Then I reached into my jacket pocket to pull out my keys, and I found a plane ticket. Made out in my name, for a Wednesday morning departure. Continental Airlines to Lima, Peru.
Hm.
Sunday, October 02, 2005
No News
Still no voice messages from Peru, no life-changing phone calls — though I did see Jimmy again today. He kept looking over his shoulder while we talked. Jimmy says that I should keep my phone on and handy — "in your pocket, if you can" — but I'm skeptical.
Ho hum. But there's more than one way to skin a cat. And to be honest, I didn't know what I was getting into anyway, with this blanket guy's brother. What was he going to do for me, really? I never had a good feeling about it.
It's Saturday night, and my rise to power seems so far away. I'm having a hard time kick-starting the program here, and it's sort of discouraging.
Maybe next week will go better.
Ho hum. But there's more than one way to skin a cat. And to be honest, I didn't know what I was getting into anyway, with this blanket guy's brother. What was he going to do for me, really? I never had a good feeling about it.
It's Saturday night, and my rise to power seems so far away. I'm having a hard time kick-starting the program here, and it's sort of discouraging.
Maybe next week will go better.
Thursday, September 29, 2005
Retraction
I've had a further communication from Burping Squid. He/she asks that I correct my earlier post, in which I (understandably, to my mind) called him/her a "Squid." Burping Squid takes the position that his/her username is a two-word participial phrase, with "Squid" serving as the object of the verbal "Burping." That is, the name describes a person who has eaten a plate of calamari, with the consequence that his/her gas emissions are redolent of squid.
When I referred to my correspondent as "Squid" for short, I mistakenly assumed that "Burping" was a participial adjective modifying "Squid," so that the Squid does the Burping.
So it goes. I apologize for the error, but you can see why I might have come down on the wrong side of the grammatical ambiguity here.
I should note, as a further matter, that I make this retraction not because I have any interest in giving any more airtime than necessary to this molluscaphage heckler, but rather out of a desire that my record of the events in this weblog be mistake-free — and therefore unimpeachable.
When I referred to my correspondent as "Squid" for short, I mistakenly assumed that "Burping" was a participial adjective modifying "Squid," so that the Squid does the Burping.
So it goes. I apologize for the error, but you can see why I might have come down on the wrong side of the grammatical ambiguity here.
I should note, as a further matter, that I make this retraction not because I have any interest in giving any more airtime than necessary to this molluscaphage heckler, but rather out of a desire that my record of the events in this weblog be mistake-free — and therefore unimpeachable.
A Sort of Update . . .
Well, I've checked my voice mail messages a number of times today. Nothing yet from Peru Guy. Just a couple angry messages from lawyers (sigh!) and a crank-call from this Burping Squid character, who seems emboldened by the fact that I called him out by name in my last post.
Squid, yours is quite possibly the worst fake Andean-Spanish accent I've ever heard, and I've heard at least three.
As ever, though, I promise to keep you all posted.
Squid, yours is quite possibly the worst fake Andean-Spanish accent I've ever heard, and I've heard at least three.
As ever, though, I promise to keep you all posted.
Wednesday, September 28, 2005
Jimmy Atahualpa
I've received a fair amount of email on this subject over the past couple days, quite a bit of it supportive. But as usual, there is an undercurrent of taunting from the skeptics out there. These are, no doubt, the same people who told me I'd never get that mail-order propane grill assembled without a contractor's help, the same faithless detractors who bet against me in the 100-meter crab-walk sprint at the '98 Goodwill Games. The overall tone and content of these messages is, I think, best captured in the following one-liner from "burpingsquid@gmail.com":
Well, Phutatorius — it's [time of email] on [day of email], and your army hasn't yet stormed Washington. What gives?
To this message and to all others like it, I answer: Patience, Brother/Sister. This sort of thing takes time, and what's more, it is accomplished in incremental steps. A march on the White House is not the only marker of progress worthy of an update.
And I do, as a matter of fact, have something to report.
Earlier today I was walking back to the office from a favored lunch spot when Jimmy Atahualpa (stage name), a friendly acquaintance, flagged me down on the sidewalk. Jimmy is a Quechua Indian from the Peruvian Andes and formerly a Harvard Square street musician. Jimmy used to play the pan flute in a drum-and-pipe ensemble with his brother, Chico. Andean folk interpretations of rock 'n' roll classics — Sympathy for the Devil, Waiting for the Man by the Velvets. Stuff like that. Jimmy was a seasonal performer, playing to the usual audiences of tourists and teenage runaways in the spring and summer months, then taking up a day job at a dry-cleaning company from November to April. He did this for six, seven years before the perchloroeethylene and other cleaning chemicals gave him lung cancer.
Jimmy's all right now. Doctors took out most of his left lung, along with the lower lobe of his right. In another couple months he'll have his five-year clean bill of health (knock on wood), but it taxes his lungs too much to play the pipes anymore. So now he just parks himself down in his customary spot on the brick sidewalk outside the Harvard Square train entrance (in fact, you can see him on the Google satellite map, if you really lean in and squint), where he sells alpaca blankets and CD-Rs of the Atahualpa Brothers' greatest hits. It helps his sales efforts that he keeps the excised portions of his lungs in a specimen jar on the sidewalk beside him. It's a good ice-breaker with potential buyers.
Anyway, I had just finished lunch this afternoon, and I was hustling back to the office for a meeting, when Jimmy called out to me from his seat on the sidewalk:
"Phutatorius!"
I waved hello.
"What happened to you?"
That stopped me in my tracks. Jimmy's a pretty discerning fellow, I thought, if he can look at me and see that, since the last time I saw him, I have had a Moment.
"Why do you ask?" was my question back to him.
"Well, you're limping, kind of dragging that left ankle," Jimmy said. "There's a butterfly bandage on your neck. It looks like somebody pulled a patch of hair off your scalp —"
"Oh," I said. "That. All of that. You're talking about the Incident." Not the Moment.
"— your right eye is blackened, you have gauze stuffed in your left nostril —" Jimmy paused to catch his breath, then continued — "you seem to be missing one of your incisors —"
"Yes, yes, yes," I interrupted, not anxious to hear Jimmy out as he catalogued every bump and bruise on my facies. "I had an Incident."
"What happened?"
I told him.
"Man, that sucks," Jimmy said. "Groomsmen."
Jimmy's a good person. Kind, thoughtful, generous, concerned. It shamed me that a man with 75% of his lung capacity sitting in a jar on the ground beside him would be offering me his sympathy, when my wounds were largely superficial. So I thought it best to try to put a good face on things, to say something upbeat. After all, I hadn't come complaining to him. He had simply asked me what happened.
"The upside to all of it, though, Jimmy, is that while I was on the ground and they were working me over, I had a Moment."
"A Moment, huh?" Jimmy picked up his jar and climbed up on his feet. He always wanted at least one hand on his jar. "Did you achieve Clarity?"
"I did."
"Insight?"
"Insight, too," I said, proudly. "Destiny-shaping Insight."
"Tell me more," Jimmy Atahualpa said to me, bringing his hand to my shoulder.
I looked at my watch. Screw my one o'clock, I decided. Some things are more important. And over the next ten minutes I told Jimmy Atahualpa all about my Moment, what I had learned about myself, the plans I had for my future. All of it. Jimmy listened, rapt, as I told him these things. When I had finished, Jimmy looked me square in the eye, and he said:
"I beat cancer."
"I know," I said.
"Let me talk," Jimmy said, lifting a finger off his jam jar lid and pointing it at my sternum. "The power is in you, Phutatorius, to do all these things you're talking about. Just like the power was in me to beat cancer. You see? You just have to believe in yourself, brother. You got me?"
Touched, at a loss for words, I nodded.
"I know you got me, brother," Jimmy said, smiling, "'cause I can see it in your eyes. And because your eyes tell me you're serious, and you're a committed person, I think I can help you."
I raised an eyebrow.
"A guy I know back in Peru sends me these blankets, right? My supplier. His brother is a —" Jimmy looked over his shoulder, shifted his eyes left, then right, took a breath. "Well, my guy in Peru can put you in touch with his brother. Are you willing to do that?"
I didn't have the first clue who Jimmy's friend's brother was, or what he did. "What, is the guy a diplomat or something?"
"Let me have your mobile phone number," Jimmy said.
I rattled it off. Jimmy pulled a Rollerball pen from his pocket and took it down on the back of his hand.
"I can't make any promises, Phutatorius, but if this works out, and you get my guy's brother to call you, remember that I helped get you started. Okay?"
"Okay," I said. We shook on it.
"The power is in you, Phutatorius."
And that's how we left it. My telephone is charged and in my pocket. More importantly, I have this to say to all of you burping squids out there who can do nothing but criticize: Jimmy Atahualpa knows I'm serious.
And he beat fucking cancer. What have you ever done?
Well, Phutatorius — it's [time of email] on [day of email], and your army hasn't yet stormed Washington. What gives?
To this message and to all others like it, I answer: Patience, Brother/Sister. This sort of thing takes time, and what's more, it is accomplished in incremental steps. A march on the White House is not the only marker of progress worthy of an update.
And I do, as a matter of fact, have something to report.
Earlier today I was walking back to the office from a favored lunch spot when Jimmy Atahualpa (stage name), a friendly acquaintance, flagged me down on the sidewalk. Jimmy is a Quechua Indian from the Peruvian Andes and formerly a Harvard Square street musician. Jimmy used to play the pan flute in a drum-and-pipe ensemble with his brother, Chico. Andean folk interpretations of rock 'n' roll classics — Sympathy for the Devil, Waiting for the Man by the Velvets. Stuff like that. Jimmy was a seasonal performer, playing to the usual audiences of tourists and teenage runaways in the spring and summer months, then taking up a day job at a dry-cleaning company from November to April. He did this for six, seven years before the perchloroeethylene and other cleaning chemicals gave him lung cancer.
Jimmy's all right now. Doctors took out most of his left lung, along with the lower lobe of his right. In another couple months he'll have his five-year clean bill of health (knock on wood), but it taxes his lungs too much to play the pipes anymore. So now he just parks himself down in his customary spot on the brick sidewalk outside the Harvard Square train entrance (in fact, you can see him on the Google satellite map, if you really lean in and squint), where he sells alpaca blankets and CD-Rs of the Atahualpa Brothers' greatest hits. It helps his sales efforts that he keeps the excised portions of his lungs in a specimen jar on the sidewalk beside him. It's a good ice-breaker with potential buyers.
Anyway, I had just finished lunch this afternoon, and I was hustling back to the office for a meeting, when Jimmy called out to me from his seat on the sidewalk:
"Phutatorius!"
I waved hello.
"What happened to you?"
That stopped me in my tracks. Jimmy's a pretty discerning fellow, I thought, if he can look at me and see that, since the last time I saw him, I have had a Moment.
"Why do you ask?" was my question back to him.
"Well, you're limping, kind of dragging that left ankle," Jimmy said. "There's a butterfly bandage on your neck. It looks like somebody pulled a patch of hair off your scalp —"
"Oh," I said. "That. All of that. You're talking about the Incident." Not the Moment.
"— your right eye is blackened, you have gauze stuffed in your left nostril —" Jimmy paused to catch his breath, then continued — "you seem to be missing one of your incisors —"
"Yes, yes, yes," I interrupted, not anxious to hear Jimmy out as he catalogued every bump and bruise on my facies. "I had an Incident."
"What happened?"
I told him.
"Man, that sucks," Jimmy said. "Groomsmen."
Jimmy's a good person. Kind, thoughtful, generous, concerned. It shamed me that a man with 75% of his lung capacity sitting in a jar on the ground beside him would be offering me his sympathy, when my wounds were largely superficial. So I thought it best to try to put a good face on things, to say something upbeat. After all, I hadn't come complaining to him. He had simply asked me what happened.
"The upside to all of it, though, Jimmy, is that while I was on the ground and they were working me over, I had a Moment."
"A Moment, huh?" Jimmy picked up his jar and climbed up on his feet. He always wanted at least one hand on his jar. "Did you achieve Clarity?"
"I did."
"Insight?"
"Insight, too," I said, proudly. "Destiny-shaping Insight."
"Tell me more," Jimmy Atahualpa said to me, bringing his hand to my shoulder.
I looked at my watch. Screw my one o'clock, I decided. Some things are more important. And over the next ten minutes I told Jimmy Atahualpa all about my Moment, what I had learned about myself, the plans I had for my future. All of it. Jimmy listened, rapt, as I told him these things. When I had finished, Jimmy looked me square in the eye, and he said:
"I beat cancer."
"I know," I said.
"Let me talk," Jimmy said, lifting a finger off his jam jar lid and pointing it at my sternum. "The power is in you, Phutatorius, to do all these things you're talking about. Just like the power was in me to beat cancer. You see? You just have to believe in yourself, brother. You got me?"
Touched, at a loss for words, I nodded.
"I know you got me, brother," Jimmy said, smiling, "'cause I can see it in your eyes. And because your eyes tell me you're serious, and you're a committed person, I think I can help you."
I raised an eyebrow.
"A guy I know back in Peru sends me these blankets, right? My supplier. His brother is a —" Jimmy looked over his shoulder, shifted his eyes left, then right, took a breath. "Well, my guy in Peru can put you in touch with his brother. Are you willing to do that?"
I didn't have the first clue who Jimmy's friend's brother was, or what he did. "What, is the guy a diplomat or something?"
"Let me have your mobile phone number," Jimmy said.
I rattled it off. Jimmy pulled a Rollerball pen from his pocket and took it down on the back of his hand.
"I can't make any promises, Phutatorius, but if this works out, and you get my guy's brother to call you, remember that I helped get you started. Okay?"
"Okay," I said. We shook on it.
"The power is in you, Phutatorius."
And that's how we left it. My telephone is charged and in my pocket. More importantly, I have this to say to all of you burping squids out there who can do nothing but criticize: Jimmy Atahualpa knows I'm serious.
And he beat fucking cancer. What have you ever done?
Monday, September 26, 2005
This First Day of the Rest of My Life
Why now? is your quite reasonable question.
Well, I'm glad I made sure you asked.
This is happening now because I had a life-changing Moment on Saturday. Although I've had such Moments before — and I reserve the right to have a subsequent Moment that sends my life careening toward some other, lesser destiny — this is the one I'm running with today. Because right now, brothers and sisters, I feel something. The Winds of Change are blowing between my ears, and I feel I have no choice but to listen to their music.
And not just to listen, but to dance.
But I'm getting ahead of myself, and ahead of my Moment. I attended a wedding this weekend, you see —
What ho, Phutatorius! You ARE a Romantic, aren't you?
Sir, I'm not terribly glad I allowed you to interrupt just now. But I'll answer your question: yes, I suppose I am a Romantic, in that broader sense of the term. Not the wine and cheese, hire-the-violinist Romantic, but an old-timey, Robert Louis Stevenson Romantic. In that sense, then, no — it wasn't the union of souls that moved me, not the day's celebration of matrimony that set my heart afire. No — the details, as they say, are in the particulars.
It was about 9:36 EDT. The vows had been exchanged, toasts delivered, casks of wine uncorked and spilled into lustful gullets. The deejay had supplied a suitably rakish voice-over to the bouquet-and-garter proceedings, and the Village People's YMCA had put more than one embarrassing uncle's sweat-soaked dress shirt on awkward display.
And so it was time, many guests supposed, to call for the Electric Slide. And call they did, in menacing, persistent, unison. The deejay knew what to do when confronted by the chanted commands of a drunken mob: you cue up the damned Electric Slide already. So he did.
On the periphery of the proceedings (where many of my brothers and sisters have known me to live), I took dainty sips at my fifteenth Diet Pepsi of the evening, and I watched wide-eyed as the Electric Slide came on, and the initial beats of this well-worn wedding-party classic snapped the scattered and ragtag assembly of guests suddenly to attention, pulled them smartly together into a square formation, and stirred them to move together in precision-timed, uniform, prefabricated steps.
Fascism! I cried. Fascism on the dance floor! This regimented block formation dancing, this soulless display of the most politically and aesthetically disturbing sort of social conformity, this Electric Slide! I could not allow it to continue. Before my judgment could get the better of me, I tossed Diet Pepsi #15 to the ground and heaved my body into the center of this military exercise they call a "dance." Screeching and cursing and flailing my arms, I shoved grandmothers to the ground. I hurled obscenities at the bride. I kicked the five-year old ringbearer and called his mother a Nazi.
And this — THIS was your Moment, Phutatorius? Another one of these Incidents of yours?
Ah, but you're jumping the gun, Brother/Sister. And you're confusing Incidents of high drama and a reasonable amount of bloodshed (of which I admit I have had many in my life) with Moments of clarity and insight (of which I am ashamed to say I have had comparably few). My initial frontal assault on the Electric Sliders was, as you say, another Incident — but only a precursor of and necessary precondition to my Moment. It was, you see, five minutes later, as I lay on the floor under a pile of groomsmen who were beating the living shit out of me, spitting teeth, that I had my Moment.
What of that Moment, Phutatorius? What clarity, what insight was given you during your Moment?
Two things, Brother/Sister. I learned two things at that Moment:
I realized, first, that to that point I was a failure as a leader of men.
And second, I understood that this world of "individuals," however many billion of them there may be, is just screaming for one man to impose a singular and dominating Order upon it. This world's civilians, wayward and dispersed, wait with bated breath for someone to play the song that will bring their lives into a strict focus. And its soldiers — God bless them! — they're just looking for someone, some Supreme Commander, who might give them an excuse to pile on an enemy and make off with his cuff-links.
And so, on Saturday night, as I pressed a Ziploc bag full of ice to my jaw and awaited treatment in the Mount Auburn Hospital Emergency Room, I took stock of my life. I understood that my ambitions were understated, and my regular suggestions of satisfaction (I'm just fine. How are you?) were outright lies. Lies I told to friends and acquaintances, and — far worse — lies I told to myself.
So now I find myself poised on the verge of a new Life's Adventure. I know not where this new path will lead, in the short-term. I can't possibly predict every twist or turn, every uphill climb, every misstep, tumble, or fruitless double-back. I only know that I will move down my new path with a steely determination, and that at the end of this path lies World Domination . . . or not. That's the game I'm playing now: all or nothing.
Keep your eyes open, Brother/Sister. Don't dare to blink. You won't want to miss a trick.
Well, I'm glad I made sure you asked.
This is happening now because I had a life-changing Moment on Saturday. Although I've had such Moments before — and I reserve the right to have a subsequent Moment that sends my life careening toward some other, lesser destiny — this is the one I'm running with today. Because right now, brothers and sisters, I feel something. The Winds of Change are blowing between my ears, and I feel I have no choice but to listen to their music.
And not just to listen, but to dance.
But I'm getting ahead of myself, and ahead of my Moment. I attended a wedding this weekend, you see —
What ho, Phutatorius! You ARE a Romantic, aren't you?
Sir, I'm not terribly glad I allowed you to interrupt just now. But I'll answer your question: yes, I suppose I am a Romantic, in that broader sense of the term. Not the wine and cheese, hire-the-violinist Romantic, but an old-timey, Robert Louis Stevenson Romantic. In that sense, then, no — it wasn't the union of souls that moved me, not the day's celebration of matrimony that set my heart afire. No — the details, as they say, are in the particulars.
It was about 9:36 EDT. The vows had been exchanged, toasts delivered, casks of wine uncorked and spilled into lustful gullets. The deejay had supplied a suitably rakish voice-over to the bouquet-and-garter proceedings, and the Village People's YMCA had put more than one embarrassing uncle's sweat-soaked dress shirt on awkward display.
And so it was time, many guests supposed, to call for the Electric Slide. And call they did, in menacing, persistent, unison. The deejay knew what to do when confronted by the chanted commands of a drunken mob: you cue up the damned Electric Slide already. So he did.
On the periphery of the proceedings (where many of my brothers and sisters have known me to live), I took dainty sips at my fifteenth Diet Pepsi of the evening, and I watched wide-eyed as the Electric Slide came on, and the initial beats of this well-worn wedding-party classic snapped the scattered and ragtag assembly of guests suddenly to attention, pulled them smartly together into a square formation, and stirred them to move together in precision-timed, uniform, prefabricated steps.
Fascism! I cried. Fascism on the dance floor! This regimented block formation dancing, this soulless display of the most politically and aesthetically disturbing sort of social conformity, this Electric Slide! I could not allow it to continue. Before my judgment could get the better of me, I tossed Diet Pepsi #15 to the ground and heaved my body into the center of this military exercise they call a "dance." Screeching and cursing and flailing my arms, I shoved grandmothers to the ground. I hurled obscenities at the bride. I kicked the five-year old ringbearer and called his mother a Nazi.
And this — THIS was your Moment, Phutatorius? Another one of these Incidents of yours?
Ah, but you're jumping the gun, Brother/Sister. And you're confusing Incidents of high drama and a reasonable amount of bloodshed (of which I admit I have had many in my life) with Moments of clarity and insight (of which I am ashamed to say I have had comparably few). My initial frontal assault on the Electric Sliders was, as you say, another Incident — but only a precursor of and necessary precondition to my Moment. It was, you see, five minutes later, as I lay on the floor under a pile of groomsmen who were beating the living shit out of me, spitting teeth, that I had my Moment.
What of that Moment, Phutatorius? What clarity, what insight was given you during your Moment?
Two things, Brother/Sister. I learned two things at that Moment:
I realized, first, that to that point I was a failure as a leader of men.
And second, I understood that this world of "individuals," however many billion of them there may be, is just screaming for one man to impose a singular and dominating Order upon it. This world's civilians, wayward and dispersed, wait with bated breath for someone to play the song that will bring their lives into a strict focus. And its soldiers — God bless them! — they're just looking for someone, some Supreme Commander, who might give them an excuse to pile on an enemy and make off with his cuff-links.
And so, on Saturday night, as I pressed a Ziploc bag full of ice to my jaw and awaited treatment in the Mount Auburn Hospital Emergency Room, I took stock of my life. I understood that my ambitions were understated, and my regular suggestions of satisfaction (I'm just fine. How are you?) were outright lies. Lies I told to friends and acquaintances, and — far worse — lies I told to myself.
So now I find myself poised on the verge of a new Life's Adventure. I know not where this new path will lead, in the short-term. I can't possibly predict every twist or turn, every uphill climb, every misstep, tumble, or fruitless double-back. I only know that I will move down my new path with a steely determination, and that at the end of this path lies World Domination . . . or not. That's the game I'm playing now: all or nothing.
Keep your eyes open, Brother/Sister. Don't dare to blink. You won't want to miss a trick.
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