By the Hoary Hosts of Häagen-Dazs, it's... Comic Book Wednesday!

Let's Rap!

This week I present a late 60's/early 70's version of the DC Comics Census poll. Here the editorial board wanted to know such vital information about you, the reader, like... how 'Groovy' you find the subjects of "Black People", "Astrology" and "Space Flights" to be? Whether your parents bought you this comic or did you (one imagines that this was before the time when fanboys obviously did in fact buy their own comics... but still lived in their mom's basement scouring the internet for spoiler alerts and Black Canary related porn). What two kinds of records do you like most out of the only five genres of music available to all mankind at the time... country music? soul? folk? rock? Bubble gum music? What did you do with your free time last week (and remember Superman, like his pals Santa Clause and Ameri-Jesus, know exactly what you really did thanks to their x-ray vision!!!)

Don't answer too hastily though... after all we are talking about the chance to win an actual portable color TV here!

These questions no doubt led to bold new directions at DC, such as the famous story where Superman nobly aided some 'black people' to launch into space after consulting the Daily Planet's Horoscope section (see Action Comics # 482 - 'The last flight of Soul Rocket 9'). Or the now classic issue of Green Lantern/Green Arrow when Ollie Queen went undercover in the thriving 'Bubble gum music' scene to help his sidekick overcome his harrowing addiction to Sonny & Cher. These are classic pre-crisis stories here peoople and they were made possible solely to the input of readers like you!

That's why I encourage everyone out there in the "Internet Zone" (which was actually invented by a time traveling Brainiac 5.0 decades before Al Gore stumbled across it) to fill out this questionaire and 'Electro-Mail' it to DC Comics. This is your chance Folk Music fans to let the powers that be know how bad you want that Tiny Tim/Hawkman crossover you've been clamoring for!

Alright, now it's time for me to get back to writing my multi-part fanfic epic involving Black Canary and Bat-Girl's adventures after being exposed to Doc Polaris' dreaded 'Bi-Curious Ray'!

Valediction

"Now mind is clear
as a cloudless sky.
Time then to make a
home in wilderness."
~ A Desolation, Allen Ginsberg

Times almost up. Bags packed. Bus schedule circled. Southside and ghetto bound. Back to normal. One last look back, a cigarette and a goodbye.

Goodbye Pepe and Polo, you princes amongst both cats and men. By day proud hunters, who bought tributes of slain voles and little brown birds to my unsuspecting lap. Who bravely stalked the feral chimpmunks through the livingroom jungle, patiently waiting for their prey to emerge from beneath the couch. By night, curled into a yin-yang around each other or laying between my face and a book before bed, reaching out tender paws to pat my goatee.

Goodbye splendid Apartment, who served as port of call to many a strange and drunken night. Here where the walls are alive with a framed gallery of original art. Where the sculptures barely repressed their giggles behind my back and the bed seemed wise with secrets it would not depart. Where the polished mahogany surfaces offer vague mirrors into parallel lives. Where the library is muse inspired and offers vast worlds to those with the patience to consult them. This place was as close as I'll probably ever come to living on the set of a movie directed by an Argentinian Woody Allen.

Goodbye Decatur, do not break my heart and forget my vagrant ghost too soon. Your masonic temple, your idyllic graveyard, your town square alive with skate boarders, performing artists, dancers, amateur yogis and bar hopping locals. You gave me a Spring rivaled only by the one I visited briefly in Izmir, Turkey and my first April in Terminus where the Dogwoods slow motion exploded across the awestruck eye offering pastel fireworks frozen in bloom. However sensing you still have much to show me, I suspect I'll return here soon.

Goodbye these last ten weeks, who strut now through memory with the piss and vinegar confidence of well traveled sea stories passed around whenever the smoking lantern was lit. In this time I: Attended a Thelemic reading of the Book of Nuit. Sat with the bar flies to watch whiskey fueled puppets at Lenny's. Caught the SHOW twice digging its carnival dadaism and freakshow vamp. Celebrated my birthday in a whirlwind blur that started at the Highlander and ended somehow at The Shelter. Worked two raves from dusk til dawn and witnessed firsthand the Zeitgeist Youth time trip their balls off into the Electric Tomorrow. Became a ghost for a night and visited the old Chamber to haunt the floor in drunken blur with the Princess keeping me drunk and out of trouble like a amazonian guardian angel. Went on camera safari for the first time in a long time - discovering ruins rich with decay's beauty and shadows of lives long past. But mainly it was in this time where I launched the book out there for better or worse.

Well, that's that.

Now, with reluctant curiosity and a winking acceptance, I must alas bid hello to whatever else shall come.