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G.W. is an award-winning novelist and essayist, a veteran character actor, a brown belt in Tae-bo, an honorary British knight, and an accomplished trombonist. Yankee Pot Roast is very proud to host Fruit Salad, a semi-frequent bloggy account of his affairs. In addition, Y.P.R. will present some noted critics' reviews of G.W.'s posts, to further explore the Wolinetz enigma. [Entries are posted in reverse-chronological order -- most recent up top, most distant way down bottom of the last archived page. Readers searching for a narrative are encouraged to start at the end and read backward. Readers who are comforted by the unyielding, indescriminate forces of entropy can begin at the top, or anywhere else. Ah, entropy.] Fruit salad, a perfect complement to yankee pot roast. Enjoy.
7/22/2002 6:57:55 AM | Geoff Wolinetz Out Of My Cold Dead Hands The hot breeze whips through the tall buildings of the city that never sleeps. I weave in and out of the worker bees on their way to their dull jobs to complement their dull lives and am quickly reminded of something the Lovin' Spoonful once said, "And, babe, don't you know it's a pity the days can't be like the nights in the summer in the city." I mean no offense to John Sebastian. John Sebastian is a dear friend of mine. John Sebastian is not only a great wordsmith but an expert badminton player. John Sebastian and I would wander the streets of Haight/Ashbury during the Summer of Love and try to freak out the acid heads by screaming, "The pigs!! Oh god help us, the pigs are tearing the flesh off our bones!!!!" We got many an acidhead to jump off a building that way. John Sebastian and I would run rum across the border and, in a vain attempt to avoid the federales, put on fake moustaches and woolen panchos. I digress. I am on my way to work at my major media company, deigning to honor them with my presence on this deplorable Monday. Outside, the sun begins to bake the streets, making it hotter than a snake's ass in wagon rot. I suspect that today will rather uncomfortable for those who toil outside for a living. I respect these manual laborers a great deal. They are the thread that keeps this country going. In my days as a Communist advocate for labor rights, I would often address the unions of these brave men. Here now, an excerpt from a speech that I gave to the United Brotherhood of Garbage men Local 347, New York, New York, on August 3, 1957: "Friends, comrades, welcome. I thank you deeply for the opportunity to address you all in this forum today. Gentlemen, you toil endlessly and tirelessly for a city of ungrateful people. You, like our brethren the mail carriers, are stopped by neither rain nor snow nor sleet nor dark of night. Heat cannot prevent you from removing the detritus of those residents of this fair city. Yet, when you stop your truck in the street for trash removal, are you not honked by a line of cars? How ungrateful and impatient can they be? When you go to clean the streets, are some cars not polite enough to move for the appointed time? This time does not change weekly. They know. They just do not respect you; do not respect the work that you do. The men of UBG Local 347 applauded loudly that day and on August 4, set out to strike against the city of New York. Eventually our demands were met. I was elected their leader, but by this time had abandoned the Communist Party after a weekend bender in Vegas with Dean and Sammy. Those memories ring clear through my mind. Rest easy, Sam Gompers, we fight on! 7/19/2002 7:08:10 AM | Geoff Wolinetz Begin The Begin My life story is a long and lustrous one to tell, much like Hunter Tylo's hair on that Pantene commercial. The intricate details of my youth are not often paid attention to, and while obviously exceptional, lack the certain je non seis quoi that my later years illustrate so superbly. However, my youth does contain certain events that are germane to my development as a person, auteur, photographer, male prostitute and love god. I was extremely lucky to mature in the presence of many remarkable people, including the sultan who I have mentioned in my earlier works. My parents went to great lengths to expose me to all sectors of the world, as they were inclined to recognize my remarkable potential very early on. It is clear in my thinly veiled autobiography, Camels Have Two Humps, that these influences were to play havoc with my disturbed and fragile psyche over the course of my life and provide me with a most formidable nemesis: myself. I am reminded now of something that Harry Truman once told me over cigars and brandy. We were in his study, at the old house in Independence, MO, and he said to me, "Wolinetz, the only man who can stop your unmitigated progress through life and the world are your inner demons. Answer them with callous defiance. Submit to your lusts for booze, hookers and blow, but never, never let your demons get the best of your talent. You are the world's only hope." I mean no offense to Harry Truman. Harry Truman is a dear friend of mine. When he'd have me up to Camp David for the weekend, my ex-wife Jayne Mansfield and I would fuck like rabbits in the President and Mrs. Truman's bed. Harry Truman always insisted that I sleep in his bed. When at the White House, I'd take a walk through the Rose Garden and urinate on the flowers. Harry Truman would laugh and the Secret Service tackled me. We would reminisce about the days when Harry Truman and I would shoot critters from the porch of his old house. Those were the days indeed. I digress. In the days of my puissant youth, I would frolic across the huge spread of land we had in Montana and bathe nude in the creek that ran across our property. Mother would cook up the vittles and we'd dine voraciously, Father exhausted from a day of teaching rudimentary vegetable picking skills to a series of inept and brutally stupid migrant workers. At one meal, Father raised his hand to mother. It was the first time I'd ever seen them fight. Little did I know that Father was a happy drunk, who would often come home stoned to the bejesus and ready to giggle uncontrollably when he heard the word "thermometer." I guess that's what fathers do. There was fun too, the days he'd take me fishing for chickens. There were the times we'd drive to town and try to pick Mary Jo Futterman's corset off by the strings. I miss father sometimes. Next time, I will regale you with an excerpt from my new book, You Have No Marbles And Other Stories, stories all calling back to my youth, to those days of virility and tripe. Join me, friends, join me.
7/18/2002 6:44:08 AM | Geoff Wolinetz Dust In The Wind The ethereal words from a rock group known only as Kansas. Other than rocking the strings off of their guitars with their seminal hit, "Carry On Wayward Son," Kansas addresses the ephemeral nature of our existence in their classic, "Dust In The Wind." How could these men, Kerry, Steve, Phil and the other boys, produce such a wonderfully incisive piece of work? Especially when you take into account that they grew up in Kansas. It seems to me this was the most clever thing to come out of Kansas since Bob Dole. I mean no offense to Bob Dole. Bob Dole is a dear friend of mine. Despite being decades my senior, Bob Dole and I would sit on the faded wooden porch of his Kansas home and shake our fists at the passing teenagers. "You youngsters are going to ruin this country," we'd shout, all crotchety and affected. Afterwards, we'd huff gasoline fumes and run around completely naked, telling his wife Elizabeth that we were going crazy like a "Chinaman at an opium festival." For fun, I'd take Bob Dole's pen from his injured hand and start screaming, "I'm Bob Dole how to run things. Bob Dole has a small penis." Oh, we had a lot of fun. I digress. Another dear friend of mine was my maternal grandfather, Eazy-E. Here now, my eulogy to one of my role models and best friends growing up, Grandpa E. Dear friends, thank you all for coming. This is the way Grandpa E would have wanted it, his compatriots from N.W.A in the house, his peeps from Ruthless Records in the house, all of his brothers, sisters, children and bitches here to honor him in this most upsetting time. While it may have seemed as though Grandpa E supported the negative lifestyle he espoused in his "gangsta rap," he was no animal, no criminal. Grandpa E sought to educate the public, to rail off against the dangers of growing up in the ghetto. And Grandpa E knew all of that. Sure, he sold drugs to school children, carried concealed weapons, spent a lot of time before judges and had seven children with six different women, but that was just Grandpa E being Grandpa E. He had an interminable spirit and that may be what I miss most about him. 7/17/2002 6:26:02 AM | Geoff Wolinetz Correspondence In the late 1970s, I enjoyed a brief rise to fame as photographer of the stars. With my reputation as an immortal wordsmith already cemented, I sought to expand my talent and scope as an internationally appreciated personality. Naturally, photography followed, I dealt mostly in grotesques and most notably with Julie Newmar of "Catwoman" fame. Don't get me wrong. I mean no offense to Julie Newmar . Julie Newmar is a dear friend of mine. During her days as Catwoman, Julie Newmar would smother me with her ample bosom and allow me to vibrate my lips against them, making a sound much like this: "brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrttttttttttttt." Julie Newmar and I would drive around in the Batmobile, making lewd gestures at the elderly, all the while ingesting a potent mixture of Vicodin and wine coolers. When the sun set over the cascading hills of the Dakotas, we would ride horses bareback and take turns blowing the cattle. Those were the days. I digress. As a photographer of the stars, I came in contact with a great deal of people. Here now, a portion of my correspondence with Angie Dickinson of Police Woman!: June 23, 1977 Angie Dickinson and I engaged in a brief but torrid affair and the pictures that we shot were deemed to risque for Hustler. Typical.
7/16/2002 7:24:57 AM | Geoff Wolinetz And The Beat Goes On Ah, yes. Those all too prophetic words off the pen of the late Sonny Bono and out of the mouth of his lovely (albeit now scary) ex-wife Cherilyn LaPierre (a.k.a. Cher). I say the beat goes on because, despite all efforts to prevent time from marching on, it does. Except of course for me. My immortal words, transcribed with painstaking accuracy, will allow me to endure well past the 150-200 years that I expect to live. You may or may not know this but that most phenomenal of all actors, Clint Howard, is actually 207 years old. How, you ask me, does Clint Howard maintain his body and form despite being over two centuries old? The answer is simple: volume. I mean no offense to Clint Howard. Clint Howard is a dear friend of mine. Clint Howard and I ran an illegal off-shore gambling operation for nearly two years. Living in tax free splendor 3 miles off the coast of Florida, we made our living from games of chance, the ample vig that we charged allowing us to spend generously on blow and hookers. Clint Howard and I would skip stones off of the top deck of our 95-foot yacht. We'd make prank calls to his brother Ron and ask him if he had Prince Albert in a can, then laugh hysterically when he told us that he did. Back in the days of the late 1990s, Clint Howard and I would hang upside down from the monkey bars at the children's zoo. Clint Howard would often be mistaken for an actual monkey, an event which he thoroughly enjoyed because he'd then be allowed to masturbate. I digress. However, the beat which I speak of is not life. of course. It is the band Journey. I was allowed to travel with the band during their "Frontiers" tour in Summer of 1983. Here now the transcript of my opening speech at the Market Square Arena, Indianapolis, IN, July 16, 1983: Any way you want it. Chilling and prophetic words from the band that will proceed my appearance here tonight. Even before Steve and the boys put pen to paper and wrote that masterpiece, I tried to live my life by those very words. Though their exact phraseology may not have come to me, that is the reason that I am credited in their liner notes. Ladies and gentleman, if you are in fact worthy of those titles, scared of the fate that may become you is no way to live your life. Of course you are scared, day to day life for you people must be at the very least, upsetting and disturbed. The reality in which I live and the reality in which you live are vastly different places. I awake in the morning and ask my houseboy, Ralph, to fetch my slippers. You likely wake up to the screaming of children and have to face another day in your pathetic lives. 7/15/2002 7:51:56 AM | Geoff Wolinetz Today I Play Hooky A curse on you, major media company. Today I take advantage of my "sick" days. Today I stay home, despite having no major malady to concern myself with. My right knee, no longer throbbing and swollen, bends at my command. My head aches not. My loins do, but for other reasons entirely. Today, I am free to spend the day as I wish. The people call this a three day weekend. I call it "Wolinetz's Day of Fun." You see, fun is that one thing which eludes definition. For instance, you may think it's fun to watch a hamster fun around his wheel for 6 to 8 hours a day. You may like to watch him run and run, in a futile search to gain ground, all the while knowing that the poor little bastard won't gain an inch. He'll just keep running and running until his little legs finally give out on him. For me, I may think it's fun to participate in an orgy with August Busch III, Janet Reno, Verne Troyer the midget from Austin Powers and Christina Applegate. I mean no offense to Christina Applegate. Christina Applegate is a dear friend of mine. I remember one morning, I went to visit Christina Applegate on the set of "Married ... With Children." Christina Applegate and I would huff airplane glue and then persuade the window washers to let us do their job. After work, we'd walk along the beaches of Malibu and make love like Sea Otters until dawn. As a side note, if you ever meet Ed O'Neill, ask him to do his impression of Ted McGinley on crack. It's hilarious. Again, I digress. Today, in search of more conventional fun, I will go where the day takes me. Perhaps I will end up at the Gap. Perhaps I will end up selling newspapers with Ashwan, my friend who sits in front of the subway. Maybe, just maybe, I'll stay in my underwear all day and pick the little fuzzies off of the couch in the living room of my spacious 3-bedroom Upper West Side apartment. The day is mine. Life is mine. I'll never forget what George Carlin once said to me. "Wolinetz," he said, "I've seen a lot of people in my time, but you are the handsomest motherfucker I have ever laid eyes on. Now let's go out and rustle ourselves up some snappers." He has a point. I am handsome. So I will do whatever it is that I want with my day off. And to the major media company, footing the bill for my time off, I have but one thing to say. No, make that nothing to say. This day is mine. |
