VISION TARP

March 29, 2008

With Saturday comes the podcast of the radio show I loathe. Now I don’t have to tune in the radio on Sundays at twelve, can simply access the proper application on the Mac and listen to the duo at my leisure. Of course they opened with a story, this one amply illustrating the utter denseness and cluelessness of the pair. The story goes like this: The one that I’d previously thought was the smarter of the two went out with a group to celebrate his grown son’s birthday. The wife and in-laws and a smattering of other family all attended the meal at a local restaurant. It was a good-sized get-together. Not having planned to have a cake, the talk show host asked the server if he could somehow procure one, have it ready to sing “Happy Birthday” to the son. The server asked if a chocolate cake would be ok, and the host of course said sure, any kind of cake at all would be fine.

After everyone enjoyed a good meal, the time had come for the cake. The server brought out the immense confection, alit with about a hundred candles, and brought it to the table. Everyone sang to the grown son, and noted that the cake had, inscribed in icing: “Happy Birthday Grammy.” Ok, they thought, maybe a leftover that someone else had ordered, didn’t really need after all. They devoured the cake, which—according to the radio host—was absolutely delicious.

At another table was a large gathering with an elderly woman at one end--another birthday celebration. They’d sung the birthday song at that table as well, but there was no cake that anyone could see. On the way out, the host stopped to ask if someone had celebrated a birthday at the table. He’d already heard them sing the song, so of course he knew the answer in advance. Yes, they told him, the woman speaking with a morose, long face. They’d had a birthday, too.
“You did, too?” asked the woman.
Oh, yes, the host replied; everything was wonderful, the cake was delicious. It was all just perfect.
“Did your cake say “Happy Birthday Grammy” the old woman asked?
“Yes it did,” replied the host. At this point neither he nor his wife had picked up on the fact that they’d eaten the woman’s birthday cake.

The host and his wife gathered their warm winter coats about them, readying themselves to leave that place. The radio man scratched listlessly at a spot somewhere high on his back, then wiped a crumb of cake from the corner of his mouth. Inspecting it on the end of his finger, he made a quick decision to consume it as well. The glum and silent birthday gathering, assembled to honor the elderly woman, waited for them to depart.
“The cake was absolutely delicious!” the radio man’s wife gushed, as they finally left. At the door he shuffled about, felt that maybe there was an extra crumb residing somewhere near his mouth, possibly in his moustache, and this suddenly took precedence over all other things. He made a cursory brushing of the area above his upper lip, hoping to mine it for some uneaten morsel, then knocked into an incoming patron, and shuffled out into the haze of the night. They went on their way, as he recounts it. It was only later that he says he realized what had transpired at the restaurant.

It is actually painful to listen to these stories, like knowing that there is a monster in the closet of a particularly bad slasher horror movie—one that features a masked maniac with a slicer that can make short work of anything in its path. Yet the unwitting heroine goes to the closet anyway, opens the door ever so slowly to take a peek inside. You want to scream: DON’T GO IN THE CLOSET! In the truly terrifying movies, the door swings open wide and one of the dull radio hosts emerges, guffawing and snorting and telling a pointless story. Everyone runs from the theatre in horror. In all fairness to the two dim hosts of this program, it was not the radio-man’s fault that they’d eaten the cake intended for some other party; the fact that he was so slow to realize it is beyond believing, however.

At the halfway point of the podcast, the host was recounting the weekly brain-teaser. Some of these are actually quite challenging, and some are embarrassingly easy. They are all culled from the internet, in a lazy three-minute search conducted at lunchtime—in between bites of a tuna-salad sandwich and gulps from a purplish soft drink.
“Listen up closely,” the radio host said. “Because this part is extremely important. If you’ve ignored all the rest of the clues, at least pay attention to this one:” The podcast immediately went dead; the show was over.

April 1, 2008

At the Vision Tarp, Sancho was out front, his likeness waving a large tarp, saying, “Amigos! At Vision Tarp we have your eyes covered!” He was wearing a huge pink sombrero. I walked in, was seen immediately by a pretty young doctor who told me that I slept with my eyes partially open.
“Oh—maybe that explains why I can’t see anything in the morning,” I said. “I stumble about as a man blind, guiding my way with what can be grasped on my matinal wanderings—perhaps a worn doorknob or a lofty protrusion to help me on my way.” My visit to Sancho’s Vision Tarp had taken a decidedly literary turn.
“Yes,” the young doctor said, “Take some of this stuff; you can buy it over the counter. It will help keep your eyes moist.”
She handed me the paper, the thing that learning and studying at the university allowed her to write. It said, “REFRESH PM—take at bedtime.”

“So what brings you here?” She asked.
I took off my glasses, waved them in front of her. They were all fogged up. Looking at things through these glasses was terrible; everything was foggy: The old motorcycle with its lustrous golden orange paint, the bright red coke machine, even piles of old tires were foggy. The whole world was misty, like a bad film noir.
“Have you ever seen anything like that?” I asked.
She nodded yes, said that maybe the coating had worn off.
“Ok, so there’s that. I also have a hard time reading up close,” I said. “I usually have to take my glasses off to read the paper.”
She examined my eyes, did a thorough job of it, told me that my distance prescription and close-up issues needed to be addressed. Bifocals.
“Can I get them without a line?” I asked.
Yes, I could have these glasses made with no line.

I told her that she ran a fine outfit, that Sancho was promoting a good business, what with his tarp out front, and reassuring words.
“Oh, that— the pretty young doctor said; “That’s just left over from when this was a firecracker shop.” It did appear, upon closer examination, that Sancho’s words were possibly painted over some older words—things he’d said in the past to promote sparklers, roman candles, bottle-rockets and the like.

I looked at some frames, thought about the new styles, felt that everything looked pretty much the same from the different frame-makers. I settled on a pair, took them to the woman up front, who measured my eyes and so on. Everything was going to cost over three hundred dollars—not counting the exam. It seemed a little steep, but I’d never bought bifocals before.
“I’ll check around,” I said, reluctant to leave Sancho and his tarp and the old firecracker shop with the dark-haired young doctor.
“Okay, have a good day,” said the eyeglass specialist.
“You, too.”