Between what has turned out to be a
lucrative and successful career, my pursuit of a yoga teaching certification,
and cramming biking / hiking / running / kayaking into the moments in between, I
have spent remarkably little time writing, much less reading. I do want to take a moment and tell my
faithful reader Oscar (and anyone else who reads this) about the western things
on my mind. Maybe I’ll get around to
really writing about these in detail, but if not…
Quick Draw- Hulu is running a sexy, irreverent,
and laugh out loud funny western series.
From what I gather it is almost all improve in the style of Party Down
and the Larry Sanders Show. John Lehr
plays Sheriff John Henry Hoyle, a brilliant yet clueless Harvard trained
criminologist who tries to tame a wild west town. The straight man to his bumbling act is the
town madam Honey, played by Allison Dunbar- you’ll tune in to see her fill out
her old west prostitute costumes but stay for her deadpan humor. It’s a
short run of eight brilliant episodes, let’s hope Hulu makes more.
 |
| yeah, baby |
Spanking- I wrote about it obliquely before, but in the weeks since I keep running into references to spanking in
the oddest places, including classic western stories (like a Louis L’Amour
Chick Bowdrie short). I'm not the first one to notice it, as Steve Hockensmith wrote about it five years ago. A lot of my “reading”
has been audiobooks lately, and it’s got me constantly on the ready to hit
pause when I hear a spanking reference.
My favorite so far is from Graphic Audio’s Great American Westerns
rendition of Zane Grey’s “Amber’s Mirage”, where upon being advised that he
should spank a wandering girlfriend the main character responds “that’ll be
like throwing fuel on the fire!”
Speaking of…
 |
| Zane & his teenage mistress |
Zane Grey- Ever read between the lines
of a Zane Grey story? He was one horny cowpoke. Grey got a girlfriend pregnant
as a college baseball player, and the family quietly paid off the now unknown mother. He slept around while dating his future wife,
and had a long string of mistresses throughout his life. He once wrote:
"I love to be free. I
cannot change my spots. The ordinary man is satisfied with a moderate income, a
home, wife, children, and all that....But I am a million miles from being that
kind of man and no amount of trying will ever do any good…I shall never lose
the spirit of my interest in women.”
Wild West Con III- Still quite shaken
by seeing a performance of Sleep No More in Manhattan last year, I am looking
for something visceral and cool to follow.
I am considering going to, of all things, a wild west steampunk
convention next year. We’ll have to see.
Rivers- there is a calm and solitude
in kayaking, even with Mrs. Slap paddling besides me. I spend a lot of time paddling on the river
that killed a good friend two years ago, but the waters keep on flowing. Every time I head out I come back and read a
few more pages of Call Down Thunder, Kerry Newcomb’s revision of the larger
than life Mike Fink and love of the fickleness of the currents. Speaking of which, it’s time to get the boats
strapped on and the paddles stowed.
Vay con dios.
