IS STEVE MCQUEEN ALIVE AND CUTTING HAIR IN CHANDLER, ARIZONA? William Z. Snyder Sticks it to the Man - Part 3

Part three? It seems like I banged out part one a heckuva long time ago. Let’s see, there was the attempted haircut at Supercuts. Or was it Great Clips? Doesn’t matter which corporate joint it was, they’re all the same. The employees were rude and nasty.



Part two involved a satisfying fantasy in which I slugged it out with the rude and nasty low level representatives of everything that’s wrong with the corporations of the world.


Part three goes something like this…


The following Saturday, I found myself with a raggedy head of hair and a couple of free hours. It was time to get old school. I got in my car and searched for an old time, mom and pop operated barbershop. I must have driven past a dozen Supercuts, Great Clips, and Super Clips before a spotted an honest to goodness barber shop pole.


It was a small place. There were three barbers and four chairs. The football game was on the television. Two guys were cutting hair. The third barber looked like an old-guy version of Steve McQueen. None of these guys wore eye make-up or metal in their faces.


When the barber asked how he could help me, I fought back the urge to order pastrami on rye, asking instead for a haircut. Come to think of it, the guy sounded a little like Steve McQueen. He took his time, stopping to watch the football game often. I had almost forgotten the pleasure of an old fashioned haircut, complete with hot shaving cream and a straight razor. Yeah, it was a relaxing experience, not a lot of conversation, and that was ok.


I paid up and was on my way. The price was fifteen bucks, three dollars more than at the corporate owned joint. The guy gave me a pretty good hair cut, considering what he was working with. As a matter of fact, it’s the best haircut I’ve had in a long time, well worth the extra three bucks.


I stuck it to the man and you know what? I’m going to keep on sticking it to him! No more soulless, sociopathic corporate owned haircutting joints for this guy.

Oh, there’s one more thing; I distinctly heard one of the other guys call my barber Steve. Makes you wonder…

Steve McQueen, Research Papers and Ten Bucks

My mind has been turned to muck. This is the direct result of grading 100 four to six page research papers over the last ten days. I’m telling you I can’t take it any more. Come to think of it, I don’t have to take it any more – until next year.

Grading these papers has actually made me stupider. I know what you’re thinking; is stupider a word? Doesn’t the use of stupider, at the very least, reflect indicate bad grammar? Didn’t I just get done telling you that grading them research papers made me stupider than I was before?

Allow me to share a few examples of antiknowledge that lingers in the recesses of my brain as a result of reading these research papers:

The Woodstock Festival was held to protest the War of 1812.

The Vietnam War was fought between the United States and Korea.

Adolph Hitler and the Nazis were communists.

George Washington owned a Coca Cola bottling plant.

There were a few good papers but the truth is I put heckuva a lot more work into grading than my students put into writing the papers. The lack of effort was no surprise. This is the fourth year I’ve been assigning research papers to high school juniors. I used the word assigning because I sure as heck don’t appear to be teaching them anything.

A couple of years ago a student turned in a paper on thr influence of Elvis Presley on American culture. He wrote that Elvis was so angry over his daughter’s marriage to Michael Jackson that he refused to speak to her for two years. For the benefit of those who don’t follow American pop culture, the king of rock and roll died at least a decade before Lisa Marie’s marriage to Michael Jackson.

This year’s assignment called for the class to compare a post 1900 American movement to a pre 1900 American movement. Five students didn’t even respond to the prompt. Three students wrote papers advocating the legalization of marijuana, citing highly respected academic sources such as smokeit.com, hightimes.com, and 420.com.

I’ve got to ask, were the authors of the three smokeit.com papers high when I gave the assignment???

Did I mention that the papers were really bad? The average score is in the low 60s. Man, last night I had a dream about grading bad research papers.

I gave the unit by best shot. I’ll try some new approaches next year.

I'm guessing Steve McQueen never graded a research paper in his life. He was too busy driving fast cars, running around with hot chicks and beening the king of cool.

It's not like the only thing going on in my life has been bad research papers and antiknowledge. For example I found ten bucks in the street last week.

Steve McQueen, Subway and Si Senor Restaurant

Adventures at Subway

I recently stopped in at a local Subway sandwich shop for lunch. I've been a Subway fan for years. Where else can a guy get a tasty halfway healthy lunch for three bucks? Nowhere, that's where. The shop was empty. A somber middle aged woman was beyond the counter to not greet me.

"Hello." I said.

She said absolutely nothing. As a matter of fact, she pretty much gave me the stink eye. I could have walked out - but I was hungry.

I ordered a meatball sandwich on Italian herbs and cheese bread.

She opened her mouth to ask, "Toasted?"

"Please." I responded.

Removing the sandwich from the oven, she complied with my request to add lettuce, tomatoes, black olives, banana peppers, jalapenos, Chipolte Southwest sauce and light Parmesan cheese.

"Meal deal?" she asked, looking at me as if I had a swastica carved into my forehead.

"Just the sandwich."

"Two thirty-nine." she said.

I handed her three dollars and she dropped the change into my hand.

Another customer appeared behind me.

"Can I help you?" she said looking right through me.

I didn't get a can I help you.

"Hold on a minute." I said.

The woman looked at me, stink eye on maximum.

"Who owns this place?" I asked.

"I do."

"And you don't see fit to say thank you when a customer frequents your place?"

Nothing but major leaue stink eye.

"I tell you what, I'm never coming back here."

She smailed and said,"Thank you."

Is it just me?


Si Senor Restaurant

Si Senor is a quaint little Mexican joint in Chandler, Arizona where people never give anyone the stink eye. My wife, daughter and nephew work at this bastion of New Mexico style gastronomic ecstasy. My three yougest girls and I eat there every week.

The owner says it’s the habañero chili peppers that make the food so exceptional. An interesting side effect of the super chilis is beads of sweat cascading down my temples. With women, their noses seem to run. It's quirky cool to watch men dabbing their napkins to their brows and woman daintily wiping their noses with expressions of pure, brainless culinary bliss.

Meals come with chips and four salsas, the best of which, and the hottest, is the white. I’m due for a heavenly stuffed shredded beef sopapilla – in about an hour.

It’s good to have some thing to look forward to, something spectacular.

And no stink eyes.

John Prine

The guy in the picture is John Prine. There's a good chance you've never heard of him. He is arguably the greatest singer, songwriter, guitar picker never to make it into the mainstream. His lyrics are so incredibly true.

Here is a particularly captivating verse from Souvenirs, a song he co wrote with Steve Goodman.

All the snow has turned to water
Christmas days have come and gone
Broken toys and faded colors
Are all that's left to linger on
I hate graveyards and old pawn shops
For they always bring me tears
I can't forgive the way they rob me
Of my childhood souvenirs

By the way, Souvenirs is John Prine's mother's favorite song.

Click on this link if you'd like to see John Prine perform Souvenirs.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1DYQe454YVs

Here is the chorus from Sam Stone, a haunting song about a drug addicted Vietnam vet.

There's a hole in daddy's arm where all the money goes,
Jesus Christ died for nothin' I suppose.
Little pitchers have big ears,
Don't stop to count the years,
Sweet songs never last too long on broken radios.

Johnny Cash covered Sam Stone.

Click on this link if you'd like to see Sam Stone performed.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QEa4qi6cYOQ&feature=related

The ticket you see above is mine. There's a story that goes along with this ticket. Friday afternoon one of the secretary's sent out an email offering six free John Prine tickets for the Friday night show. I raced to the secretary's desk and picked up one of the tickets. The business of seeing John Prine perform wasn't going to be easy. You see I was obligated to accompany a group of students to an academic competition across town. You never know with these competitions; they can end as early as seven o'clock or go on until eleven. The show started at eight but there was a warm up band. It was a proverbial crap shoot. The bus returned to our home school at 9:30. There was still a chance I could see John Prine sing. It would be worth the 45 minute drive to downtown Phoenix just to see him play one song.

As drove toward Phoenix I began to reevaluate the situation. I was pretty darned tired. And I had to get up at 5:30. Since there had been a warm up band, John Prine must have begun his performance at nine at the latest. It was ten o'clock . "The guy's got to be seventy." I thought. "A seventy year-old isn't going to play much longer than an hour." And I was pretty darned tired. I understood I would regret turning around and going home more than I would have regretted losing a little sleep as I pulled off the freeway and headed home.


And so I have this ticket.

Last night I came home, cracked a beer and watched a few John Prine songs on Youtube. It was nice. It had been a good day. I enjoyed being with my students at the competition. It's good to have a job from which I can drive home every day knowing I at least tried to do something good.

I was walking down the road, man
Just looking at my shoes
When God sent me an angel
Just to chase away my blues
Now everything is cool
Everything's okay
Everything is cool
Everything's okay

- Everything is Cool by Jon Prine



Steve McQueen did not see the John Prine show Friday night.

Steve McQueen, a Pogo Stick and Washington Irving

Pogo Sticks

My daughters complained that they were bored. Being the genius that I am, I offered five bucks to the first girl to reach 100 pogo stick hops - in the back hard. They raced into the back yard and I paused to marvel at my brilliance before getting back to my coffee and morning paper.

Five minutes later they were back in the house wanting to renegotiate. I guess feeling like a genius for five minutes is better than never feeling like a genius at all.

The Devil and Tom Walker

My students recently read Washington Irving's The Devil and Tom Walker. It's one of my favorite short stories and I'm amazed at how the 150 year-old chronicle has maintained its relevance. Irving uses the story to absolutely shred slave traders, hypocritical Christians and money lenders. I don't run into many slave traders, these days but there doesn't seem to be any shortage of hypocritical Christians or unscrupulous bankers.

The Devil and Tom Walker is one of the funniest stories I've come across. Most of the humor was too subtle for my high school students to pick up. They did get a kick out of the situation when Irving explained that Tom Walker had no fear of the devil after putting up with a woman like Mrs. Walker.

As with the stories of Faust, Daniel Webster, Robert Johnson and Charlie Daniels' fiddle player, The Devil and Tom Walker centers on the devil's offer to make Tom Walker a rich man in exchange for his soul. He also asks Tom to be a usurer, that is a money lender, one of his own "peculiar people." The devil suggests that Tom charge two percent interest a month, that is 24 percent a year. Modern American banks rouinely charge their cusomers 24 percent or more today, don't they? As Tom Walker grows old he tries to cheat the devil by attending church, singing and praying louder than the rest and pointing out all of the townsfolk who break the rules of the church, all the while destroying lives, cashing in on his customers' misfortunes during the week. Of course, in the end, the devil takes Tom into the bowels of the earth where the hypocritical money lender will burn for all eternity.

In a day and age when Bankers seem to get away with such unspeakable behavior, Irving's classic tale is - comforting.

The Coolest Cat in History

You may be wondering why I included a photo of Steve McQueen from the set of The Magnificent Seven.

No reason.

Swine Flu, Scorpion Wars, Dog the Bounty Hunter, Man v. Food, and Steve McQueen

It’s been a long short week. I couldn’t seem to kick it into gear after the three day weekend. My throat’s a little scratchy. Of course the first thing that comes to my mind is, Oh my God, I’ve got the Swine Flu! Good thing I can count on the media to remind me to cough into my arm and to wash my hands at least 63 times a day.



SCORPION WARS
My five year-old daughter exterminated her first scorpion last week - got the little sucker with the heel of her shoe. I'm so darned proud I could cry. The Arizona bark scorpions had no idea of what they were getting into when they invaded my household. My nocturnal back yard scorpion hunting expeditions yielded just six confirmed kills last week. A month ago I was killing 60 a week. Victory is within reach. The scorpions are on the run.


Super Blogger, Gueley of Sweden recently explained that he and his daughter watch classic films like Charlie Chaplain’s The Great Dictator.

Wow. I’m feeling pretty mediocre over here. Do you want to know what I watched with my daughters last night? Dog the Bounty Hunter. I'm not proud of this. My kids and I can't seem to take our eyes off of Dog and his gang of cartoon characters as they chase anemic bail jumping drug addicts.

And then we watched Man v. Food.

We are what we are...
Wait a minute, what right thinking family wouldn't enjoy watching some schmuck shovel away a six pound burrito in 30 minutes?

STEVE MCQUEEN TRIVIA
Kevin Costner, Collin Farrell, Bruce Willis and Homer Simpson have each listed Steve McQueen as their personal hero.

Bad Epiphany

I wasn’t looking for any trouble. Then again I suppose I never actually look for trouble. Who does? Another long hard day of educating the youth of America was over and out. Grabbing the TV remote control, I plopped down on the couch for some mindless channel surfing when my wife asked me to head out to the grocery store for a box of sugar cubes. My daughter was building a sugar cube pyramid for a history project and she had gone through something like 26 boxes of sugar cubes. We were going to need another five boxes. Yeah, it was a big sugar cube pyramid.

Being a good husband and father I did exactly as I was asked. I found the sugar cubes and made my way the checkout counters. There was only one checkout counter manned by an actual human being. Since a half dozen or more blue haired senior citizens were lined up to cash out with the live employee I decided to try my luck with the self check out. Bad idea. It seems that I have trouble with technology. After the transaction stalled out five times I decided to line up with the blue hairs. I don’t know how long I was in line but I had time to read entire articles on Britney Spears, Paula Abdul and another on Brad Pitt. I’m not proud f this, but what else was there to do? When I finally made it to the human she asked me how old I was.

“I’m 49. Why?”

“At 55 you’re eligible for the senior citizen discount.”

“YOU THOUGHT I WAS A SENIOR CITIZEN?”

“Well, you’re not that far away from 55.”

“Oh my God, you thought I was a senior citizen!”

“Well, I've seen you in here with the grandkids. You are a grandfather, aren’t you?”

“But a senior citizen!”

I walked out of the store blubbering like the Cowardly Lion. What a rotten epiphany! I’m getting old. And what’s worse is people actually see me as an old guy. You see, before this little reality beat down, I thought of myself as youthful or at the very least, youthful looking. Sure my hair is thinning out and maybe my face is starting to show a little wear and tear, but I thought of myself as – athletic. Hell, I ran a half marathon, what was it? Three, no… six years ago?

Has it really been six years since I ran the half marathon?

And six years from today I’ll be eligible for the senior citizen’s discount???

No!

No.

no.

Senior citizen discount, my left elbow.



You know what I’m going to do? I’m going to watch Steve McQueen kick ass in The Magnificent Seven. It won’t make me younger but it’ll make me feel better. The Magificent Seven always makes me feel better.

Steve McQueen, Curly Search and Scorpion Wars

 THE LATEST EIGHT FINGERED CRIMINAL'S SON NEWS 

THE EIGHT FINGERED CRIMINAL'S SON, a kooky collection of quirky stories based on true  events will be available for purchase at this site or at GELI Book Store in Bangkok, Thailand and Tempe Auto Repair in Tempe, Arizona in November. We'll be announcing two new venues this week and promotional video number three is in the works. Stay tuned for more information...

Watch the epic book promo for The Eight Fingered Criminal's Son here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-c7zvZ4mt1I&feature=related

Jim Carrey has backed out of the role of Curly in The Three Stooges Movie. Benicio del Toro is set to play Moe while Paul Giamatti has replaced Sean Penn to play Larry.

My family and I have been waging all out war against the bark scorpions of Arizona for a little over a month. We’ve eviscerated upwards of 150 of the diabolical creatures. And still, they keep coming. My eight year-old was stung a couple of weeks ago. She took a stinger to the knee. It scared the macaroni and cheese out of her, but she was fine in half an hour.

And so the conflict rages on. Every night we head out to the perimeter of the house with a can of Raid, a hammer and a black light flashlight. The family that eradicates scorpions together stays together. Joe, the neighbor on the other side of the wall hunts scorpions too. He uses a blow torch to take the little bastards out. Joe seems to enjoy the process a little too much. Every time he makes a kill, the other side of the wall lights up and we hear Joe laughing diabolically. I accidentally squirted him with Raid last week. I suppose I’m lucky he didn’t lose his cool and let me have it with the blow torch.

This shot of the King of Cool is from the film, Le Mans and it's nothing short of epic. The finger gesture, known as “the two finger salute,” goes back to the Hundred Years’ War. Legend has it that prior to the Battle of Agincourt, the French knights bragged they would cut off the string pulling fingers of the heavily outnumbered English and Welsh bowmen. After soundly thrashing the French army with their longbows, the English and Welsh bowmen raised their intact bow fingers in celebration.

The Last Prescott Posting: Prescott Alleys

Considering the Prescott Justice League trip was my first serious stab at photography since 1974, I think I did OK. Consider the symmetry, the style and the symbolism of the picture above.

I have a thing for the alleys of Prescott. There something about strolling along a desolate alleyway and letting my mind wander back in time. There's nothing in these pictures that says 2009. It might as well be 1909.

Richard Nixon spent his chilhood summers in Prescott. The odds are he wandered these alleys in the early 1900s.

And this is pretty much what he saw.

Sherrif Bucky O'Neil probably arrested somebody in one of these alleys.

Wyatt Earp must have loaded up his supply wagons behind one of these old structures when he was running the town saw mill.

Maybe Steve McQueen sweet-talked Barbra Leigh behind one of these buildings.

Yeah, I really dig these old back alleys. It's good to know there are places where a guy can let himself drift back and relive a little history.

The Arizona Justice League of Photographers Ride

The Arizona Justice League of Photographers embarked on its inagaural mission to Prescott, Arizona on Saturday July 18, 2009.

Isn't this slick? I got a shot of Fellow Justice League member, Eric taking a picture in the Prescott town square.

I happen to be a member of the newly created Arizona Justice League of Photographers. We were inspired by the Bryan Frank and the original Justice League of Photographers in Los Angeles. My photographey background begins and ends with the photography class I took as a freshman in high school.

The five members of the Justice League stopped for lunch at the Palace Bar on Whiskey Row.

The building burned to the ground in the Whiskey Row fire of 1900. The bar you see above was saved. Patrons disassembled the bar and reasssembled it across the street in the town square. The bartenders continued serving drinks as the Palace went up in flames.

Junior Bonner with Steve McuQueen was filmed in Prescott in the early seventies. One of the major scenes was shot in the Palace Bar.

The newspaper clipping above is located in the men's restroom. That's Steve MccQueen without the shirt. The girl is his costar Barbra Leigh. I think it's a cool photo. Sorry about the weak photography on my part.

I snapped this photo because they were advertising $8.50 Budweiser draft beers. I went with a glass of water. If I want to pay $8.50 for a beer I'll go to an professional baseball game.

I had a Rueben sandwich and corn chowder. It wasn't bad.

How about a cheesy dog photo?

Fellow blogger, Blues Frau in Germany takes fantastic Bicycle photos. Thought I'd try my hand.

Here's a shot of a couple of Justice League photgraphers. That's Rick the I.T. Guy down low and his brother, Clif The Lawyer up high. They actually knew what they were doing.

This is Matt's Saloon on Whiskey Row. Legend has it that Bruce Springsteen rolled up on his Harley one night in 1989. Locals say he bellied up to the bar, had a couple of cold ones and proceeded to play a set with the house band.

Here's a photo of the Boss and the E Street Band, not Matt's House Band.

You never know who you're going to run into on Whiskey Row. Here's a shot of Kris Kristopherson. Pretty cool, huh. Bryan Frank and the original Justice League of photograhers got a shot of Shugg Knight of Death Row Records in Hollywood a couple of weeks ago. I think Kris Kristopherson trumps Shugg Knight. OK this isn't Kris Kristopherson. It's actually Wild Bill Kathan, but he looks a heckuva lot like Kris Kristopherson. He's planning on breaking the world pushup record next month. The standing record is 1,400 pushups in an hour. Good luck, Wild Bill.

This is Wild Bill's car.

And here's a shot of your's truly rifding in the back seat of Wild Bill's car.

The first potography excursion of the Arizona Justice League was a success. We plan to meet again in a month or so. The real photographers are going to send me some photos and I'll post them as soon as possible.

Bryan Frank and the original Justice League of Photographers, thanks for the inspiration.

STEVE MCQUEEN NEWS

A biographical film based on the life of Steve McQueen is in the works. Brad Pitt is under consideration to play the King of Cool.

Speaking of Brad Pitt, I finally got the chance to rent the film, Benjamin Button. Everything I heard about the film was bad. More than anything people said it was just too long. I thought it was a cool movie. Not only was it poignant and quirky, but it was funny. The film left me with two important lessons. First, we don’t get back the time we waste and second, there is no right or wrong way to live our lives. The film is Based on a short story by F. Scott Fitzgerald; I thought it was interesting that the main character’s love interest is named Daisy. Good movie. Thumbs up, baby.