FollowI love walking around the kitchen looking for ‘verboten’ snacks. You’d think after 3 decades, I’d know all the hiding places. But I don’t. Found these wonderful mint chocolate cookies with ‘weight’ prominently on box. They were bite size, wrapped individually(interesting marketing ploy) and an easy 3 in 3 minutes. Then I turned the box around; I woofed and chewed my way through 210 calories(more than I wanted to spend) The good news for my blog readers; the three minute interval gave me time to think. I’ve already posted this on Facebook. Here goes. Damn, my novel, ‘Vichy Water’ touches on current events and life style– hauntingly so. There’s a graphic scene dealing with auto companies holding back recalls(in the news every day) and drug companies knowing about bad side effects with silence(a diabetic drug last week was found to increase heart attacks 43% but in silence), health insurance companies(protests going on daily and President Obama addressing issue and I’m even battling now with one). The novel also glibly deals with tuna fish becoming extinct. The United States just announced we’re going to support a ban on fishing for Atlantic blue fin tuna. Why? Of course, we realize extinction is around the corner. HBO(Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks) are coming out with a series on March 14th called “The Pacific” dealing with World War II in the Pacific. ‘Vichy Water’ takes a character to Guadalcanal (important battle of war) to pay respects to those soldiers. President Obama gave a speech in Egypt on June 4, 2009 stating how America will look to the Muslim world with respect and understanding. Vichy Water did just that with a main character( part Muslim) Nostradamus? Me? No, but typing fingers and long cerebral telomeres have touched on a special pulse and I can’t help but wonder(and worry) what else from ‘Vichy Water’ appears in a similar crystal ball, visually like Margaret Hamilton’s in her castle before melting, melting.
In a line borrowed from the movie “Mr. Roberts,” “So what’s all this crap about no movies tonight?” I miss Jack Lemmon, Walter Matthau and Henry Fonda. “What’s all this crap about New Jersey Mayors?” There’s bad press about mayors here in the Garden State(we don’t have a lot of gardens; too many pot-hole roads, factories(small), smoke stacks. Take the hour-long Jersey Transit coast train from Matawan to NYC Penn Station. Seven hundred and forty four smoke stacks). You read and hear about ‘bad’ mayors like a “Bad Santa.” I know the former mayor of my town took bribes from developers (prison, parole?). The mayor of Hoboken, just after getting elected, now gone with the northeast wind. And so forth. But so much of that is far removed, never involving me personally so you naturally go through denial. Recently I attended an environmental conference. At the end of day, by a coat rack, I met the mayor of a small, mostly summer Jersey shore town. I exuberantly told him that I wrote a novel, “Vichy Water” that has a love-affair with his town. Many important things in the novel take place in his town (I was probably conceived there as well and I told him) Taking a deep breath, I talked about a dream of seeing a Hollywood film crew at a jetty which borders his town. He said, “I’d love to read it.” I said, handing him my business card with novel website, “You can order it on-line.” There was dead silence for 5 long seconds; his hand retracted almost symbolically or reflexively. He wanted a hand-out; a free novel. He doesn’t have to pay. He’s the mayor. “So what’s all this crap about New Jersey mayors?”