I can hear it though the door: MOBY ORANGE

                                            THE MOMENT THAT SHE APPEARED

                                          

In 1978 I was working as a delivery driver for Kerry's, an office products store (remember those? There were several in downtown Oakland in those pre-Costco and Staples days) I entered into a brief and unfortunate affair - I did that a lot back then. Kerry's was on Broadway in downtown Oakland. One morning, late getting started on my delivery route, I was standing at the front counter looking through the plate-glass window at passers-by (downtown Oakland was bustling then, not the ghost town that it is now) I was surprised to see  The Ballerina stroll past. We had been friendly before but never anything more. I went out to the sidewalk and greeted her. She was quite pleased to see me and, in our brief conversation, I learned that she was working around the corner at the phone company billing office and was on her lunch break. We made plans to meet for lunch the next day.

She, and probably still is, a vegetarian and there was a single restaurant in downtown Oakland that catered to her dietary constraints, a dark and dumpy little establishment a few blocks from Kerry's. I arranged my deliveries so I could meet her there on her lunch hour. This became our regular meeting place for the next several months as our relationship progressed. I called it "the vegetable place" - vegetarianism seemed weird to me and I couldn't fathom why someone would avoid meat - and she even avoided dairy products. Nowadays even Denny's has vegetarian dishes, but back then you couldn't even buy tofu at Safeway. It was a challenging choice to make.

                                                   

Stan Burger was a little mom-and-pop (Literally. It was owned by a young Chinese couple and named after their infant son, Stan) burger joint across the street from the store A "Moby Orange" was an orange-flavored syrupy drink that was like a foamy Slurpee. Moby Orange cups were emblazoned with the catchphrase "a whale of a drink".  I would sometimes have lunch there: a greasy burger, a bag of soggy fries and a Moby Orange. Stan Burger is long gone. When downtown Oakland died of mall-itis, the businesses that depended on the local lunch crowd were the first to go. As I write this I'm not sure if Moby Orange itself is still a going concern (I just checked - it's not). When we started this particular Le Bonx improvisation I simply started singing about what I'd done for lunch that day.

Went down to Stan Burger
Had me a Moby Orange
It's a whale of a drink

I went on to write several songs about her, "I Don't Mind" - covered earlier - among them. There's another one titled simply "Ballerina" that I've tried to record several times. Someday I'll get a good take. Maybe this year with this bunch of Backorders? She was tall and lithe, with long curly brown hair  really gorgeous. Our relationship was doomed from the start because they all were (I make no excuses - that's the way it was, folks). 

I never really knew how she felt about me. One tearful night she told me she loved me. There was a storm raging outside and rain was spattering on her apartment windows while the wind howled. She sat cross-legged on the floor with her face in her hands and I stood behind her like an inquisitor. It was over soon after that. Two years later while driving home one night I saw her on the freeway in her old Honda Civic. I honked my horn and waved, but she didn't look. A year later when I was a big-shot customer service manager for Schwabacher/Frey, a contract office products dealer (remember those? There were several around the Bay Area in those pre-Costco and Staples days) I ran into her in the company's lobby. She was a repair person for the phone company, wearing the traditional helmet and utility belt laden with wires and clips. She had gained a substantial amount of weight and her lustrous hair was much shorter. I smiled at her but she looked right through me.

That's it for now - IGLOO 

                                                        

Let's rub noses..  

Andmoreagain: I had a throat procedure last week (this explains my absence, I guess - not that anyone's paying attention). After several post-surgery voice rest days I discovered that my voice, which I'd lost 25 years ago due to THE EVENT (which I will explain soon, I swear), had mostly returned. I can now speak above a hoarse whisper. I still can't sing, but there are a few more procedures to go over the next 2 years, so maybe...Right now I'm being very careful for fear of losing it again - taking long rest periods between speaking. So, I can talk now but I ain't talkin'.

I'm reading the book Living The Beatles Legend (lousy title) about the Beatles' road manger/assistant Mal Evans. With Neil Aspinall taking his secrets to the grave, this is the one I've been waiting for. Mal was in the Fab inner circle before, during and after. He saw and heard everything, recording sessions, world tours, hotel adventures, concerts and continued working with individual members after the breakup. He had the scoop. Sadly the book has been a major disappointment. It's BORING. Nothing new is added. The same old Beatle stories are trotted out. It reads like a mix of information from the many Beatle books already out there. Boo! But I'm looking forward to reading ex-Turtle and Mother Mark Volman's book, Happy Forever. If it's anything like his partner Howard Kaylan's memoir Shell Shocked it's gonna be a hoot. 

                                                 

READ THIS