Fred Wemyss

I was wondering what to write tonight when I opened an email which solved the problem. It's reproduced below, and underneath it is my take on it. Here goes:

Subject: Hope I can Trust You
From: Shadak Sherrif

As you read this, I don't want you to feel sorry
for me, because, I believe everyone will die someday.
My name is
SHADAK
SHERIFF a merchant in Dubai, in
the U.A.E.I have been
diagnosed
with
Esophageal cancer. It has defiled all forms of medical
treatment,
and right now. I have only about a few months to
live,
according to medical
experts. I have not particularly
Lived my life so
well, as I never
really cared for anyone (not even myself) but my
business.
Though I am
very rich, I was never generous, I was always
hostile to
people and
only focused on my business as that was the
only
thing I cared for But
now I regret all this as I
now know that there
is more to life than
just wanting to have make all the money in the
world.
I believe when
God gives me a second chance to come
to this
world I would live my
life
a different way from how I have lived it.
Now that God has called
me, I
have willed and given most of my
property and
assets to my
immediate
and extended family members as
well as a few
close friends.
I want God
to be merciful to me and
accept my soul so,
I have decided
to give alms
to charity
organizations, as I
Want this to be one of the
last good
deeds I do
on earth. So far, I have
distributed money to
some charity
organizations in the U.A.E, Algeria
and Malaysia. Now
that my health
has deteriorated so badly, I cannot
do this myself
anymore. I once
asked members of my family to close one
of my
accounts and
distribute
themoney which.
I have there to charity
organization in
Bulgaria and
Pakistan; they refused and kept the money
tothemselves.
Hence, I do
not trust them anymore, as they
seem not to be contended
with what I
have left for them.
The last of my money
which no one
knows of is the
hugecash deposit of eighteen million
dollars
$18,000,000,00
that I have with a finance company abroad. I
will
wantyou to help me go
there and collect this deposit and
dispatched it
to charity
organizations.I have set aside 10% for you
and for your
time. Please
get back to me as soon as possible so that
i can furnish
youwith the
Relevant documents and to get a proof of
myself to you.
My family are really working to see that this great
Dream of mine
reaming a thing of
Thought. Best regards as I wait
Your
quick
response.
Reply to this
Email in my personal mail : shadak.
___________________________________________________________________________________________
I'm leaving out his email address, because I'm sure a number of readers already have it and are now each safeguarding ten per cent of this dying man's hard-earned lucre.

What should I reply to Shadak Sheriff? Should I suggest to him that what's made in Dubai stay in Dubai? Should I compliment him on the poetry of his phrase, "reaming a thing of Thought?"
Or should I suggest that the Ugandan General's widow who emailed me last week has my bank account at her disposal?

I should certainly thank him for his bit of verse. But if I contact him, he may spend more time emailing me, and, from what I can tell, he barely has time to draw a breath, let alone a sum from my account.

The title of this entry is has nothing to do with the topic, which is still BAMBI and other Waltian products.

Two friends have emailed me about my latest entry. A Mr. Richard Feder, of Fort Lee, New Jersey writes (actually, it was Andy) that almost all of Disney's cartoons are available, with the exception of SONG OF THE SOUTH (Zip-ah-dee-do-DON'T!) and the probable exception of 'Der Fuhrer's Face." (Would this be because Disney doesn't own this? Was it commissioned by the government? I feel fairly sure there was a disc, about five years ago, of Disney's war effort stuff. Or was that Looney Toons material?)

A friend from Baltimore says he didn't remember the deaths in BAMBI. I can't say I didn't remember them because, having never seen the movie before last week, I didn't have anything to forget. There is a moment in LADY AND THE TRAMP, which I watched for the first time tonight, during which I thought an animal had died, but a couple of scenes later he came back with his leg in a cast. This is an example of Disney being willing to tease his audience about something serious and this surprised me.

I'm also surprised that Disney scrapped plans for a scene in CINDERELLA (which movie I saw for the first time last night) which would have rivalled anything in FANTASIA. The scene is sort of restored for the DVD. Storyboards are shown in succession, accompanied by the song Cinderella would have sung. She is wishing there were more than one of her and the storyboards show her becoming double, then triple, etc. In the actual movie there are no scenes of her actually performing the tasks her stepmother makes her perform. The movie is seriously marred by the same thing which wrecked the Fleischer's GULLIVER'S TRAVELS: characters whose voices are simply highly sped-up voices. The mice, an almost constant presence in the movie, talk this way. The munchkins of THE WIZARD OF OZ, of course, talk this way, but they certainly don't dominate the movie. If they had, Rufus Wainwright wouldn't have been singing Judy Garland's set at Carnegie Hall last week. (I saw him at the Knitting Factory in 2000, and for his encore, he stood on the piano and sang "Over the Rainbow." His mother played piano.)

I watched ALICE IN WONDERLAND tonight and, although it was made the same year as CINDERELLA (1951), it was everything the other was not. When a song became boring, it ended. Hallucinogenic scenes were frankly so and the cuteness bordered on nightmare. It was fun. And Lewis Carroll deserves the Americanization, he being otherwise almost intolerable.

I'd have reported on the short "Lonesome Ghosts," but the DVD I borrowed was scratched and all I can say is it became clear very early that GHOSTBUSTERS took its premise from "Lonesome Ghosts." I'm going to watch it on VHS tomorrow. God bless VHS!

I rented a VHS of BAMBI recently. I've come to the conclusion that Disney's classics should be viewed on VHS. Without having seen any on DVD, let me say firmly I suspect the DVDs are so augmented as to distort the originals. I could be wrong. I wouldn't even be surprised if a typical Disney DVD of, say, CINDERELLA, offers the option of hearing an audio track resembling the one which went with the original release. But, I have a feeling the colors are now too bright. The filmic quality is gone. (I'm projecting here, but aren't MOVIES supposed to be projected?) I can swear that an ad I've seen for the new re-release of SLEEPING BEAUTY has different people doing the voices. I believe Disney issued a re-orchestrated FANTASIA. Disney's a strange company. It releases something in some tweaked form, takes it out of release, re-tweaks it and releases it again and then "restores" it. A lot of companies re-package old classics, but, somehow, Disney seems altogether more willing to break, as opposed to fix. The policy of keeping something OUT of circulation in order to maintain some bogus mystique annoys me, especially as time proves that the stuff done in Walt Disney's lifetime is, on a technical level, at least, world-class art. If Shakespeare had copyrighted THE TEMPEST, would some idiot own the rights now? Luckily, a lot of libraries and video shops purchased those "Limited Edition" re-releases in the mid-eighties, allowing people who know where to look to actually find the "Silly Symphonies" and other more obscure Disney works.
So, I watched BAMBI last night. I'd never seen it before. I know enough about Disney to know he really studied animals carefully before drawing them. BAMBI looks like a watercolor in a hunting lodge come to life. It is, as an impression of nature, stunning. The little animals are a double-threat. They move like actual little animals, but act and sound like children. If it's over-the-top, well, all cartoon kids can't act like Cartman from SOUTH PARK. I knew BAMBI's mother gets killed by hunters, but I was not prepared for the way it was done. There's a scene a little earlier where she tells Bambi to be very careful in an open field. In a slightly later scene she tells Bambi to run. We hear shots. She tells him "Man" has entered the forest. Later, she and Bambi are walking in the snow and shots ring out. All the deer, including a deer-in-chief, if you will are running away. Bambi's mother shouts at him to keep running and not look back. We follow Bambi as he runs and runs. He makes it to the little bit of underbrush where he and his mother live and he turns around and says "We made it. We made it. Mother? Mother?" It was here I expected to see the body of Bambi's mother. Instead, as Bambi walks through an increasingly thick
blizzard, he makes out the face of the patriarch of deers, who says to him, simply, "Your mother won't be coming back." A child below the age of six or so probably won't even notice that BAMBI's mother has died. Later, there's a female quail who panics as the hunter's fire their guns. She finally screams, "I can't take it anymore," flies up and a shot is heard. Her body quickly lands on the ground. Disney doesn't dwell on it and, as the other birds fly away there's a quick cut (if that's the term in animation) to a different scene. I expected BAMBI to be subdued about death, but I didn't expect it to rely as heavily as it did on the intelligence of the viewer. In a cartoon today, at the very least we'd see Bambi's mother dying. In the actual movie (which is from 1942), the last we see of her is the scene in where she's telling Bambi to run and not look back. The quail which gets shot shows no blood, and it is, as a character, very peripheral, being introduced just seconds before being shot. Again, a child might not even notice what's happening, but the death of the quail, for an adult, is pretty scary. When the quail starts saying she wants to get out of the thicket, the other birds are saying, "No, stay perfectly calm. Don't move." Already, movies about the Nazis were being made and certainly audiences would have seen a few movies which had scenes with people hiding from storm troopers. This is not so much a movie about man's destruction of the wild as a war movie about people dealing with war as a force of nature.
This is Disney's truly anthropomorphic flick, his one Aesop fable. It's pretty moving.

Herman Capelmeister did not want to hear what his son was telling him. The freckled face, colorless eyes and uncombed hair, dirty blond, he wanted very much to see. He was pleased at the voice. The words were clear. Clarity worked, of course. Herman Capelmeister had to interrupt, and now. "What in God's name does 'there for me' mean?"

Nepomuk looked relaxed. He smiled without really seeming amused, as if he were thirty instead of thirteen. "A peasant expression, father, I know." He leaned forward. "I talk to her on the phone at one in the morning."

"You know, the Preppy Murderer started out like you," said Herman Capelmeister.

"Do tell." Nepomuk took a cigarette from his sleeve.

"Neat trick," said Cantaloupe. "He doesn't light them, Herman."

"I know," said Herman Capelmeister. "I'll even point it out to the wait staff, if they get aroused."

Nepomuk, the unlit cigarette dangling from his lips, said, "I fit in with females. That makes me an A-list faggot in this town."

"Never call yourself a faggot in front of your father, Neep."

"What I stress," said Herman Capelmeister, "Is this: These silly girls have persuaded you not that you're gay, but that you need to tell them everything you plan to do in that direction."

"They're just friends," said Cantaloupe.

"Pajama party gals. Thirteen year-old girls acting like middle-aged divorcees."

"Well, he lives with a middle-aged divorcee."

"One is enough," said Herman Capelmeister.

"He needs friends his own age."

"He doesn't need the future staff of 'W' micro-managing his adolescence."

"He's gay, Herman. He can't turn to the boys for support."

"Support. What the fuck is support at thirteen? He's supposed to be having a masturbation complex at this point, not a week-long marathon of Truth-or-Dare in the Penthouse apartment of some latch-key Barbie-doll with a copy of VOGUE."

"You workin' for Conde Nast, Dad?"

"Shut up. This isn't about you."

"What?"

"It's about your life. Your mother and I are planning it."

The busboy walked slowly toward the table. He poured water from a sweating picher.

"More bread," said Cantaloupe.

"Bread," said the busboy.

"God," said Nepomuk. "What Third World country are you running, Mom?"

"The whole United States is the Third World to your mother, Nepomuk," said Herman Capelmeister.

"Your father got crabs in Tijuana once," said Cantaloupe.

"Should have got 'em in Vegas, father," said Nepomuk. "What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas."

"Well, his crotch dropped them off in New Canaan."

"And the rest of me shook this one off in Manhattan," said Herman Capelmeister, pointing at Cantaloupe. "Maybe the gaggle of teen fag-hags is better for you than staying home with Mother. You don't need delousing after jumping on couches with them."

"My sentiments exactly," said Cantaloupe. "He needs to get away from me. Why won't you let him stay on Shelter Island?"

"Because I don't want to BE on Shelter Island."

"You're staying there, aren't you?"

"Yes, but I want to get over to the Pines a couple of times."

"Take him with you."

"I will NOT leave him alone weeks at a time on Shelter Island, dear!"

"Then stay on Shelter Island."

"Balls to Shelter Island!"

"Balls in the Pines."

"Bread," said the busboy, putting a wicker basket of hot bread on the table.

"Butter," said Nepomuk.

"At least he eats," said Herman Capelmeister. "The anorexics haven't talked him out of a good steak yet."

"What song is this?" said Cantaloupe.

"'Come Fly With Me,'" said Herman Capelmeister.

"Where?" said Cantaloupe.

"It's 'Fly Me To the Moon,'" said Nepomuk.

"'Fly me to Rangoon!'" sang Cantaloupe.

Herman Capelmeister said, "Oh! I heard him sing 'The Road to Mandalay' once."

"Sinatra?"

"Yes. It was ludicrous. 'On the road to Manda-lay-eeeee, where the flying fishes play.' Jesus! Kipling wouldn't have known whether to shit or go blind."

"I like Rufus Wainwright," said Nepomuk.

"Loved his 'Gap' ad," said Herman Capelmeister. "I'd fuck him."

"Da-aad!"

"Nepomuk, are you surprised?" said Cantaloupe.

"He's much more than a 'Gap' ad."

"Well, the Calvin Klein ads weren't much more than Marky Mark and his funky bunch."

"Your father's delving into pre-history, dear. You know he used to say gays should have their behind's tattooed?"

"I was a NAZI," said Herman Capelmeister.

"He voted for Reagan twice."

"Oh, barf!"

"Bush once. The first Bush."

"Bush 41," said Herman Capelmeister. "The fightin' 41st, as Colbert would say. Better Know a Dipshit!"

"And then you voted for Clinton the second time," said Cantaloupe. "When you began to agree with my politics, you began sleeping with men."

"And you know where Neep was conceived?" said Herman Capelmeister. "On the road to Tom Delay."

"On the road to Men-to-lay!" said Cantaloupe.

"Shhh..." said Nepomuk.

"What are you shushing me for?" said Cantaloupe.

"Yes, Nepomuk. Are you, perhaps, urging discretion on us?" said Herman Capelmeister.

"Ursula's parents are here."

"Ooooh," said Herman Capelmeister and Cantaloupe at the same time.

"You just be quiet," said Nepomuk.

"The boy's straight," said Herman Capelmeister.

"No, I'm not!" said Nepomuk.

"No, he's not," said Cantaloupe.

"No gay boy pretends to be gay at thirteen," said Herman Capelmeister.

"That's because I'm not pretending," said Nepomuk.

"My primary concern, from thirteen to fifteen, was to not be detected as gay," said Herman Capelmeister.

"And it was your primary concern at thirty!" said Cantaloupe.

"Why is Nepomuk concerned about what we say in front of a girl's parents?"

"He wants the respect of his friends."

"Balls!"

The waiter came and poured wine for Herman Capelmeister.

"Another Scotch for me!" said Cantaloupe as the waiter began to turn away.

"You're going to these pajama parties to have sex with Ursula."

"Oh, I can't BELIEVE you!" said Nepomuk.

"They'll hear!" Cantaloupe said.

"Do kids have sex any more?" said Herman Capelmeister. He took two gulps of wine. "What do you do, play MONOPOLY?"

An elderly couple in a corner looked over. "Parchesi," one of them said.

"I can't watch Nepomuk's every step," said Cantaloupe.

"You've got custody."

"I'm letting you have him this summer."

"I'm going to the Pines!"

"Then take him to the Pines!"

"He can't go to the fucking Pines!"

"Why not? You can."

"He'll become one of them!"

"One of who, Herman?"

"One of you, Dad?"

"Don't call me a faggot!"

"What?"

"He didn't call you a faggot, Herman."

"You're staying in the city this summer."

"Okay. Did I object?"

"Herman, I want to be alone this summer."

"You can't."

"I can."

"Who's going to take care of Nepomuk?"

"London Broil?" said the waiter.

"Nepomuk! Nepomuk!" Ursula's mother waved.

"Please, please, don't say anything embarrassing," said Nepomuk.

A woman in a yellow dress walked up to the table. "Mr. and Mrs. Capelmeister?" she said.

"Yes and no," said Cantaloupe.

"I'm Venitia Holland. Ursula's mother."

Herman Capelmeister shook her hand and then took a sip of wine.

"We finally meet," said Cantaloupe.

"Nepomuk may not have mentioned this, but Ursula and Jerry and I would love to have him at Rangeley this summer."

"Well, yes," said Herman Capelmeister, "As a matter of fact, he did."

"I--" said Cantaloupe. "Well. Yes, yes, he did mention something."

"You're inviting me?" said Nepomuk.

"I take that as a yes," said Venitia Holland. "If it's all right with Herman and Cantaloupe, of course."

Herman Capelmeister and Cantaloupe looked at each other.

"Swordfish," said the waiter.

"Scotch," said the busboy.

Herman Capelmeister said, "Check."

"Bottom's up, boys," Cantaloupe said.

"You know, I might stay up there after the summer," said Nepomuk. "Oh," shouted Nepomuk, who hadn't noticed Mrs. Holland had gone back to her table. "Tell Ursula I said 'Yes.'"

"You might stay there year 'round?" said Cantaloupe.

"Yes, well, there's a boarding school nearby."

"Spoken like a Capelmeister," said Herman Capelmeister. He drained his glass.

Cantaloupe downed her Scotch.

"Ursula's pregnant," said Nepomuk.

This is from something I wrote to an email correspondent today:
"Partner" will come again to mean "business associate" soon. The one word which people of my orientation have added to their permanent collection is "gay."
Sometimes, a pundit will bemoan the fact that the word "gay" has been co-opted. If you look at it, though, "gay" used to be a marginalized word. The fierce drag-queens of old ripped it from its shelter, painted it pink and set it on fire. "Gay" no longer means "politely cheerful." (It NEVER meant "happy.") It was a word which, I think, would have completely vanished from usage if it hadn't been transmogrified at Stonewall.

It's 5:17 in the morning and it's way to late to be posting blog entries.
I entered the title of a 78 r.p.m. record I've had for many years into the database at the Barnes and Noble of my employ and found that the particular song I wanted, as recorded by the performer I was interested in, exists on CD. The song was "Ukelele Lady" (which Bette covers these days), a recording from 1926 by a fellow named Frank Crumit. I ordered the CD and the song sounds marvelous in its full-bodied CD restoration. This performer was a cross between Rudy Vallee and Cole Porter. Most of the tracks on the CD were recorded in the twenties, with him on banjo and somebody awfully good on fiddle. Frank Crumit had a huge hit with a bit of light comedy called "Abul Abulbul Amir," the sort of song you'd hear in a POPEYE cartoon from the Great Depression. The history of this song is interesting. A Trinity College (Dublin, for you Joyceans) student named Percy French (not to be confused with Percy Faith) was quite a wag, and, like Frank Crumit after him, he played a banjo and wrote funny songs. He was a watercolorist of certain renown and took a civil service job as a "drain inspector," apparently for an outrageous salary. (This makes me think of Bob Dylan's cryptic line from DESOLATION ROW: "He went on sniffing drainpipes and reciting the alphabet." Of course, in the London of the early 60's, a "drainpipe" was a type of pant-leg, so this character is probably closer to "the sword-swallower" who dogs Mr. Jones, the straight-to-closeted hero of Bob's "Ballad of a Thin Man.")
Anyway, Frank Crumit had a Number 12 hit, on which chart I don't know, with "Abdul Abulbul Amir." The song involves a fight to the death between two soldiers, one Russian, one middle-eastern. Maybe Anderson Cooper should sing it at the top of his broadcast instead of the headlines. For the curious, a couple of the lyrics are:

"Vile infidel, know
you have trodden the toe
of Abdul Abulbul Amir"

and

"The bravest by far
in the ranks of the Czar
was Ivan Skavinsky Skavar."

What's Number Twelve on the U.S. charts today? I have no idea, but I bet the song doesn't have a line to match the poetry of this:

"A Muscovite maiden, a vigil she keeps,
alone 'neath the pale polar star,
And the name that she whispers so oft as she weeps,
Is Ivan Skavinsky Skavar!"

"Edward G. Who?"
"Robinson. You've never heard of Edward G. Robinson?"
"I've heard of Edvard Munch."
"You've never heard this voice?" I pretended to hold a cigar and began to make a grimacing face. In Edward G. Robinson's tone, I said, "Mother of mercy...Is this the end -- of Rico?"
My dinner companion looked at me. "What's that?" said my dinner companion.
"An imitation of Edward G. Robinson! Here," I said. I pretended to hold a cigar again and pointed at my chest with the imaginary cigar. "I'm the boss here, see?"
"What do you mean you're the boss?"
"It's what Edward G. Robinson always says."
"Who is Edward G. Robinson?"
"A thirties movie star."
"Would I recognize him?"
"I don't know. Since his voice is one of the most recognizable voices in movie history and you didn't know his voice, you might not recognize his face, either."
"What if your imitation of him wasn't any good?"
"That wouldn't matter because the lines are so famous most people would know who was famous for saying them. For example, if I suddenly say 'You dirty rat' in my regular voice, you'll still know who said it first."
"Who was it?"
"Oh, come on!"
"I don't know who said it."
"James Cagney."
My friend stared.
"Anyway," I said, "I've invited you for a reason."
"You mean this isn't all pointless?"
"You, my friend, are going to say something to the waiter in the voice of Rico from LITTLE CAESAR!"
"What's he sound like?"
"Edward G."
My friend looked dismayed.
"I know," I said. "I know. You can't imitate Edward G. Robinson."
"That's not what I was going to say."
"But you see," I said. "You'll want to do this."
"I won't want to do it!"
"Not only will you want to do it," I said, "You'll love it!"
"Why?" said my friend. "How?"
"How?" I said. "Why?"
"Yeah!"
"For money."
"Money?"
"That which is, of all evil, the root."
"What?"

[To Be Continued...]

H. L. Mencken once wrote to a friend (who had written something to the effect that he -- the friend -- detested "men who confess") that he agreed with him.

Another writer once wrote that dreams should not be described in works of fiction.

I wonder where this leaves me, I being a person with a somewhat violent urge to confess and a definite desire to report my dreams.

A few nights ago I dreamed I was in an antiques shop with three strangers who turned out to be thieves. In order to look at a plate I was asked to show one of the men my driver's license. I handed it to him and he put it in his pocket. The other men laughed. Desparate to get my license back I put a chair on a table, jumped on the table, stood on the chair and sang "Jug of This." I sang the wrong words at one point and stopped myself. Waving my hand, I said, "Wait, wait. It goes this way." I re-sang the line correctly, bowed, got off the chair, jumped off the table, took down the chair and looked at the men.
One of them clapped.
But I didn't get back my license.
The man who clapped broke the end off a bottle and walked toward me.