Another opening to another short story. "Mr. Roosevelt"

    I took it and turned it over in my hand. The reverse was nearly worn away, but the front side was still recognizable as Kennedy’s profile. As a collectible half-dollar coin, it was worth about half a dollar.

“I don’t want it,” I said. “What else you got?”

    Georgie scrunched his face up into a little fist and showed his irregular, broken teeth, letting out a little mew of discontent. Then, he relaxed and nodded.

    “'Kay,” he said.

    Digging through his pockets for another treasure, he produced a plastic army minesweeper, three train-flattened dimes, a collar with a dog license still hanging from it, a still-sealed box of black snakes and at last, another green plastic soldier, this one lying on his belly holding a severed rifle stock- the end looked to have been bitten off sometime before.

    “Anything here you like?” he asked. His voice was high and thin and fraught with hope. I used the tip of my finger to stir through his inventory of items. I tried not to touch Georgie’s hands. Black and filthy as they were, there was no telling where he’d been or what he’d pawed through while he was there.

“What does the dog collar say?” I asked.

    He selected the rhinestone-studded strap from his palm and laid it into mine. It was tiny- it wouldn’t circle my wrist- and a shining green metal shamrock hung from a steel ringlet that moved freely up and down its length. I tilted my hand to keep it still from swinging.

“Hello, my name is

MR. ROOSEVELT

And my phone number is

286 995 8922”

    “This is a Garden City number. Where did you find this collar?” I asked.

    Georgie was already distracted, rubbing his green army men on the sidewalk to wear away their heads and arms. He looked up, squinting into the sunlight behind me.

    “I found it by the library. It was in the grass by the library” he said. Fair enough. The library was not far from the highway, and the next exit was Garden City.

    The rhinestones were perfectly placed into the jeweler’s settings, set well away from the straps and buckles. The buckles themselves had been etched with Celtic designs so fine that I had to rub some of the dirt from the collar into them to see them clearly. The whole thing looked like a devotional work of art, all but the shamrock tag, which would have been at home hanging from the flea-bitten neck of any mutt in the garage. This collar was special, different. Garden City was a pretty ritzy area, and I’d have bet anything that the dog that wore this could probably buy and sell me a hundred times over himself. I thought I’d call the number after lunch and see if the owner wanted the collar back enough to answer the phone.

    “Georgie”, I said, “Tell you what: I’ll take this collar off your hands for- for ten dollars, how’s that sound?”

    “Ten dollars? Wow! I’m rich, Mr. Amberson! Sure! It’s a sale!”

    I got two fives out of my wallet and held them out to Georgie. We had this thing, Georgie and me. Georgie found things around town, and I bought those things. Junk, mostly, but I still carried a cigarette lighter he’d found down by the theater on Fern Street. He needed the money, I needed to help Georgie, I guess. More about that later.

    “Here you go, Georgie, and remember my name’s Paul. Mr. Amberson’s my mother’s name.” I winked to try to sell my little joke only to watch it soar past him and land in the gutter.

    “Thanks, Mr. Amberson”, Georgie said, breathing heavily. He put his money into the same pocket with the mutilated soldiers and the half dollar, “Do you want me to get you some more dog collars? ‘Cause I can get you a bunch more dog collars if you want them.”

    “Don’t take them off of any dogs, but whatever you find, I’ll take a look”, I said. I got back to my paper and Georgie got back to his neverending scavenger hunt. I watched him ride off, his giant body bent low over his bike’s small, bent frame. I’d try to see if I could find him something bigger somewhere in town.

    After lunch, I made my way back to my office, and out of habit I opened my ‘treasure’ drawer and tossed the collar in, where it landed on some old National Geographics, a broken circuit board, a very old lightbulb, and a woolen mitten. Before I closed the drawer, I had a crazy thought. I picked up the collar again and took a hard look at the rhinestones. I wrapped it around my fist like a set of brass knuckles and ran it along the glass cover on my desktop. Now, this wasn’t a scientific test or anything, but it looked to me like these might actually be…

    “Diamonds!”

    They were small, and not the royal jewels or anything, but still. I let the little strip of leather and money hang between my fingers and squinted hard at it. Was it my imagination or did these little sparklers look more important than they had before? I wrote down the number that was pressed into the clover and wrapped them in my handkerchief, carefully placing them in my top drawer and gently closing it after them, as it trying not to wake them.

    After running through what I wanted to say to the dog’s owner, I picked up the phone and dialed. A man answered on the first ring.

    “Hello?” he said. His voice was full of blood and oxygen, as if he had been interrupted in the middle of moving a heavy safe up a stepladder.

    I gave him my pitch. “Hello. My name is Paul Amberson. I’m a- well, what I do doesn’t matter. I'm local. I was wondering whether someone at this number had lost a dog collar anytime recently, say, near the public library on Early and Randolph. An associate of mine found the collar and gave it to me only an hour ago. Naturally, he wants it to go back to the owner, who I imagine would be grateful enough to show that gratitude to any Samaritan good enough to return it. It’s my opinion that my associate would naturally deserve a reward for his conscientious service.”

    I could only hear breathing on the other end of the line.

    I said, “Unless you aren't interested in having it returned to you. I can always just throw it away in my-”

    Mr. Roosevelt's assistant suddenly found his voice.

    “I can offer your 'associate' twenty-five dollars. The collar is a sentimental piece. Our dog passed away recently and the collar is very precious to my wife. It's all she has. The dog was like a child to her.”

    “I'm sorry for her loss”, I lied, “Our pets can be so important to us. Can you tell me how the dog got her unusual name?”

    After a beat, another beat. Then the man on the phone said, “She never said, but I believe she was named for her Aunt. A childhood nickname for her Aunt.”

    “Her Aunt's nickname was Mr. Roosevelt?”

    I could sense a spike in his blood pressure.

    He said, “Let's meet up so that I can get the object and give you and your friend a little something for your trouble. Are you free to meet tomorrow morning at seven or so?”

    I hadn't seen seven AM since grammar school.

    “Let me call you back later," I said, and I dropped the receiver back into the cradle before he could answer. 

©Tom Dougherty 2019. 

A creative writing warm-up doodle

    Frankie looked every minute of his seventeen years on Earth. Cotton wool hung low from a pulled seam at his crotch and the plastic resin of his eyes had taken on the dull, foggy look of a bear twice his age. An amateurish attempt to repack some stuffing that had escaped from the side of his neck had left him with a permanent kink there; his chin pulled to the right and low to his sunken chest. It made him look suspicious and a little circumspect and not at all willing to sit quietly for a tea party or to accompany a little boy or girl to their first sleepover. Frankie looked a fright.

    He relaxed his shoulders a bit, which allowed him to lift his head enough to see the road that lay before him.

    Although he would have guessed that he’d walked at least ten miles, he could still plainly see the red shingled roof of his house just over the rose bushes. Frankie recognized that the fact that he made it this far had been something of a miracle. He inhaled deeply and could smell the strong mothball scent that clung to him. “Boy oh boy! Is it breakfast already?” His mournful expression was not matched by any of the eight pre-recorded sentences on offer in his mechanical voice box. He struggled to express himself in most situations. He thought about the events of the night before, and the little girl whose plight had compelled him to wander out in search of help. He wondered if he'd be able to convince anyone to follow him back to the house with the red roof, and to the family inside. Frankie shook his head slowly, allowing his fears to show, if just for just a moment.

    He lifted his chin and pressed on, shuffling his filthy, frayed feet as he walked. “Boy oh boy,” Frankie sighed again, “Is it breakfast already?”

©Tom Dougherty 2019. 

♪♫ The (Other) Simpsons! ♪♫

Image source: https://www.geek.com/culture/homer-simpson-will-be-inducted-into-the-baseball-hall-of-fame-1701101/

Following up on my last Simpsons post is this, my other Simpsons post. This is the other unused Simpsons comic book proposal I've had on my hard drive for years.

Some backstory. At the time it was trendy for hipsters to get together and play games like kickball with other adults. Whiffle ball was mentioned. Game nights built around games like Operation and Don't Break The Ice. Cootie parties, maybe. It was a trend, it's not a trend anymore.

This is raw, barely edited, and was intended only as a pitch for further development. Enjoy it if you can.

Oh, the title of this story is a punny take on the title of the movie Fear Strikes Out, a psychological drama about a baseball player's nervous breakdown. I'd recommend you check that out, but in retrospect, it makes for a very rarified bit of wordplay. I don't think it would have made it through to the next edit.
Beer Strikes Out- A Simpsons comic story treatment

Tom Dougherty

While being examined for a work-ordered annual physical, Homer is once again cautioned by Dr. Hibbert to lost some weight. Hibbert illustrates Homer’s dangerous total body fat index by scraping some of Homer’s belly off with a butter knife and buttering some toast with it. Hibbert tells Homer he's got to get some more exercise.

Later at Moe's, Homer signs up to play for a local amateur ball team. The next morning he finds that he’s joined an adult tee-ball league*, playing for a team called “The Tee Totallers”, sponsored (ironically) by Duff.

*The league is a part of the current fad of adults playing playground games, like kickball and dodgeball in competition.

Duff chose to sponsor tee ball because you can drink to excess and still be able to hit the stationary ball, and you never have to put down your beer to play. Duffman makes an appearance at their season opener, but it's obvious it's not the same actor portraying Duffman. This event doesn't rate the real Duffman.

Unexpectedly, Homer becomes the Babe Ruth of Tee Ball, guzzling beer and eating dozens of hot dogs on the Tee Totallers way to the State Series. Fans wear big foam bellies with “Tee Totallers #1!” printed on the front – all of the kids on Bart and Lisa’s school bus are wearing them. Nodder figurines of Homer bump the Duffman nodders out of the souvenir stores, and Duff ads featuring Homer (radically altered to appear to have a waist) appear all over town. Homer endorses his own line off abacuses, “The T Totaler”

The ’Totes are seemingly on their way to an easy sweep of the State Series, where they’re scheduled to compete against hated rival Shelbyville’s Swingin’ Misses, sponsored by Lady Foot Locker.

In the locker room, after winning their third game and tying the Swingin’ Misses, Homer is approached by the elementary age sons of the Springfield mafia leaders: Fat Tony’s son, “Little Michael” D'Amico, Mario “Luigi” Macaroni, and Anthony “Little Anthony” Manicotti. Little Michael tells Homer he and his boys “run tee ball in Springfield.”

He tells Homer he wants him to throw the game, but he phrases it, “We want you to play ball with us”.

“Well, I’d love to, boys - except that I don’t want to. Look, I have a son of my own at home and I never play catch with him either. Whattaya gonna do?”

They press on. Michael: “One hand washes the other, hand in glove, capisce? We’re looking for someone to throw the series, and we think you can knock it out of the park for us.”

Homer (wall-eyed and uncomprehending): “Mmm hmmm.”

“Just to cover all bases, Mr. Simpson, we don’t want to play hardball with you, but you’re up against the big leagues here, you catch?”

Homer doesn’t understand.

Mario: “Augh! This is impossible”.

Michael: “It’s just like when we was talking to the first baseman, Mr. Hu!”

Eventually, they get through to Homer. They offer to bribe him with prank magazine subscriptions and pizza orders sent to “any name you like” and “imagine your lawn, mowed to such perfection as to make you the envy of the neighborhood. The ladies will THROW themselves at you.”

Michael: “You name it, Mr. Simpson. We’ll make it happen.”

Homer: “Can I finish those gummi worms?”

Anthony: “It’s gummi pasta fazool, but sure. Here you go.”

Michael: “Understand that you’re accepting these gummis in good faith. Certain promises are implied.”

Later, at home in the kitchen, Homer talks to Marge. “Some little mafia guys came by and they told me I had to throw the game tomorrow. I think I might have made a blood promise of some kind or other.”

Marge: Homer, I wish that one week could go by without you making a blood promise to someone in the organized crime industry!

Homer: You should have seen them, Marge! They looked like killers! One was looking at me and cracking his knuckles! His own knuckles, Marge!

Lisa walks in, and Homer says, “Oh, and Lisa, little Michael D’Amico says ‘Hi’.”

Lisa blushes and giggles.

The next day, during game 7 of the State Series, Homer convinces the team to let Shelbyville win, citing mob influence and pointing out that they don’t get paid and can’t expect any reward. He gives an impassioned Bizarro-world pep talk. Lenny and Carl just shrug and say “Okay”, and “Anything for a pal, Homer!” It’s no big deal to them.

Homer and company play intentionally terrible ball, racking up the errors and basically making fools

of themselves. The other team is playing just as poorly, and we’re 17 innings in after 6 and a half hours of play. The players are limp and exhausted, and a full moon shines down on the field.

Fat Tony sits in the bleachers with his son. They realize that Tony and Michael each bribed the opposing teams into throwing the game, and it proves to be a sweet bonding moment for both father and son. They sit back and watch in contentment as the game drags on into the night. We see Homer

at bat, slumped over the catcher, both of them sleeping at home plate with the moon high above them.

©Tom Dougherty 2019. 

Dateline: Springfield- An Unused Simpsons Story

    

    Several years ago I tried to make a go of writing Simpsons comics for Bongo Comics Group. At the time, my idea was to layer in A and B storylines like the best of the animated series and pack every panel with at least one joke, in my attempt to recreate some of the anarchic magic of the earliest MAD comics. I was frustrated by Bongo's lack of interest in this idea, and I couldn't see my way to doing the heavy editing necessary to fit their vision. They wanted it to be shorter, but in my ego-soaked haze, I couldn't see what could be removed without the whole thing collapsing. I honestly thought every line was a keystone. How embarrassing to think of that today. However, they did use my work and that comic was released, but the other two stories I sent in were based on current trends and then-living personalities. I shelved those ones, but here's the breakdown for one that heavily drags Steve Jobs, months before he died. That type of CEO isn't as widely seen as it was only a few years ago, so this whole thing feels as dated to me now as an episode of Friends. There's even a Justin Bieber mention in it.

    So, this isn't a script, and it's not a story. It's a pitch. Very raw. And I don't know what happened to the formatting here. I couldn't tell you. Blogger keeps her secrets.

    I will probably post my other unused Simpsons story here at some point. The trend it references never so much as left a ripple in the culture. I bet on the wrong horse.

21st Century Burns- Simpsons comic story treatment

Tom Dougherty

    Smithers and Burns are at the theater, attending a performance of Hal Holbrook as Gallagher in the one-man show “Watermelon Days”.

    Tech mogul Steve Fuji stops the show and takes the stage to announce the release of the Fuji Webtop: a laptop the size of a woman’s compact. The crowd and cast forget all about the play and follow him out to the Fuji E Store, with Fuji himself playing a keytar and leading the way.

    Burns: Did you see that? He just walked on stage and told them he wanted their money and they all love him!

    Smithers: That’s Steve Fuji, founder of Fuji Computers. He was voted the most popular CEO alive by both Forbes and Teen People.

    Burns: I was once voted “Man Most Likely to Have His Own Reich” in Der Spiegel! Remember that, Smithers? This was years before the war. Some upstart art student stole my thunder- what was his name?

    Smithers: That was literally decades before I was born, sir.

    Burns: Pish! I suppose that not everyone was meant to stay youthful and desirable forever. Unless one were to have my billions, that is, Smithers! I want to supplant that hippie’s position in the hearts and minds of all of Springfield!

    Smithers (excited by Burns’ energy): You’ve already got one of them, sir!

    So, in an attempt to reinvent himself as a modern billionaire, Burns starts a new high tech company and begins to build himself into a 21^st Century man.

    Burns buys a Justin Bieber-esque hairpiece and some trendier clothes. He wears a Bluetooth headset everywhere, and uses it to call Smithers, although Smithers is always standing at his elbow. His Burns Technology company releases their Kindle-killer, the BurnsBook; a new entertainment device called the IBurns, and a notebook computer called the LapBurns. They are all terrible products, but they’re selling well due to a veritable tsunami of advertising and hype.

Smithers arranges a photo shoot for Wired for a cover feature. The photographer eventually has to mold Burns’ pose like a sculptor to make him look “like an actual person.” The final photos taken depict a lounging Burns, relaxed and casual, save for the glowering expression on his face.

Burns appears on RADTek, a tech news television show aimed at twenty-somethings. To help Burns connect with the young viewers, his arms and mouth are puppeted by a young man from the Jim Henson Company, who stands behind him and answers all of his questions for him from prepared text.

In an answer to Fuji’s work for green causes, Burns institutes a policy where landfills and dumps are camouflaged with paint and chemicals to make them look like rolling meadows. The “Burns Forests and Fields” programs are met with protests and government fines. The Wired article attacks Burns’ old-world solutions to new-world technical issues. People all over are complaining. Burns products are revealed to be assembled using child monkey labor, in an area of the Amazon jungle Burns had specially deforested for this purpose.

To lift Burns’ spirits after this bad news, Smithers surprises him with his plans for their appearance at the Springfield Tech Expo. Fuji will be there, so Burns speaks to his troops, insisting that they come up with something that will really show Fuji up and make Burns the big man of tech.

One of his designers: “But the Texpo is only 3 weeks away!”

Burns (attempting to be more like Fuji): “And today’s Thursday already. Tell you what: take Friday off and come back fresh on Monday and let’s get cracking! Try to have some ideas on the next tech revolution by then. TTYL! LOL, ROFL, and so on! Off with you!” He fans his hands to shoo them away.

    At the Texpo, the sign has been crossed out and painted anew several times, from Tech Expo to Tech-expo to Teschspo to Texpo. Burns and Fuji are scheduled to unveil their new technology in a Tech-Off, in the main hall. Burns rides onto the stage on a penny-farthing bicycle, honking a horn and waving his straw boater in the air. Fuji beams himself onto the stage, then flies around the room in a jetpack, to thunderous applause.

    The Tech-Off is like a rap battle for brittle billionaires. They stand onstage facing one another and they take turns trying to best one another introducing new inventions.

    Burns unveils some awful new products - a high tech level for correcting posture, for example. The crowd hoots in derision. Fuji then pulls back the curtain to reveal his Fuji I-Me, a fancy Metropolis-style exoskeleton that does everything for you while you watch television in comfort from inside. The crowd rushes Fuji and carries him on their shoulders to the Fuji store. In the commotion, they stampede over Burns, leaving him lying on the floor, face down in confetti.

    Smithers snaps Burns into shape, shaking him out a beach towel. An enormous portrait of Fuji smiles down on them as Smithers carries him out of the auditorium in his arms.

    Later at home, Burns is a broken man. The news of Fuji’s I-Me is all over the media, with a photo of Burns suffering under the heels of a parade of Fuji supporters.  Burns Technology is going to fold. He orders all records of the company erased and sends Smithers to seal the employees in the building and fill it with sand. Burns says, “Old Monty Burns knows when he’s been beaten. Burn the records and the com-pu-ting machines and drive the company cars into the ocean!”

    Smithers asks, “What are you going to do now, sir?”

    “Back to doing what I do best; the vending and wielding of terrible power. Come, Smithers! Somewhere in America is a dimly lit corner still crying for a 24-hour floodlight!"

“Welcome back, sir.”

Final shot of Homer, wearing an I-Me, standing up at a 45-degree angle while sleeping at work, donut in hand.

©Tom Dougherty 2019. 

Warm Up Pancake

Image from https://imgur.com/gallery/PHOnt


    I'll be posting often enough on this blog that I'll be reaching into the older files on my computer for content, some of it from my late, beloved writing group. Whenever we'd meet, our first writing exercises would be ten-minute warmups intended to just get us comfortable. We're read them aloud, usually be teased by the rest of the group, and we'd start our next exercise.

    At my suggestion, we called these first warmup offerings Sacrificial Pancakes. It's my belief that the first pancake made is the worst pancake made. I usually feed my first pancakes and waffles to the crows in the yard. This is the sacrifice we make to get the beautiful pancakes that come later. These \ writing exercises were sacrificed to the process, no matter how many little details we might have thought were worthwhile. I thought this little bit I wrote had some charm.

    By the time she was six, Shannon had had more pets than most of the grown-ups in her life. When she was a newborn, fresh from the hospital and still all pink and purple, Shannon's father had given her a mastiff puppy. That he chose to do this without ever having discussed it with Shannon's mother goes a long way toward explaining their separation and divorce the following year. Shannon's father left, the puppy stayed, and eventually grew to be a seventy-pound behemoth named Luther. Luther and Shannon were as close as a brother and sister could be for the first eleven years of their lives, right up to the day that Luther drank from a pool of antifreeze that had puddled near the curb at the side of their house. RIP Luther. Good boy.

    When Luther and Shannon were only four years old, a tiny, black, one-eyed kitten named Freddy showed up on the doorstep one morning and stayed for two years before his habit of sleeping in the driveway brought an end to him one summer evening. A tiny stick in the back yard marks the final napping spot for little Freddy, who to date remains the only pet interred on Jefferson property. Not counting the fish, that is.

    Shannon became obsessed with fish after being given a copy of Finding Nemo one Christmas. She was three when she announced her intention to be a fish doctor. She asked for and received a fishbowl like the one she'd seen filled with peppermints at a neighbor's house, and along with the bowl came two popeyed goldfish, named Socks and Shoes. Soon there were three fish, then another bowl, then a small aquarium- the fish were getting more exotic as their numbers grew. At peak population, Shannon's tank had held thirty fish of various types and sizes. Ten of them had been neon tetras and none of them had been given a name. Each earned their name by dying so that their markers would not be left blank. The first to die had been Nemo, the second to die had been named Nemo as well, but after that, the names of the fallen were unique unto themselves: Star Wars, Goldfish, Redfish, George Washington, Mrs. Baldy, and Peppermint Sue.

©Tom Dougherty 2019. 

I missed the old blog

    Years ago I had a fairly popular blog called Automatic Daddy. I really enjoyed blogging, but I felt my off-the-cuff posts were more like a notebook, and I would never allow myself any edits after publication. After a while, Automatic Daddy was a mess. I pulled that wiggly tooth of a blog several years ago, after having spent almost a decade posting there. Sad emoji.

    Starting this weekend I'll be posting here with some regularity. I'll try to encourage readership. I'll proofread and edit!

    See you later? See you later.

    Oh, and I will probably post artwork. Some of it cute.