This past week we took our annual take-a-couple-of-days-and-drive vacation. This will not be interesting at all to read about but we had fun.

Sunday 10/6 through Tuesday 10/8 was the annual and excruciating Radio Shack GOLDEN QUARTER MEETING--whatever that means to you. Mainly my car did not get stolen. Also I was called up on stage to receive my fifteen-year service pin. Somebody please kill me.

During a lull on Monday afternoon I went on a vain search. The last two Jack-In-The-Boxes east of Nevada were not far from the Huntington Hilton, in which we were squirrelled. As you know, I consider their tacos to be Ambrosia itself. We had located these alleged Jacks on a CD-ROM that lets you search the entire USA for a telephone number, and say were you aware that there are an awful lot of people named "Katz?" Duh. So anyway, I went there hoping to find them still operational and found two empty cinderblock bunkers without roofs (rooves?) and weeds growing in 'em. So there ya go.

Wednesday I worked. Thursday we sped down the Turnpike to Pennsylvania and Longwood Gardens. Wow. Ever been? It's the old DuPont estate turned into a public garden. A HUGE public garden. A lot of walking. Very neat. We have to go back, I think, at least once each season to get the full picture. They have a huge conservatory as well, so it's even worth visiting in the dead of winter. We will. Near the end of the afternoon, as we were trudging through the Heath and Heather section, we even encountered--as a bonus--a friendly kitten who chose to act as our tour guide for the last hour. I called him, of course, "Bonus."

Friday we went to PA again--New Hope, this time. LIterally right across the river from a town in NJ I can't remember the name of. It's unusual the way these two towns hit the river--the bridge is smack in the middle of their downtown. It's literally movie theatre, bridge, movie theatre. Anyway, New Hope PA. Funky little Shoppers' Town. The main attraction is a train ride, on an authentic steam locomotive. One is led by the write-up to believe that the train ride (9 miles total) takes one through picturesque local settings in several turn-of-the-century towns. Well, ha ha it is to laugh. The train goes where ALL trains go, that is to say BEHIND EVERYTHING, and all you see is woods and the occasional cornfield. The real attraction is just being on a steam loco. With two Nazi tourists and a whole lot of really old people (not like you and me, I mean REALLY old people) who smelled like vinegar and mothballs. And you get to hear THIS a lot:

"That's the station theeeeeerrrre."
"That's the station theeeeeerrrre."
"That's the station theeeeeerrrre."
"The station."
"That's the station."
"The station."
"I say, the STATION."

At which point Wendy (not me Jack, I'm too polite) would turn purple and scream "WILL YOU SHUT THE F*** UP YOU DRIED-OUT, USED-UP, CAMPHOR-LACED C**T??!?!!!???"

Or maybe I hallucinated that part. Seems so REAL, though.

We spent the rest of the day wandering thru the tourist-trap district. Pretty neat, though. Two very fine used record stores. Wendy's eagle eye scored an old Pat McLaughlin LP that I didn't even know existed--and I found another gem as well: a live bootleg LP that I am sending you a tape of under separate cover. (It will not fit through the fax.) I am betting you'll get quite a kick out of it.

Also a Memorabilia shop that specializes, apparently, in all manner of Trash Collectibles. Old LIFE magazines all the way up (down?) to the complete Charlie's Angels doll collection. That was fun as well. Except for, as Wendy reminds me, the boxes of "Penis Pasta." Everybody, of course, makes the same f***ing "al dente" joke for what they assume is the first time ever.

And finally, we were passing a shop window when the aforementioned Eagle Eye Of Wendy spotted some Alison Palmer candlesticks. I don't remember the name of the shop but I assure you they're right in the window.

The next day we planned to go to Philadelphia , so at dusk we headed South and checked into a Holiday Inn in Bensalem PA. "Bensalem" was the name they used, by the way, for the one-year-only "Experimental University Experiment" at Fordham when I was there. Groovy, man. No grades, man. I think they had about 36 students enrolled who later had to be absorbed into the "regular" university. It was quite a shock for their little cottage-cheese-filled psyches, as I recall. A quarter-century precursor to the Summer 1995 phenomenon we witnessed--Grateful Dead fans having to face the world without Jerry. But anyway. Bensalem.

We checked in and ate dinner (10 PM) at the local IHOP (there being no Perkins nearby; we checked our Perkins Map. Please kill us.)

Next morning we headed out towards Philly, and ate breakfast at a Perkins. It was on the way--almost. (Sidebar: every August my sister has a pool party to celebrate the birthdays of all the August Babies in my family. There are many. One of whom is herself and another of whom is Cousin Pete. Cousin Pete was telling us about their recent trip to Florida where they had the most disgusting culinary experience of their lives--"Greasy, disgusting, just grease on top of grease. It must be a chain--it was called 'Perkins.'" Horrors! Well, he lives in kind of a rarefied atmosphere over there in Port Washington--and he probably wouldn't know good cheap ambience-free food if it bit him on the ass, which at Perkins it quite possibly did. Actually, I'm figuring he probably had one of their "Melt" sandwiches, which actually contains more butter than sandwich.)

Regarding Philly: I had only been there once before, as a kid--October 1967. Here's how I remember it: Expressway To Your Heart, Soul Survivors; Gimme Little Sign, Brenton Wood; Apples Peaches Pumpkin Pie, Jay and the Techniques; The Rain, The Park, and Other Things, Cowsills. Got all that?

Driving in and looking on the map, I was again struck--as I always am--at how completely different New York is from virtually all other cities. New York is the only city with no expressway or Interstate running through it. The only city with no "outskirts"--water, BOOM, city, BOOM. The only city where the skyscrapers outnumber the non-scrapers. We were heading for Philly's historic district, and to get there you have to drive through 35 minutes of what looks like the back-ass of Trenton or Rochester.

I had prepared a Road Tape which was theme-driven--consisting of Nazz, Hall & Oates (first three albums only--I still like those) and the American Dream. Ever heard that one? I'll digress again. They were a band from Philly, 1969, who had the distinction of being Todd Rundgren's first outside production, and also the first LP on Ampex Records (our motto: "Seemed Like A Good Idea At The Time.") It's a real crack of an album, too. Sounds like old Horsey-Face just turned on all the mikes and said "Last one in don't get no hoagie." If you've never heard it I must copy it for you. None of the personnel was ever heard of again, at least not by me, EXCEPT: very hot lead guitarist Nick Jameson, who ended up around Woodstock/Bearsville somewhere, and put out a solo LP in the late 70s, I think. Why I mention him is that we were watching Seinfeld earlier this year, and I spotted this familiar-looking blond guy doing a cameo as a German Tourist. There, in the credits, it was: Nick Jameson. So how about that?

We spent the entire day wandering around the historic district. I have quite a passion for our Founding Fathers--I take this whole We The People thing quite seriously--so we made sure to hit virtually every historic spot without exception. And I stood overawed at Ben Franklin's grave--while some kids standing next to us kept scooping the pennies off of the footstone with their little Pearl Jam baseball caps. I made Wendy wait till they left so we could be alone with Ben.

Much the same at the Betsy Ross house. There is, of course, some question as to whether she actually lived there, but SOMEBODY did, in 1777, and they let you go in there and tread the same old boards. Funny, isn't it, how we Cardboard Americans revere the Deep Age of a 200-year-old building? A far cry from Jerusalem or Beijing, I'll say.

At Independence Hall, I wasn't quite prepared for my own reaction. They're renovating just now, and all the furniture and furnishings are out of the room the Declaration was signed in. What a gyp, I groused to myself--until we got inside the room. Because, when all the furniture is in there, they don't actually let you IN THE CHAMBER. You stand behind ropes, way back away from the action. 'Cept now, with nothing in there that you could steal or damage, they let you IN THERE.

Wonder what they'd think of their Noble Experiment NOW?

We walked that entire day--from 10AM till about 7. Here's an interesting little brain-f*** story: the cover of the American Dream LP shows the band clustered around a statue in front of what I had always assumed was Independence Hall. Except when we got there, it didn't look right. I remembered the statue's pedestal saying "JURY." So we were looking for some kind of courthouse or something. Wasn't till we got home and looked at the cover again that it became clear that Mr. Jameson is covering all the letters except "...RY." The pedestal actually says "BARRY" and it's right in back of Independence Hall. The building looked different in person, and the tower was obscured in the picture by the statue, and the camera angle makes the building look closer than it is. So there we are, standing right in front of this statue, and Wendy (who's only seen the picture once and doesn't remember it) says, "Are you sure it didn't say 'Barry?'"

How do you suppose I saw "...RY" and came up with "JURY"????

Well, that night we drove around the rest of the city--yeah, sure, actually about 1/80th of the city, but there you go. We went to another most excellent record store on "South Street And Gomorrah"--I assume you've been there so I won't describe South Street--called Philadelphia Record Exchange. Got a few more things. Still no Even Dozen Jug Band, though. Why don't you and your erstwhile pals start lobbying for a re-release of that thing? If I can purchase a CD copy of They Call Us The Au-Go-Go Singers--which contained only THREE people who would later be luminaries--then certainly Elektra could make a few bucks off of the Jug Band, which had at least four.... Elsewhere on South-Street-And-Gommorah, a shop called, ewwwww, "Condomania", with of course more "Penis Pasta." One more interesting thing: according to Fodor's, there are a few blocks South of South Street and Gomorrah that house a sort of permanent version of the San Gennaro Festival, with an open-air market in the street--so we drove down to have a look. But it was after dark and everybody was gone. What made it interesting were the HUGE MOUNDS OF GARBAGE in the street--they just leave it all there. Looked like the final holocaust had come and everyone had beat it in a big hurry. We drove back to Bensalem a different way. One of the songs on the American Dream LP was called Frankford El, and it goes like so:

You can't get to heaven, on the Frankford El,
Can't get to heaven, on the Frankford El,
Can't get to heaven, on the Frankford El,
Cause the Frankford El goes straight to Frankford......

You get the idea. One of my roommates in college, (Peter Denitz--are you keeping score? Catch up!!!) who was from Allentown, told me that one day he'd treat me to the "Frankford El Experience." He never did. So, blissfully unaware, we drove back to Bensalem under the Frankford El. Shriek! Shiver! Here's what you get, and on a Saturday night at 9PM, mind you: Bar. Deserted building, deserted building, deserted building, bar. Deserted building, deserted building, bar. Deserted city block, bar, deserted building, bar, deserted used car lot, bar. Yipes. And for literally MILES.

Next morning, (Sunday) came out to the car, flat tire. That's not bad enough, it's the SAME F***ING TIRE I JUST CHANGED BEFORE WE LEFT, and the spare is sitting cheerfully in the trunk with a nail in it. So I said f*** it and put the one with the nail back in and we drove home on that one. Damn the galvanized torpedoes. Firstly though, we drove to scenic historic old Doylestown where there is a PERKINS, but it was socked in with Old People and we had to go to Friendly's instead. Thence we went to something called "Peddlers' Village" in Lahaska--which was the last stop on the New Hope Scenic Train Ride but we didn't get off the train. Peddlers' Village is a sort of Crafts-N-Crap haven, but it was fun to walk through. In a couple of the shops were some very Palmer-like pieces. I was all for torching the place, but Wendy said "She didn't INVENT ceramics, you know." Well, fair enough.

We drove from there to Bethlehem to wind up the vacation by visiting our friends Matt and Patty (Matt is the gray-haired bassist in that wedding video of ours) who have two children and a brand new Gestating Surprise, which was in fact a surprise but luckily will be welcome anyway. The younger post-natal child, Matthew, who is five, came out with a small piece of brilliance: we were on our way out to dinner, in two cars--boys in one, girls in the other. Why is that? Anyway, Matt had some college radio station on in the car and they were reading poetry. After ten minutes, he abruptly switched to a "modern-rock" station that was smack in the middle of an Ozzy Osbourne song, and I hear this little voice behind me: "Now dat's what I call wock and wole ! " Yeah, okay!

Then we came home. Monday night we went over to Bill's apartment in Hackensack and helped pack up his records. He bought a condo. He's moving out of a once-grand old rent-controlled flophouse he's lived in for over twenty years--I believe his rent is about $28 a month, but all his stuff doesn't fit anymore. Anyway, the floor-level record shelves haven't seen any human traffic in several years, and they have not dust-bunnies but rather dust armadillos--ATTACK armadillos. Also, continuing a theme noted earlier in this document, I'm packing up his Grobschnitt and Peter Hamill LPs, minding my own business regarding same (almost), when what's this on the floor but a miniscule rubber D**K???!!!!!!???

Bill, you see, is a buyer for Russ Berrie--the company that made its fortune with those plastic troll dolls (sans weeny) and this was, apparently, a prototype of an, um, "artifact" that some client of theirs was hoping they would market. As a pencil eraser.

At least, that's how HE explained it.

That's all. Except yesterday I slashed my right pinky finger between a handtruck and a door-bar. Ow.

This coming Monday through Thursday we will be home. Not going anywhere, just taking four days off. Except I, of course, will be going to the store each day to do the books.