take a letter, Maria

My wife has been selling on eBay, the top online auction website, for years. Many years, as a matter of fact. In addition to regular auctions, she maintains an eBay "store" with an inventory of several thousand items. She makes trips to our local post office several times a week. Basically, she sells a lot of stuff.

For the most part, Mrs. P specializes in pop culture collectibles. That's a fairly broad term for a category that encompasses advertising memorabilia, sports team logo items, rock and roll merchandise and TV and movie related items. Various items emblazoned with logos representing Coca-Cola, McDonald's, M&Ms and other internationally-recognized companies are especially popular and particularly consistent sellers. A lot of these items in her eBay store and those offered for auction, had limited availability in their original distribution. Most were only available to company employees for a short time, either through brief distribution or from an employee-only store or catalog. Small promotional items — such as pens, t-shirts, mugs or figural likenesses of a company mascot — are highly sought-after by collectors of a particular company's memorabilia.

Last week, she sold and closed a sale for a promotional notepad from the headquarters of Pep Boys, the national chain of auto parts stores. Pep Boys, with their familiar mascots of Manny, Moe and Jack, produces a lot of promotional tchotchkes for their employees. Their aim is to boost employee morale and to maintain the company's branding. They have created and circulated key rings in the shape of cars and various automotive tools. Employees were treated to coffee mugs promoting a variety of company goodwill policies. Logoed pens and notepads were a staple throughout the company's Philadelphia-based main operations facility. (I should note that I worked in the Marketing Department of Pep Boys for four years and I managed to acquire more than my fair share of promo items.) The notepad that Mrs. P sold for $4.99 plus shipping was used to promote a specific employee initiative in the late 1990s. The top of each page displayed the smiling visages of Manny and his pals along with some sort of cheerful motivational slogan. The rest of each page was left blank to allow for the quick jot of a phone number as it sat by your desk phone at the ready. The very fact that most of these note pads were completely used or most likely trashed over the course of nearly twenty years, makes the one my wife sold a pretty rare commodity and a great find for a collector.

A few days after Mrs. P sent the Pep Boys notepad to the buyer (in a batch of a hundred or so other packaged shipments that went out that day), she received an email of a decidedly disappointed nature. The notepad had arrived and the buyer was not at all pleased. My wife prides herself on customer satisfaction and does her very best to ensure that her customers are content and that all wrongs are righted quickly. The email, angry and accusing in tone, proclaimed this as "the worst transaction in her history with eBay." The buyer dismissed her purchase as "not worth 49 cents let alone four-ninety-nine!" She demanded a refund. Calmly, my wife composed her standard "I'm sorry you are not happy with your purchase" email and inquired about her dismay. Mrs. P explained that this notepad was a limited-run, company-only item, out-of-print for nearly twenty years and then available only to employees in the main office.

A day or so later came the reply. The buyer said that she didn't really care what was printed on the individual pages, she merely needed a notepad.

My wife and I scratched our heads and tried to fully understand the "fucked-up-ness" of the situation.

This particular buyer lives in Sweetwater, Texas, the county seat of Nolan County. It boasts a population of a little over 11,000 people and sits approximately 35 miles west of Abilene, the 25th most populous city in the United States. Sweetwater is home to many independent drug stores, as well as outlets of national chains like CVS. I've been to a fair amount of drug stores in my life and I believe that most have a small section devoted to household items like light bulbs, adhesive tape and, um, notepads. In addition, right there on Interstate 20 (locally known as Georgia Avenue), there is a K-Mart (with convenient hours of operation; most evenings until 9 PM) and, less than a mile away, is a WalMart SuperCenter that is open TWENTY-FOUR-FUCKING-HOURS-A-FUCKING-DAY! You're telling me that this numbskull, in search of any ol' notepad to write a goddamn message to whatever other inbred moron to whom she needs to impart precious documented information, can't get up off her lazy, cheap beer-swillin', barbecue-munchin' ass and get on down t' th' WalMart to purchase a notepad for half-a-buck? No! Her first thought to obtain a notepad was to turn to eBay, search "notepads," and click "Buy It Now" on a listing for a notepad for four dollars and ninety-nine cents plus the cost of shipping it to her double-wide trailer. (By the way, in case she is doing some travelling, there are two more WalMart SuperCenters just up the road a piece in Abilene, as well as a Staples and an Office Depot. I'm fairly certain that they sell a variety of notepads. Many priced well below $4.99 with no collectible value whatsoever.)

Texas leads the nation in state-sanctioned executions, but obviously they are not working fast enough.

www.joshpincusiscrying.com

old man, look at my life, I'm a lot like you were

I had lunch with my friend Steve this week.

I met Steve when we were both employed in the Marketing Department of a national aftermarket auto parts distributor whose corporate mascots are three Jewish guys with out-of-proportion heads, one of whom smoked a cigar until it was unceremoniously removed in 1990. But I ain't naming names. Steve is a copywriter and I am a graphic designer. ( I used to be an "artist," until the corporate world reassigned me.)

Steve and I have commiserated about the trials and tribulations (and assholes) we have encountered during our collective years in the intriguing, yet utterly ridiculous, industry known as "marketing." While neither of us are in the employ of those unnamed retailers any longer and have moved on to other jobs, we still manage to get together, though not as often as we'd like. A few years ago, after a lengthy stretch in the freelance world, Steve began working at an ad agency just three blocks from my office. We meet for lunch frequently, but still, not frequently enough.

On Monday morning, an electronic whistle from my cellphone alerted me of an incoming text message. I unlocked the screen and read:

("Liberty" refers to the food court at Liberty One, a 61-story high rise building that houses offices, retail stores and the aforementioned food court. Liberty One holds the distinction of being the first skyscraper to break the decades-old agreement that no building can be higher than the statue of William Penn that sits atop Philadelphia's City Hall.)

Having no plans for lunch (actually, I never have plans for lunch), I rode the elevator down to street level. Steve greeted me at the corner of 16th and Market, just across from where the Preacher was delivering his daily midday message. We immediately began catching up as we made our way to the street entrance of Liberty One. Inside, Steve queued up for a big, Styrofoam plate of Japanese-prepared tan meat and cabbage. I opted for pizza, but when I discovered a darkened and stripped-bare location that — until recently — served that beloved Italian quick-bite staple, I settled for an overpriced egg salad sandwich. We reconvened at one of the many small, metal tables that populate the seating area and began eating and conversing.

Steve had been travelling for work non-stop since the beginning of June. As he related the whirlwind itinerary that included such exotic foreign locales as Paris and Lyon and such mundane domestic territory as Pittsburgh and Morgantown, West Virginia, he reminded me that it was strictly business. He was not there to leisurely stroll the romantic banks of the Seine. He was there to supervise the grueling production of a television commercial and put up with non-productive producers.

A subsequent leg of Steve's work tour took him to Austin, Texas... and that's where the real fun* began. Steve woke up in his hotel in the worst, excruciating pain. Soon, he found himself a stranger in the emergency room of a strange Austin hospital, just one buffer seat from a Mom and Dad trying to comfort their gunshot-wounded son — and trying to keep his obviously-disliked boyfriend at bay. Eventually, Steve was diagnosed with a kidney stone.

"I've been there.," I said, knowingly.

With that, we commenced on a tangent, trading tales of kidney stone episodes for the next twenty-five minutes. We consoled and sympathized over vivid memories of not being able to sit comfortably and fearing an addiction to Percocet. We nodded solemnly and re-experienced the pain. We began a lot of sentences with "Well, when it happened to me..." When, suddenly....

"Listen to us!," I said, "We sound like we're 80 years old! Is this what it has come to? This is what our conversations have been reduced to?"

We stared blankly at each other for a second.

We quickly changed the subject.

To something younger.

www.joshpincusiscrying.com

Originally published 8/15/13. 

* and by real fun, I mean no fun.

It's only words and words are all I have

I was twenty-four the first time I said "fuck" in front of my parents. I suppose it was a "respect" thing, but something must have pissed me off so much that the heretofore unspoken "F" word finally breached our dialogue. However, I was already married for two years and I no longer had to abide by the unwritten rules of my parents' house — so saying "fuck" was fair game. I mean, they couldn't very well spank me or ground me or send me to my room! My room was at my house and I lived in it with my wife! So, with no fear of repercussions, I allowed "fuck" to enter the conversation.

Which brings me to a question that has been the topic of many a discussion at the Pincus house: "How well do you have know someone before "fuck" is introduced into the verbal exchange?"

Now, I am not prudish by any means. I acknowledge the fact that my speech tends to be "colorful" and is peppered with an overabundance of salty language — especially during baseball season, when, in the course of a Phillies game, it can get particularly vulgar. My wife and I made a conscious decision to watch our phraseology around our son as he grew up. For years, we never uttered anything more crude than "darn" within range of his young and impressionable ears. But, somewhere around his sixteenth birthday, all heck broke loose. The gloves were off and the "fucks" were flying. I don't know what specifically triggered the transformation, but almost overnight, our house went from a convent to a day of working down on the docks. Despite the freedom of expression I employ in my vocabulary, I am still taken aback when a total stranger speaks that word I so liberally use myself.

Last year, my wife and I were at an invitation-only dinner hosted by several celebrity chefs from The Food Network. We were seated at a large round table with four other couples — none of whom we had met before. To my immediate right was a couple who were close to our age. (In reality, the other couples were closer to our parents' age!) We struck up a very benign conversation with them, when suddenly — on sentence number three to be exact — the gentleman allowed "fuck" to compromise the conversation's security. My wife and I were briefly startled, but after several more "fucks" were sprinkled throughout the next few sentences, we were becoming desensitized and eventually more comfortable. I may have even spoken a couple-a "fucks" myself — just to let him know we were on his side. Hey! What the fuck!

This past Sunday, Mrs. P and I attended a particularly tedious Phillies game. Our hometown boys were getting their sorry butts kicked by the pathetic Miami Marlins and the game grew more painful as the innings ticked away. To bide the time, my spouse amused herself by playing a few distracting rounds of the addictive, online game Candy Crush Saga on her smartphone. The unmistakable digital sound effects from the game caught the attention of the couple sitting in the row directly in front of us. We have been Phillies season ticket holders for eighteen years, but we have never seen this couple before. The woman turned around and asked my wife the updated version of the mid-70's standby "What's your Sign," and that's: "What level are you on?" And those were the last words we understood her to say — except for "fuck." She slurred her words and talked fast and guttural, but "fuck" came through like an obscene beacon, loud and fucking clear. My wife nodded and smiled as the woman's speech just became a barrage of sentences of "fuck" after "fuck" after "fuck." The fellow she was with was totally unintelligible — even his "fucks," if he was indeed using the nasty word.

So, have I reached a definitive answer to my question?

How the fuck should I know?

www.joshpincusiscrying.com

dynamite's in the belfry, playing with the bats

Note from JPiC:
In case you missed the beginning, read fly on, little wing and its follow-up, i'm fixing a hole where the rain gets in. Then you'll be ready to read — what I hope — is the final chapter.

Are you kidding me? Are you fucking kidding me???

On Thursday evening, I was sitting on the den sofa, dozing. I was half-paying attention to the pathetic Phillies as they limped their way through the final game of what would be a series sweep by the St. Louis Cardinals. Mrs. Pincus was in the third floor office, either answering business-related emails or playing Candy Crush... or a little of both. As my eyelids slowly sealed me off from the television, the room lights and the world around me... something flew an inch or so above my head. Something unnervingly familiar.

My wife heard me emit (as my people call it) a geschrei (Yiddish for "shriek"). From one floor above me, she knew that sound could only mean one of three things:

1. The Phillies had committed an amateurish error or had just lost another consecutive game
2. I was experiencing the excruciating discomfort of another kidney stone
3. There was some sort of wildlife critter in our house

Mrs. P briefly analyzed the tone and volume of my cry and settled for choice number three. She was correct. She stood sheepishly at the top of the stairs and peered down, just in time to see me feverishly slam the door to the guest room. I was hunched over, hands on knees, huffing and puffing like a 51-year-old, out-of-shape freight train.

"What was that?," Mrs. P, asked, knowing full well what it was.

"A bat! Another fucking bat!," I replied, slowly regaining regularity to my breathing, "I have it trapped in the guest room. The door is shut, so I'll deal with it tomorrow."

"TOMORROW?!?," my wife protested, "I am not sleeping in this house with a bat flying around."

"Well, what should I do?," I questioned rhetorically aloud, not really wanting a list of suggestions. When the previous "bat episodes" occurred, I handled them myself. Now, echoing the words of Danny Glover in Lethal Weapon, I'm getting too old for this shit. I was content in having the bat sequestered in an 8' x 8' room until I was fully rested and could think clearly. Mrs. P felt otherwise.

My wife suggested that we call her father. I considered that adding a less-than-agile, 75-year-old to the mix would not be a wise decision. I nixed the proposal. She next suggested that I call the police.

"Yeah!," I thought, as a wave of relief flowed over me, "The police! We pay taxes! I'm calling the police!" I decided that my bat-killing days were behind me and I would leave the next ones to someone better equipped and with better training. Art school didn't teach stuff like this.

As my spouse watched the shadows flicker from beneath the closed guest room door, I dialed up the local law enforcement/animal apprehension bureau. After several recorded prompts, my call was answered by a live dispatcher. I hesitantly asked if this was the right place to call for my particular situation and I was assured that they do, indeed, handle such ... such ... natural inconveniences. The friendly dispatcher took my name and address and told me that an officer would be at my house shortly. Before he ended the call, he told me to "try to stay away from the bat." I told him I had no intention of going anywhere near it. We watched the street for the calvary to arrive from a second-floor window, just two rooms from the imprisoned, airborne mammal.

A township police cruiser pulled up and parked across my driveway. I ran downstairs and greeted the officer as he walked towards my front porch. He smiled and listened as I babbled about my winged intruder. I directed him up the stairs to the guest room. He pulled some official-looking gloves onto his hands as I wished him luck and bolted downstairs. I anticipated gunshots and the sound of exploding mirrors and bullet-impacted furniture. Instead, we heard a little bit of clattering and some tinkling of glass. Then the officer cracked the door slightly and asked for a large towel. When he opened the door to make his request, the bat escaped and flew across the hall into the den. A second request — this time for a step ladder — came from the officer from behind the closed den door. I ran down to the basement and returned with a small ladder and a beach towel that my wife said she wished never to see again. Through a minimal opening of the door, I passed the items to the officer. With the door slightly ajar, I winced as I observed the policeman daintily ascend the ladder, delicately unfurl the towel and trap the offending beast — who, by now, was perched in an uppermost corner of the room — within its folds. The officer cradled the small, towel-enveloped being in his gloved hands and carried it downstairs. Once outside, he snapped the towel open and the bat flew off into the night. I received the towel with a waiting trash can.

My wife and I thanked the officer many times over. He smiled and muttered something about "duty" and "most excitement of the night." Then he jotted down my name and address in a small, spiral-bound notebook and jogged back to his vehicle.

My wife cautiously climbed the stairs leading to the second floor and keenly scanned the den and the guest room. She meticulously closed every window and checked the already-closed ones. On the other hand, I went right to bed and made a mental note: "Next bat, call cops."

www.joshpincusiscrying.com

sitting in the stands of a sports arena, waiting for the show to begin

I love music. I have loved music since I was a little kid. My taste in music runs the full spectrum from rock and pop to R & B to rap (not 'gangsta rap', I much prefer the old school sounds of the Sugar Hill Gang and Run-DMC) to swing and country-western and everything in-between. 

And I love live music. I went to my first concert at 14 years old (Alice Cooper) and I never stopped. My wife is a music fan as well, but her tastes are a bit more specialized. She's a little wary of anything that isn't The Grateful Dead. She has maintained her affinity for the AM radio bubble-gum pop of our youth, but give her the meandering Space>Drums>Space of a random '73 Dead show and she's pretty contented.

This week, I attended four concerts in nine days. As a reflection of my eclectic musical interests, those shows couldn't have been more diverse.

FRIDAY

My son and I saw nouveau-rockabilly guitarist JD McPherson rip up the stage at Philadelphia's World Cafe Live. JD and his band tore through song after song from his debut album Signs and Signifiers, much to the sweaty delight of the packed house. The crowd was comprised of a dichotomous mix of older couples looking as though they just arrived from cheering for their kids at soccer practice and young biker dudes with hair slicked into pompadours, a tattooed Bette Page look-a-like hanging off their equally tattooed arm. The couples, on a sans kids "Mom's Night Out" date, were making out like hormone-ravaged teenagers. The bikers were jitterbugging uncontrollably within the confines of the crowd. It was surreal, to say the least.

TUESDAY

Knowing full well that I was missing the Major League Baseball All-Star Game, Mrs. Pincus and I took my two nieces - ages ten and seven - to their first concert. (Why weren't their parents part of this important rite of passage? You tell me. [See the previous two links.]) The girls would be making their concert-going initiation with the double bill of Victoria Justice and Big Time Rush. WHAT? Are you kidding me, Josh? YOU went to see Victoria Justice and Big Time Rush? Oh, you're damn right I did! I'll have you know that I am very familiar with Miss Justice's work. My wife and I have been avid fans of her Nickelodeon sitcom Victorious, since our son introduced us to it a few years ago. (Our son, by the way is nearly 26 and well past the show's target demographic.) But — goddammit! — the show is pretty funny! Created by TV veteran Dan Schneider, co-star of the 80s comedy Head of the Class, it is a throwback to classic sitcoms from TV's Golden Age. It is chock-full of off-the-wall humor and digging inside jokes, as it borrows heavily from sources like Make Room for Daddy and I Love Lucy. The young ensemble cast headed by the adorable Miss Justice, while still honing their acting abilities, can hold their own without being precocious or obnoxious (unless, of course, the script calls for it). Victoria Justice has branched out into the world of teen pop music à la Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera minus the skank. Every show features at least one vocal performance and she has parlayed that into a concert experience.

Big Time Rush are also the stars of a Nickelodeon series, one of which I have never seen. They are just another in a long line of manufactured "boy bands" that includes The Backstreet Boys, 'NSync, New Kids on the Block and a host of also-rans with hopes of making it big. Big Time Rush abbreviates its name with the ultra-hip, ultra-cool acronym "BTR". I questioned my wife as to the appropriateness of naming a youth-oriented singing group after a convicted serial killer. She offered clarification, explaining that I must be thinking of "BTK".

The audience at the sprawling semi-outdoor mess of an amphitheater that is Camden's Susquehanna Bank Center was jammed with a giddy contingency of prepubescent young girls, swathed in glitter and glow-sticks and toting handmade signs proclaiming their love for the various and collective members of Big Time Rush. Most were accompanied by one or two adults, the males of which all displayed the same disgruntled yet resigned look of "Well, at least I got out of work early" across their faces. My nieces sat, then stood, then sat, then stood in anticipation of the show. Suddenly the loud, opening strains of a synthesizer cut the summer air and spotlights bathed the stage in a purple-pink glow. A youngster who introduced himself as Jackson Guthy (son of direct marketing mogul Bill Guthy and cosmetic magnate Victoria Jackson) prowled the stage to warm up the anxious crowd. He rambled through three or four songs (that all sounded identical) and prefaced his final song with " This is a cover — I hope you like it." He then broke into Daft Punk's new, infectious jam "Get Lucky." Mrs. P and I joyfully sang along. My ten-year old niece turned around and, in a thoroughly puzzled tone, asked her old aunt and uncle, "You know this song?"

I smiled and quickly shot back, "You don't know this song?"

When Victoria Justice took the stage with the peppy dance-groove "Freak the Freak Out," I was both pleased and embarrassed that I actually knew the song and three others that she sang — lyrics and all. Her music may be vapid and repetitive, but that girl is sure filled with energy. She pranced, danced, jumped and ran all over that stage. I hope she savors this stage of her career, because, as we all know, fame is fleeting. Especially in the fickle, short attention span of the teenage target market.

Big Time Rush were awful. Admittedly, I am not a fan of trendy boy bands, but one can at least recognize a modicum of talent in Justin Timberlake and his cohorts. These guys were just plain bad — wailing and screaming tunelessly over a programmed series of "boops" and "beeps" and other electronic sounds. Their simple choreography betrayed their lack of dance prowess, as well. And their set went on waaaaay too long. The girls enjoyed it, though.

WEDNESDAY

My concert-going reputation was redeemed with an enjoyable performance from throwback guitarist Pokey LaFarge. Fresh from their appearance on The Late Show with David Letterman, Pokey and his five-piece band treated the small audience to an evening of hot jazz, Western swing and all things old-timey. After the show, my son and I met and spoke with Pokey. He's a really nice guy.

SATURDAY

Speaking of manufactured boy bands, The Monkees brought their "Mid-Summer Night" Tour to Philadelphia's Mann Center for the Performing Arts on Saturday. My son, a DJ on a Philadelphia radio station, was spinning a mix of psychedelic songs in the Mann's concession courtyard as pre-concert entertainment for the arriving patrons. His gig came with two complementary tickets which he offered to his biggest fans — his parents.

The Monkees' current line up features long-time recluse Mike Nesmith, the lead guitarist who had previously shunned all Monkees reunions over the years. It is something of a mystery as to why he agreed to participate in the first tour following the untimely death of original member Davy Jones. One can only draw their own — fairly obvious — conclusion.

Mrs. P and I arrived at the entrance gates just prior to the 6 PM opening time. Once inside, we sat ourselves on a bench a few feet from where our son's audio equipment was set up. We took in the various get-ups of the arriving fans (mini skirts; go-go boots; various t-shirts from many past Monkee tours; a stray Ozzy and Hendrix shirt in the mix) as we listened to our boy's carefully hand-picked musical nuggets from our childhood.

Soon, it was showtime. We took our seats (in a mid-audience private box). We were joined by our son, after he settled monetarily for the gig and scored himself a big ol' dish of gourmet ice cream. The flashing lights illuminated three old, wrinkled guys who may or may not, at one time, have been The Monkees. They launched into "Last Train to Clarksville," "Papa Gene's Blues," and "Your Auntie Grizelda," thus showcasing the questionable talent of the three surviving members of the so-called "Pre-Fab Four". There was something missing, though. Something eerily missing. Davy. Davy was missing. The band purposefully left out all of the "Davy" songs from their repertoire, focusing instead on a setlist full of Micky-sung tunes and Mike-heavy country-tinged compositions. Hits like "Star Collector," "Valleri," "I Want to Be Free" and "A Little Bit Me, A Little Bit You" were noticeably absent. Davy's likeness was also conspicuously missing from the tour merchandise. While the trio plodded through muddy renditions of some lesser-known Monkees tunes, it became apparent that Davy was the spark of this sorry assemblage.

The tone-deaf crowd - ruining "Daydream Believer" for everyone.

As the performance drew to a close, Micky Dolenz stepped to center stage and announced that the band's most well-known song — the Davy Jones-vocal "Daydream Believer" — now belongs to you, the fans. He then called for a representative of the audience to take the stage (in this case, a gray-haired man and his young son) and led the crowd in song, as the band played the music. What could have been a heartfelt, loving tribute to a beloved pop icon and colleague became, as my son put it, "a fucking mess." As the father and son warbled out the off-key chorus, the overcast sky let loose a huge, angry thunderclap that shook the venue — I kid you not. It was as though Davy was expressing his disapproval. In hindsight, while Nesmith, Tork and Dolenz followed their inflated egos and fancied themselves rock stars in both talent and importance as The Beatles and The Rolling Stones, Davy was the only one who "got it." He knew he was an actor cast in a part in a TV show and he milked that role for forty-six years. The Monkees were a novelty act. And that's all they'll ever be.

Next week will find me at the annual three-day outdoor festival staged by local radio station WXPN.

As Sonny and Cher once observed: The beat goes on.

As The Grateful Dead once observed: The music never stopped.

www.joshpincusiscrying.com

east meets west and it goes bang (東 が 西に)

It's no secret that I love old television, specifically programs from my youth. Thanks to networks like MeTV and Antenna TV*, I can relive the glory days of life with the Cleaver family and the daily grind of Officers Reed and Malloy. I love watching the simple premises upon which each episode is based. Situations that the scriptwriters felt they could stretch out to a full half-hour (with commercials), like Mary Stone having two dates to the big dance on The Donna Reed Show or Dennis breaking Mr. Wilson's window (again) with an errant football on Dennis the Menace. These are examples of typical intrigue on late-twentieth century television.

There is one particular plot device that has popped up on nearly every drama and situation comedy in the 50s, 60s and right into the 70s — Asians. There was something about the Far East that fascinated television writers enough that every show had at least one "Asian-centric" episode.

I was born in 1961. I grew up in a predominantly Caucasian (99.9%) neighborhood. I went to a predominantly Caucasian (98%), predominantly Jewish (85%) elementary school. There was one family from Korea on my block. You had to remove your shoes before you went into their house (which smelled like ginger). They had two boys — John (the older one) and Dong Wook (the younger one). John and Dong Wook (later known as "Donny", despite some of the narrow-minded, sons-of-bigots neighborhood kids insisting upon calling him "Dung Gu") were friendly and easy-going. They rode bikes. They played baseball. They wore the same clothes everybody else wore. They were just like us.

But on television, Asians were depicted as mystical, magical, eerie, ethereal and mysterious. On shows written by guys named "McGreevy," "Kalish," and "Tibbles," Asians were treated as a novelty. There was always one episode that showed the main characters crossing paths with a family of Asians with "ways different from our own." The characters were pretty cookie-cutter, too. There was the young, Americanized boy or girl who is befriended by the show's main character's child. They would introduce a parent who was trying to assimilate into American society while still maintaining ties to the Old World ways. And then we'd meet the stoic, wizened grandparent - quiet, stubborn and unwilling to adapt to this "frivolous American behavior." I remember My Three Sons, Donna Reed, Family Affair and That Girl all having their obligatory "Asian" episode. They would cast American-born Asian actors (regardless of their specific heritage) for any number of Japanese, Chinese or generic Asian roles. Character actors like Benson Fong, Beulah Quo, Frances Fong and Richard Loo, whose careers spanned several decades, were cast over and over, often appearing in guest roles on different shows at the same time. Even more familiar actors like James Hong and George Takei took the demeaning parts of houseboys or waiters early in their careers. But they were all subjected to the same quaint, subordinate depiction of Asians. Most often, they would deliver their lines in a self-mocking, exaggerated accent, substituting "L"s for "R"s in their dialog. Or, if they were playing an Asian-American character, their speech was peppered with "groovy" and "far out" and other cool, contemporary lingo. It was commonplace in the 60s, but now it's painful to watch.

Sometimes, if an actual Asian actor wasn't available, a heavily made-up American was cast instead. I saw Marlo Thomas in a kimono play a mail-order Asian bride in a particularly embarrassing episode of Bonanza. And who could forget David Carradine playing Chinese Kwai Chang Caine for three seasons of Kung Fu? 

In these ultra-aware, politically-correct times, Hollywood wouldn't dream of doing anything so offensive — so blatantly racist — towards any ethnic group. Except for Native Americans.

Isn't that right, Johnny Depp?

www.joshpincusiscrying.com

*Although TV Land infrequently broadcasts The Andy Griffith Show, I cannot consider The Golden Girls and King of Queens part of classic television.

everyone's gone to the movies, now we're alone at last

I love movies, I just hate going to the movies. It's not because of the expense – and don't get me wrong, it is indeed expensive – it's because of people. People have ruined the movie-going experience.

Mrs. Pincus and I went to the movies twice this week. Twice! In the same week! Two consecutive days, as a matter of fact! Before that, the last time we went to the movies was nearly two years ago. And I know what kept us away. People. People who don't know how to behave. I'm not talking about children (although I will in a minute). I'm referring to adults. Adults who don't know the proper way to behave as a member of society.

My wife loves Superman. All things Superman. She read Superman comics as a kid. She watched the campy TV series starring poor, pigeon-holed George Reeves. She loves the big-screen film series, featuring hunky Christopher Reeve, that made us believe a man could fly. She was an avid fan of the revival series Lois and Clark, starring Teri Hatcher and Dean Cain, despite Mr. Cain's weird pronunciation of "Shooperman," when referring to his character's name. She even enjoyed the ill-conceived 2006 Superman Returns, featuring an embarrassed Kevin Spacey and a wooden Brandon Routh. So, when word came out that a high-tech big-budget reboot of the Superman story was hitting theaters in the Summer of 2013, it was understood that my spouse and I would be there – front and center. After raking in a whopping 42 million dollars, Man of Steel looked promising – even for someone who is not particularly a "superhero movie" fan... like me.

I arrived home from work around 5:30 on Wednesday. We picked an early evening, mid-week show in hopes of a small audience for a movie that had been released two weeks earlier. We found a parking space at the theater pretty quickly. That offered encouragement of a light crowd. We bought our tickets (eleven and a half bucks each!) and entered auditorium number 22 of 24. The place was fairly empty with a few popcorn-munching families and couples scattered throughout the high-backed, stadium-style seats and focused on the pre-show commercials flickering on the screen. We selected a pair of seats in the last row (so as not to get repeatedly kicked by a nervous patron with Restless Leg Syndrome, as past experience has taught us), just under the projection window. At the end of the row in front of us, was Dad and Little Billy. Little Billy was conducting some sort of pre-movie, under-seat inspection in random rows. Then, he began running up and down the steep access aisles that flanked the middle section of seats. Then, he knocked over his giant bucket of popcorn. Suddenly, Dad – who up until now was totally motionless – sprang up and jogged down a side aisle, soon returning with a replacement container of popcorn. Little Billy continued his activity until the lights dimmed.

In between the trailers for upcoming films, the screen was awash in lighthearted but firm warnings prohibiting cellphone use during the movie. The message was clear – no calls, no texting. At least, it was clear to me and Mrs. P. Despite the sentiment being repeated numerous times, several members of the audience felt that they were somehow exempt from this admonition.

The movie began and so did the conversation. At regular volume, as though people were in their living rooms viewing an On-Demand selection from Netfilx, able to be paused at will. Other conversations took place on the aforementioned cellphones to parties not able to join us at this evening's feature. Then, Little Billy took this time to engage an uninterested Dad in a lengthy "Question and Answer" session. Little Billy proposed his queries from several feet away, since the fact that a film was being shown to other paying customers wasn't a hindrance to his up-and-down-the-steps workout.

"Who's that guy?" "Where's Superman?" "What are they doing?" all came from Little Billy, at top volume and in rapid-fire succession, in addition to the out-of-context "What's the lady's name on True Blood?" and a few more non-sequiturs.

"This," I cautiously whispered to my wife, " is why I hate going to the movies." And then I added, "And why I hate people."

On Thursday, we were invited to a special advance screening of the new film The Lone Ranger, the highly-touted Western epic boasting the re-teaming of director Gore Verbinski and the irrepressible Johnny Depp, trying to reignite the magic and success they brought to the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise. When we arrived at the theater, the specially-hired security staff announced that cellphones and other similar electronic devices were strictly verboten and should either be returned to your car or checked at the door. Patrons were additionally "wanded" to flush out anyone who wasn't forthright in their answer to the "any cellphones tonight?" question.

Once seated (again, in our usual last-row, "no kicking zone" spot), Mrs. P and I talked quietly as the theater filled up. A man in his fifties, accompanied by a much older man, took a pair of seats to my left, leaving a courtesy buffer seat between us. The older man, in ill-fitting shorts, his bony knees noticeably adorned with an abundance of wrinkled Band-Aids, began a loud speech about the previous night's Phillies game. Okay. The lights were still on and the movie hadn't started (and the Phillies are pretty disheartening right now), but he was only talking to the man next to him and his voice could easily be heard by those on the other side of the room. He picked at and rubbed the bandages absentmindedly as he spoke.

A member of the security staff addressed the crowd and repeated the warning about errant cellphones. He mildly threatened to remove anyone who produces one during the film. Then, the room slowly lost its lighting and the film began.

The old man said, "Here we go!" and chuckled.

The dark screen was startlingly illuminated by the familiar Disney castle logo.

Suddenly, the bandage-kneed old man next to me muttered, "Hmm! Walt Disney! It's a Walt Disney movie!"

In the darkness, my eyes met Mrs. P's eyes and we rolled them in exasperated unison.

A title card opened the film. It read "San Francisco."

The old man said, "Hmm! San Francisco!"

Then, the date "1933" appeared.

The old man said, "Hmm! 1933!"

A sepia-toned scene of a fairground came into focus, with crowds bustling in and out of Ferris wheels and balloon vendors. Small boys in cowboy hats shuffled and danced along the winding dirt paths.

The old man said, "There's the Lone Ranger right there!" and he chuckled again.

My "SHHHHHH"s fell on deaf ears, as the screen presented a close-up of a massive buffalo and the old man announced, as a service to all within earshot, "Buffalo."

"You gotta be fucking kidding me!," I thought, "Is this asshole gonna narrate the whole fucking picture to me?"

The Lone Ranger clocks in at a hair under two and a half hours. The old man possibly fell asleep (or perhaps died) during its run, because the commentary eventually ceased. Though, towards the film's climax, he chimed in with a "silver bullet" remark and promptly dozed off again.

I am astonished by the behavior of adults. I am astounded by blatant acts of impoliteness, disrespect for other people's feelings and total disregard for rules. I am reminded of a line from Bob Goldthwait's (yes, that Bob Goldthwait!) brilliant, if ham-fisted, film God Bless America, a biting, astute commentary on current trends in society: "Why have a civilization anymore if we no longer are interested in being civilized?"

See, you can learn from movies – if you would only shut up.

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