The Second Half of the Double Feature Book

Dunno what # willeford this will be for me...will look-see on my page and add that info later...later...what that page say? this is the 19th? 20th? confirmation, later. later...this is the 18th willeford for me.

paperback, wit's end publishing, new albany, indiana...240 pages

there's this on the copyright page: to lose willeford we can ill afford

There is a quote on a white page:
my work is one long triumph over my limitations
--charles willeford

there is a contents page:

contents
the old man at the bridge
the condemned
the pop-off caper
the deserted village
give the man a cigar
citizen's arrest
sentences
saturday night special
to a nephew in college
checking out
one hero to a war
behind him goes his dream
an actor prepares
the emancipation of henry allen
some lucky license
a matter of taste
the first five in line
the tupperware party
the gardener and the princess
the laughing machine
the man who loved ann landers
warren & lee
the listener
everybody's metamorphosis
sand dollar

okee dokee then, as the good doctor said, (the number-two berries, 1971)...onward & upward

the first story, the old man at the bridge ...i read already, a review of that exists...here:

2nd story, the condemned begins:
we were in the baguio market one morning, walking around and looking at the bare breasts of the igorot women. their breasts were brown and taut, and the nipples stuck straight out. this was because, d'angelo said, none of these women had ever worn brassiers, which break down the muscles under the arms and cause breast to sag.

yeah...i get the idea that some are reading that and saying...now i learn this...
story set in the philippines...camp john hay, the baguio market...a jail, where an igorot, all of 4'6" is waiting to be put to death for killing another man and eating his heart...three americans, d'angelo, charles...i think...eye-narrator, and tom higdon, an m.p. from manila...also from terrell, texas, visit the man, the last set on converting him/saving him which he does after a fashion.

the pop-off caper
this story is a hoot and all those Stephen King fans ought to enjoy this one. mrs wheeler, a 70-yr-old, 102# woman living on fairfax street, waiting for the crandall's nasty little brown-and-white terrier to show...so she can run out and swat it w/a broom...is also visited by a representative of the regional can company, art duncan, 28-yr-old, 230#...who shows w/some test cans to show the woman how it is done. now she's going to miss her granddaughter's birthday party on friday.

the deserted village
another hoot...set in miami, florida, where the eye-narrator, married for one year now to sally, must open their home to refugees from various parts...all part of the reagan refugee resettlement plan of 1982, time...of the story. the eye records life, journal-like. lived in florida around this time...almost stayed in miami, too, coming in the back door, across alligator alley may it do ya fine...and the conclusion, yeah, thought of that, too...all those clothed in the apparel of the home-country, stepping into henry's pot, stepping out clothed in suit and tie, briefcase...heading out to new lands of opportunity. reading this and was thinking, hay-soos pizza! someone else had the same idea! only willeford came up with it a couple decades ago!

give the man a cigar
an unnamed eye-narrator has a shop in miami and the big shot editor of el grito, senor armando martinez, enters noonish...gets a cigar and then some.

citizen's arrest
an eye-narrator in gwynn's dept. store. ...spots a guy, "the big man"...lifting an expensive lighter. one of those s.n.a.f.u. story w/a beginning, a middle, an end....as was the one before that.

sentences
an eye-narrator...poker buddies...wifes...

saturday night special
as said in other reviews, this is a part of The Shark-Infested Custard...although i haven't cracked that story open--i read it already--to check-see word-by-word comparison...although the little i looked at here--i didn't read this one here--looks familiar. it is a good story...the longer piece, of which this is a portion.

to a nephew in college
franz kafka. bone up on kafka...you will go far...or at least do better than a d-average, an indication of many friends...

i wonder what the advice would have been had the nephew stayed in florida? go gators.

checking out
a short piece, husband, wife, checking out of a hotel...they get in a tiff over a massage

one hero to a war
eye-narrator, willeford, in 1948, japan, army, and another assigned to his...unit...as his chief though fewer stripes, nelson v britten. willeford 29, britten 28...both w/war experiences the same---ww2, germany, wounded, this that the other, both re-enlisted...on the island of kyushu.

some americana/folklore from this story
"couldn't have caught a pig in a trench."

a quote from this story:
knowledge is a strange and peculiar power. it is a power even if one does not have it yet people think that one has it.
or, even a fool is considered wise if he keeps his mouth shut, as the proverb has it.

behind him goes his dream
fascinating story about mr. jordan, who comes into the bar of harry there in california...often...one drink, leaves...saturday, shows, a drink a girl shows they leave together.

comes in late one night, past 2 a.m. they talk. mr jordan tells harry about life on the bum before the war, before prosperity came back and parked its length on the continent. this story is like the polar opposite of another story...i read recently, in that other...collections of sorts. what was the name of it? don't recall the title of the story or the collection. later gator.

an actor prepares
49-yr-old dishwasher (who lost his cafe, why he is washing dishes for others)...is offered a chance to play a part in the stage production, things that go bump. jacob b sinkiewicz...jake...and that name seems familiar, like willeford used it elsewhere, but again i'd have to look-see to say one way or another. he played sir calvin wardhouse in the play...shot dead at the opener. ooga booga.

the emancipation of henry allen
staff sergeant henry allen, united states air force retired has a new poolroom in los angeles, across the street, the new york cafe where a sign hangs in the window fry coot wanted. jake rauhaus and melvin "mel" thead swing by...mel owns the southland pool hall on slauson avenue...do da, do da. 3rd-person this one


a note of meta-criticism
the reviews...all two of them?...have said that some of these probably weren't meant to see the light of day? dunno what to make of that, as all but seven of these were previously published in other things...in alfred hitchcock's mystery magazine, tropic, sports illustrated, books abroad: an international literary quarterly, savannah, florida and at least one of the two other reviews enjoyed "the pop-off caper"...one of the seven previously unpublished. what's a poor carpenter to do?

some lucky license
eye-narrator, detective sergeant william "bill" hartigan...subject of the inquiry, subject of an arbitrary number set down by the elect, a number that now must be enforced...interpreted. you got the honorable police commissioner j.d. matthews, chief garland "gar" carey...you got a lieutenant morris....you got two youthful thieves, both deceased, the brett kid, tommy brett and joseph e. craig.

the thing about this story is it reads like the headlines of today...three guys killing a guy from australia here in the states because they were bored...this that the other in that case...the zimmerman/martin episode...the three kids beating the shit out of another...all this boolsheet of the purest ray serene to-do w/bullying, but the stoopid bastards in charge of the school are too funked up on their political correctness, that they allowed this one to happen. gas em all.

heh! which in a sense, is william "trigger happy" hartigan's mind-set by story's end. one of those endings where one asks, will he? won't he? what will he do? but this is willeford, and the deadpan result seems like the only avenue open to him. hoorah. let's all gather at the white house fence and toss our brains over, wrapped in brown paper and tied with a string.

a matter of taste
mom's cafe, scene of this one, another eye-narrator story...a cook, the eye, a hook-nosed man, and a woman who looks like the queen mary.

some americana/folklore in this one
--smear mayonnaise on the bun before toasting it on the grill may it do ya and do ya well...called 'marination' by the cook. and the eye is off to the library. now we have questionable search engines and spiders watching from the ceiling. oh la.

the first five in line...
this one was the novel that willeford abandoned in 1975. an interesting take-off...these two guys communicating at times w/"cassette tape" messages...this was 1975...and they are separated by miles, but the two are involved w/the creation of a television show that will be filmed in miami..."the first five in line".

willeford uses character names from other stories...harry thead who is station manager of wooz...and he is a character in another story all i can tell you at the moment, recent read, like either this one (#18 for me), or a read 1 or 2 back...too, there's an old man in this one, name of leo zuck or leo zuckerman...and in the story, here it is, remembered the title, something about a deserted village...he is in that one, too. and yes, that is from this collection, 3rd or 5th one in.

it is curious, how polished this is, howsomeever brief it is, and does that provide an insight into willeford's writing? perhaps perhaps not.

somewhere, saw something about The Running Man...from stephen king, to-do with this story, i imagine, and yes, that seems to be the tilt of it...but i could add that in this other collection of shorts, there's one that anticipates king's One Past Midnight: The Langoliers...ooga booga. don't believe i posted something about that tidbitt in that review for fear of the dreaded spoiler....and whining whangers...

the tupperware party
some guys have a tupperware party. "winking"...they don't call it burping no more what with the advent of barry manilow's feelings...or was that alice cooper?

the gardener and the princess
and eye-narrator, miami, fernando, his marielito gardener, nuances...like wearing or not of the white socks. paul newman did it, wearing of white socks, in fort apache bronx. volvos and such.
women. names that end in "i"...like candi, fernanado's finacee.

the laughing machine
smiley mason, 3rd person, alexander "smiley" mason, working the locker scheme in new york, grand central or penn station? grand central it is. gets a laughing machine, can't unload it.

the man who loved ann landers
man writes to ann... she does not answer...he writes to her...he begins to see messages to him in her replies in her column...he acts on those messages. all is well and all manner of things are well.

the listener
heh! then again, maybe this is the story that is meant when someone something said something about reality television. "the listener" is a tv-program that gets hot for a time...a time when guns are not shown on the tube, verily, all hail the crimson king...but too, the listener smokes on television, sometimes numerous cigarettes at a time, then he uses a variety of products. heh!
then..."the talkers" get involved, a minority group. this could have been written 2013...has a snarly kind of prescience while simultaneously an amusing naivete.

everybody's metamorphosis
2nd story to do with gregor samsa...or kafka, great big bugger that he was.

sand dollar
a fernando story...miami...not late-trailer payment for fernando as he can't afford one...he sleeps in a park, other side of the wall to stay low. makes a buck. great line: his black mustache looked like a dirty word that had been crossed out. not about fernando, precious, simply a great line.

update, finished, 25 aug 13, sunday evening, 9:29 p.m. e.s.t.
what a scorcher today. and all those climate-change whankers are out and about, bells and whistles. thing is, we get hellacious winters and those fart-lickers are flown south by then.
good stories, all. some were more enlightening and baffling than the others...but i doubt we can get 9 out of 10 readers to agree about anything and that is the beauty that is story-telling. willeford has this wonderful way with words. odds are you have already read some of his more well-known stories...these are a plus, short and sweet...the business about marielitos in miami is interesting...perhaps a personal flavor. good read.