washington with crows

van gogh

language alert

wow
fucking wow

van gogh is a nut
he might be the most talented nut ever

to honor him
merging his genius
and my non genius
i reject punctuation

the reason for our trip

dont think im in the arts and croissant crowd that rush hates
the rape at red sage is proof of that
but van gogh jimmy page and bono are the only artists
whos work ill cross the street to enjoy

oh sure theres some loser half talents but who cares

try to understand mrs bartcop and i have paid thousands to see a concert
several times thanks to ADM the crooked bastards but ill pay 100 dollars
to get away from a bad band  art is the same way

vincent van gogh

the whole van gogh exhibition was very very very very well done
almost as well done as that goddamn sixty dollar cowboy steak at red sage

the exhibit had 80 paintings
twenty werent my favorites
and thirty were very good
but those last thirty were fucking monsters
fucking monsters i tell you

van gogh was starting the most productive run in art history
he was reaching his zenith
he was in the air

perhaps my 25 year relationship with the architect with the art collection
created an island of refinement in the brought up catholic street smart bartcop
or maybe its just my passion for rock music that created the bridge

van goghs early works were nothing to write home about
these were his she loves you and i wanna hold your hand paintings
nice enough but hardly ground breaking
some people think potatoe eaters is van goghs best
ha ha phillistines

its not

its a simple painting an early dark painting with almost
cartoon faces done before he had a chance to expand
his style was similar to rl lnw vols 1-40

later after he moved to southern france vincent began the bad
habits of eating gobs of leaded paint and drinking absinthe
he was getting into his sgt peppers white album phase
this was like nothing the world has ever seen before or since

pure emotion the edge of sanity pushed his brush
vincent van gogh was on the most emotionally destructive downward spiral
the mind could never imagine and he had the talent to record his descent on canvas

several paintings a day
his last 30 works caught the genius at his peak

choke

get a drink

after we had seen his lesser work we knew what was coming
wed been promised the real actual van gogh mona lisa
i was ahead of the group and I turned the corner
there it was

wheatfield with crows

its got to be the greatest painting ever
i was so overcome with emotion
i stood there staring right at it
son of a bitch
look at it

van gogh was talking to ol bartcop

for reasons i cant explain tears were running down my face
im not saying that jpeg should move you like it did me
but that painting is like nothing ive ever seen before

the paintings texture was so earthy and course
van gogh used massive amounts of paint gobs which further
demonstrated his lack of convention his disregard for the status quo

ive never been emotionally moved by a painting before
ive been moved by music hundreds thousands of times
but never by a 120 year old painting

i was 6 feet from wheatfield with crows and i was overcome
rivers running out of my eyes it was so cool
mrs bartcop eventually drew up beside me and noticed my condition
to her credit she didn't yell whats wrong she quietly understood
she stepped back and allowed my emotions to run
she gives me freedom mrs bartcop is a national treasure
if i ever win an award im not going to prattle on about my agent and my lawyers
and the suits back at the studio im going to thank mrs bartcop for everything
nobody else means anything just mrs bartcop

meanwhile more tears from the crustmeister
amazing maybe it was constitutional residue but i dont think so
four years after seeing wheatfield with crows
i can still feel it

a goddamn painting stuck in your head like a pop song
thats never happened before and im old
you know how often i say i wish i was a better writer
so I could better convey what im thinking
this is another one of those times

van gogh painted what he saw with his brain not what he saw with his eyes
i confess id like to spend an afternoon with alone with wheatfield
id like to stare at that emotion for a half day

isnt it odd that a dutchie in france in 1885 could put oil to canvas and convey
such strong emotions to an add liberal with an iq of 64 in america 113 years later
what are the odds similarly a guy like jimmy page or the edge vibrating the strings
of a guitar provoking such strong emotions to unknown people to hear years later
this whole art emotion thing can move mountains

when van gogh saw death flying at him from the wheatfield
he described the terror of the crows coming to tear his eyes out
it was the last thing hed ever paint

he painted emotion show me another painting like this

oh sure he painted some after the crows took his eyes
but the colors just didnt conflict like the old van gogh

...blinking back
 

scalpers had tickets
they were cheap
shit a hundred dollars was cheap for this

i hope you had a chance to see it

ill remember that painting in my final days at the venetian in las vegas.
ill be on that barstool at the tequila bar, staring at wheatfield with crows

=============

Coming back from the Van Gogh exhibit, I passed through the Air and Space Museum.
Been there, done that, but it was nice to see John Glenn's original "Friendship 7" spacecraft.
It must've taken a lot of courage to crawl in that 9-ft bathtub and be blasted into the unknowns of space,
taking us closer to the future. It took balls.

Rush hates John Glenn.
Hey, fuck the Pigboy and his Nazi hate.

It took balls to fly EIGHTY combat missions over Korea.
Biography said Glenn got three Migs on his very last mission.
This man is a hero, and I don't care WHAT that Nazi Limba says.
Rush spent Friday talking about what a sham and a dog Glenn was.
Oh, yeah?  Hey, suck me, Pigboy.

Glenn flew 80 combat missions, and he's a fraud?
While Pigboy gets on the radio and sells his hate by the Ryder-truckload.

Who's the hero, Rush?

Rush also said that Clinton was a fake for watching the launch
since he cut Nasa's spending 3 years in a row.

So now, Clinton is in trouble for spending less money on federal programs?
Hard to beat sheep-logic like that.

...ignorant bastard.

America disagrees with you, Rush.
America has a hero on their hands,

...and he's a Democrat, Pigboy.

He lifted off the same day I saw his first rocket.
With a tear in my eye, I touched Glenn's original Friendship Seven capsule
and I said out loud, "Koresh-speed, John Glenn."

---

The next day, our friend wanted to see the architecture at the National Catherdral.
I made a joke that if they didn't let us in, I'd give 'em a little Latin to prove we were regulars.

Lo and behold, as we approached this magnificent cathedral,
I began speaking in Latin again, against my will.
It may've been another miracle.

So, we get to the front door and we see a party going on.
There were bottles and bottles of white wine, some cheese and crackers and LOTS of glasses.
A full-blown Catholic party with plenty of alcohol.

We walked in and were immediately accosted my a well-dressed church lady holding a large glass of wine.

"Can I help you?" she asked.

I figured she was drunk, so we tried to walk past her.
"Excuuuuse me, ...what do you want?" she demanded.

I tried to tell her that we wanted to see the church,
but she couldn't understand me because I was speaking Latin.

She never learned Latin because she wasn't an altarboy.  You see, ...she was born with a uterus,
and we can't have ANY OF THAT near the altar or in any position of responsibility.

"You can't come in here," she kept repeating.
I checked to see if I was wearing my "BartCop" cap.
I wasn't.

Figures.

First time I voluntarily step into a church in 25 years and a drunken church lady tells me I don't belong.

Eventually, we wore her down and she said,
"Well, you can look for a second,
 BUT THEN YOU HAVE TO LEAVE."

Catholics.
Just try to figure them out.
Go ahead.

Apparently she was too drunk to remember we were there,
so we stayed a while and took pictures and videotape.

I'd like to say one thing...
If you're looking for some nice stained glass, there's Catholic and there's everybody else.
This church is beautiful.
I guess Catholics had the good sense to let gay people design their churches.
 

Driving home from the Cathedral, I made a mistake.
We were trying to see the White House at night.
(We were unsuccessful.)

Driving near the White House, something caught my eye:
I saw the "National Press Liquor Store."

I thought I might run into some partisan/whore/hack trying to get a whiskey fix,
maybe catch Judas Maximus buying a bottle of fortified wine to crawl into,
or Sam Donaldson trying to lose himself in some gin, so we stopped there.

Just to say I bought something, I got some Wild Turkey 100.    Usually Ol Bart stays with
the 80 proof, but the turkey picture is better on the 100, and we were on vacation...

...It was a big mistake.

---

Here it is, ...Wednesday morning.
TICKETS to the White House tour.

...but why is that alarm so goddamn loud?
...why is that light so painful to my eyes?

I can't see very well, my coordination is bad
and I'm having trouble speaking coherently.
That, and the drum solo in my head tell me something's wrong.
(I should've been a detective.)

It would appear that my miscalculation concerning the difference in the effect of the 80 proof liquor
versus the effect of the 100 proof liguor may have resulted in a non-requested 25% increase in the
amount of alcohol consumed, and that's assuming I consumed the amount of alcohol I intended to consume.

In English, I never have a hangover when I drink.
This was new territory for me.

With Mrs. BartCop's help, I was on my way to the White House and, at this point,
I was in such a shape that I could've lost a debate with a ditto-monkey.

Nahh...
That's a lie.

Thank Koresh, a cab took us to the White House.
Cheeses, it's a good think you don't have to blow through a straw to get in the White House.
If you did, America's future might be quite different,

...and I'm talking about YOU, Milhouse!

Anyway, I'm being pulled through the White House tour.
BartCop, ...hungover like Bob Dornan after election day.

Don't think I'm proud of this.
I don't recommend that you get drunker than Cooter Brown before you take the tour.
It's the truth, so I wrote it down.

So I'm in the White House, doing my best to focus, and I see a photograph
on the wall of whatever White House room we were in, and the photo said,
"the Cassius M. Clay Battalion with ABE LINCOLN!"

GO BOYS!

No wonder they shot Lincoln.
He was seen in the company of negroes.
Later, Mrs. BartCop confirmed the photograph's existence.
(New RL-LNW subscribers: Lincoln was the last good Republican.)

Then, to my right, I saw another White House photograph.
It was a small photo of Ross Perot, feeding squirrels.
Swear to Koresh, Mrs. BartCop confirms this, too.

This is where is got really cool.
Let me preface this by saying the day before we took the White House tour, I watched
"Beavis and Butthead Do America" on the same system that offered us "Pam and Tommy."

In the movie, both Beavis and Butthead wandered around, alone, in the White House.
I thought, "how absurd."

Here I was, hours later, wondering around ALONE in the White House.
The Secret Cervix dude giving us our tour was "inattentive."
I stayed behind in the East Room while the tour went on,
planting  bartcop.com  cards everywhere.

In every vase, behind every lamp, on table tops and mantles.
When the group was in the Blue Room, I was busy seeding the East Room.
When they went to the Red Room, I was seeding the Blue Room, then the Yellow Room, then the Green Room.
It stuck me like the lightning that kicked Saul's ass.

BartCop - alone in the Green Room of White House.

I stopped, (holding on to something to steady myself) and found a window chair and sat down.
I looked south, I guess, and saw a lush, green lawn, white granite sentinels, a blue sky as a
backdrop against the Jefferson memorial, and the Washington Monument at the end of my gaze.
It was cool.
I could live here for eight years.

BartCop - alone in the Green Room of White House.

So, I'm sitting alone in the Green Room, hoping my stomach would hold on.
They said Thomas Jefferson hosted many a dinner in this very room.
Perhaps they discussed the Louisiana Purchase here, over dinner.
Perhaps they debated the soul of the Constitution, IN this very goddamn room!
I sat alone in this room, my head throbbing like I was at a Metallica concert.

BartCop, alone with history!
I looked at each chair set at the long, wooden table,
imagining the historical importance of a simple dining room set.

I noticed the paintings.
Now that I'm an art critic, I assessed the room's contributions.
I was enjoying myself, having the BEST time one can
possibly have while being severely drunk and hungover.

(Again, don't go saying I'm glorifying alcohol abuse.
 I've always made it a point NOT to drink and drive,
 which has been corrobborated in previous testimony.
 We were on vacation, I WANTED to see the White House,
 but ...this was 100 proof I was battling,
 ...plus the altitude in Washington can play tricks...)

I was in no shape to ask our tour guide questions, like I did at Monticello and Mt Vernon,
but I was capable of seeding the White House with enough anti-fascist positivity
to get Clinton through the next seven Presidential crisisi.

I'm furiously writing my LNW Journal For History when..

Uh-Oh,
I got caught.
I hear a voice:

"Are you OK?"

It was a Secret Service Agent, concerned about my health.

"Are you OK?" he asked again.

"Yeah, Cubby. I'm fine," was the best I could do.

"I'm going to have to ask you to rejoin your group," he barked.

"Don't arrest me, Cubby..."

He let me go, and again I avoided the plunger, and I rejoined my group.
As we were leaving, I approached our Secret Service Tour Guide and
offered him a  bartcop.com  card. He was startled.  He looked at the card,
then looked at me and said, "THANK YOU!"  like he'd just won some damn prize.

We also did the Library of Congress and the Train Station.

--------

Bored with Washington, we headed back to Baltimore.
What's in Baltimore?

First thing that popped into my head was that "Homicide,"
the best show on TV, shoots their show there.

Their season-ending arc about Luther Mahoney was way too good for television.
I've never seen a group of actors work so well together with great writing and direction.
The story lasted for months, and it was truly riviting.
Catch the reruns on Lifetime.

When Reed Diamond asked Clark Johnson for his gun and a few minutes to
be alone so he could kill himself, it was a magic moment for TV.

"I can't do that, Mikey," Meldrick said to his partner.
With those few words, there was a tidal wave of drama.

...and we were going to try to meet these guys!

We drove into town and asked somebody where the building is
that they use as the Homicide HQ. They said "Fell's Point."
We drove over there in our gay Town car and found the building on Thames Street.

Now, across the street from the precinct is the Waterfront Bar,
which is owned by three detectives on the show,  Munch, Meldrick and Bayliss,
played by Richard Belzer, Clark Johnson and Kyle Secor.

We walked in the bar and were surprised it's the same bar they use on the show.
The only thing they change was the pictures of the real owner, Chet, hugging the stars of the show.

We had a few drinks and some food. I had a burger, Mrs. BartCop had crabcakes. There's some law
in Baltimore that at least one person must have crabcakes or it's some kind of a misdemeanor.

As I did everywhere we went, I placed a few BartCop cards around the bar. The owner, Chet,
picked one up and started talking to us. Chet's one of those longtime bar owners (20 years) who
knows how to bullshit with anybody. He started asking about BartCop.

I told Chet I was going to put him and his bar on the Internet.
He looked at Mrs. BartCop and said, "Is he kidding?"

Look, Chet!
You made it on the Internet.
(Poor Chet lost the bar later that year - sorry, Dude!)

Funny, a guy who'd served drinks to Belzer, Ned Beatty, Yaphet Kotto, Robin Williams,
Andre Braugher (Emmy winner) one of those Baldwin brothers (who can keep 'em straight?)
Berry Levinson etc etc would be impressed if BartCop mentioned him in his newsletter?

He asked what the newsletter was about - I told him. He said he liked Rush Limba,
and thought that Bill Clinton was the REAL bag of gas. I gotta give Chet credit - it's not often
that somebody looks me in the eye and tells the truth about what their politics are.
Chet was a good guy, so I didn't tear him up.
Besides, people aren't SUPPOSED to agree with me.
What fun would that be?

So, now we went looking for autographs.
I've been a fan of Belzer's for over twenty years.
(Belzer, you're old!)

I also wanted to meet Yaphet Kotto.
He's one of the best actors in the world.
You can find someone who can act as well as Yaphet Kotto,
but you can't find anybody who can act better.

All of the people on Homicide are excellent.
Clark Johnson, who plays Meldrick, should get his own show.
As good as all the others are, Meldrick is the one who I'd
most like to see spin-off into his own series.

Wake up, NBC!

So, we walked in the front door of the "precinct" set.  It was deserted, mostly, but there were
cop cars and TV trucks and "stuff" all over,  so we knew they were nearby. Finally, I ran into
some dude pushing a cart who told me they were shooting at "the morgue," one block over.

We went over there and sat at an outdoor table of a little cafe
and watched the director, who was NOT watching anything, direct the show.

At seemed strange that this guy with headphones and a mic would bark "Cut" and "cameras UP!"
when he wasn't looking at anything  but the harbor. Maybe somebody from Homicide will write back
and explain how a guy can direct a scene when he's not watching it happen.

We saw Kyle Secor and Callie Thorne exit the "morgue," along with the "murder victim."
When they left, we went inside the morgue and looked around.
Yep, that was the "Homicide" morgue, all right.

We followed the gang back to the coffee room. Out of respect, we didn't go inside this time.
We just waited outside like lost puppies hoping we'd get an autograph.

We stopped a crew member or two and asked questions.
"Would it be possible to get an autograph from Mr. Belzer or Mr. Kotto," I asked.

It was so funny.

We asked three people, and they all said the same thing.
"Belzer in in Washington doing the Richard Pryor tribute.  ...and  ...uhmmm  ....you might be
....uhmmm   ...careful  ....about  ...uhmmm   ...the way you approach Mr. Kotto..."

Cool!

Seems as though Kotto is a bear in real life.
It seems Mr. Kotto appreciates his privacy.
I told them I'd love to hear him bellow "Get out of my damn way"  if we asked him for an autograph,
Shit, that'd be BETTER than the autograph.    I'd remember that forever.

Clark Johnson walked from one door to another, but I wasn't able to catch him, damn.
I waited closer to the door. Kyle Secor walked by so I asked him for his autograph.
He was nice.He seemed a LOT like his character. He asked us about Oklahoma
and spent more time with us than he needed to.       Kyle, you're OK.

I spoke with a few other crew members, and they were all very nice.
One lady named "Mother" said she'd put my BartCop card on the
bulletin board, saying the cast & crew enjoyed a good laugh.

I asked another crew member if he had any souveniers for us and
he gave us Mr. Kotto's home address and phone number.

(Just kidding, Yaphet.)

Another crew member gave us a "call sheet" as a souvenier.
This is a list of who's-supposed-to-be-where. It listed this episode as "Do or Die," and they
called it "a mini-movie." Maybe they call all of them that, or maybe this is some sweeps stunt.
It's about a woman who's picture was in the paper twice in one day:
Her wedding annoucement, and her obituary.

It was a lot of fun meeting some the cast and crew and watching them shoot a few seens.
They went on location in NW Baltimore to shoot scenes of the dead girl's house.
That same director guy stood OUTSIDE the house yelling "cut" and "Quiet, everybody."

After waiting a couple of hours, it looked like we weren't going to see Belzer of Kotto,
and we did get to meet a couple of cast members, so we were happy.
We started back towards the hotel and guess what?   As we were leaving,
we had to make a left and there's Yaphet Kotto, behind the wheel of a green Suburban.

We were inadvertantly blocking his way. I waved to him, and he growled and stomped the
gas pedal and tore off down the street.  I got to see his temper, after all.  Cool.

So, we went back to the hotel and watched that night's episode of Homicide.
Sure enough, they had a scene in Chet's Bar.

Maybe we'll hear from somebody on the Homicide crew.

(Dumbass, it took you so lomng to write this story there IS no more Homicide.)

--------

That Homicide detour was a real highlight.
Before West Wing and The Sopranos, it was the best damn show on telvision.

Well, that's my trip report from Washington DC in October 1998
In less than 30 days there will be another trip report to write.
Let's hope I get it posted in less than four years.