Stephen Quint and the ZOMBIE MIKADO

I never drink... wine.

Can you imagine this face coming out of the dark and leering at you as you lay there powerless? Halloween is in a couple of days and Lucy is going dressed as Sleeping Beauty. But don't get near this sleeping beauty if you find her in repose, especially around sunset. At least not without a wreath of garlic and a crucifix, or maybe a Star of David, I'm not really sure how it works for Jewish vampires. Look at those friggin' fangs! We have to avert our eyes from it every day! And they're no special effect. Those are baby teeth being pushed out by new ones, and in serious need of more wiggling than she's willing to put in.

Usually, on the Saturday preceding Halloween, the whole family goes to a fantastic, elaborate Halloween party at the house of our friends Paul and Sarah. Unfortunately, this year I'll be putting on the Major-General costume and doing another NYGASP Pirates of Penzance at the Schubert in New Haven, a stage once trod by Mary Martin, Zero Mostel, Richard Burton AND THE REST in out of town tryouts. But the womenfolk will be going to the party. Lucy as Sleeping Beauty, Maggie as a scarecrow, and Val as the hottest mama in the building, as usual.

Last year, at this party, I was recruited to take part in the haunted house section (huge basement). Among the many other horrors was a dimly lit cobwebby coffin in a confined cubicle. My gig was as follows: I put on pasty, dead makeup and lay in the coffin. Whenever someone came into the room I held my breath and did my best to look fake, then just as the visitor was looking away I'd move my head to face them, or groan. It's not often in my business that I get screams! But the reaction that made the greatest impression on me was one little girl who came in alone. She stared at me for a minute, I turned and looked at her, she turned right around and silenty walked out of the room the way she'd come. If she had any interest in continuing to the apple bobbing or the bowl of cold spaghetti it was abruptly reconsidered.

I'm thinking that maybe if we don't let Lucy brush her teeth after trick or treating those fangs will dissolve when the sun comes up.

why do you think you are nuts?

Turn up yer volume.

Does ALAN HILL Rule, Or What?

Yet another ALAN HILL SHOCKER!!! The famous NYGASP performer, widely known as the "World's Oldest Chorus Boy," has done it again. In his never ending battle against status quo complacency, the feisty grandfather has stunned the operetta world by beginning the lengthy, painful acquisition of extensive tattoos, starting with his head!

Alan's admirers have long smiled and nodded indulgently at the garish "EXITS" and "ONLY" tattoos on his left and right buttocks and wondered what was next. For the twenty years I've known him ALAN HILL has spoken wistfully about various kinds of minor cosmetic surgery, but as the years have passed the surgery in question has become increasingly major and distasteful. Instead of "correcting" his body issues Alan has embraced them, decorated them, made them unmissable.

But this tattooing of the head has impressed even me and Eva, long time believers that ALAN HILL can do no wrong. Or he could do wrong if he felt like it, but it's just not worth it at his age. I always thought, though, that if he got his head tattooed it would be with Japanese features, so he would never again have to put on that God damn Mikado makeup. With his new look he'll have to wear more makeup than ever. BUT YOU'LL KNOW, gentle Zombie Mikado readers (your average daily visits are now below 16, thank you so much), what perversity lies below that Jap, or pirate, or sailor makeup, and maybe you'll never look at a later-middle-aged, sweet, gentle, dirty old man again the same way.

I won't even mention about the piercings!

ALAN HILL . . .