The Luna Park Gazette

My favorite Twilight Zone episode is all about a game of pool. In fact, that’s the title of the episode—“A Game of a Pool”—and it tells the story of a small time hustler who literally plays the game of his life against the ghost of the legendary Fats Brown. The episode achieves so much with just the bare essentials: two fabulous actors in the form Jack Klugman and Jonathan Winters, a great script, and a pool table. No CGI effects, no explosions, no screeching critters bursting out of people’s guts and spraying ketchup in all directions. No space ships. Just quality. I’ve been thinking more about that episode recently because I played pool the other night for the first time in nearly a year. Pool is like a lot of things in my life: I tell myself this is fun, I should do this more often and then…I don’t. On its own, pool is such a great game. It has been associated with all sorts of vile behavior, thanks, in part, to the movies-- The Hustler, The Color of Money ; I love those flicks--w...

"Fear is that little darkroom where negatives are developed." ---Michael Pritchard Franklin Roosevelt said the only thing we have to fear is fear itself, but he never rode the R train. However, I do, and I got a lesson in fear and paranoia on Thursday while taking that very train into Manhattan. There I was reading my paper when I happened to look up just as we were pulling out of DeKalb Avenue and saw a Muslim man sitting directly across from me. He had a full-beard, a skullcap, and was clutching a backpack in his arms the way a mother cradles a baby. So what? The man has much right to ride on the subway as I do. Yeah, he looks different than most people I know, but not really. My neighborhood of Bay Ridge is well on its way to becoming a Muslim community. I see bearded men with skullcaps nearly every day when I go shopping. I usually walk by the mosque on 68th Street, where these guys are praying all the time. Why freak out when I ...

"The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong." -- Mahatma Gandhi I once saw a Dennis the Menace cartoon where our young hero is clobbering some kid right in front of a shocked minister. "I know vengeance is the Lord's," Dennis is telling the astounded parson, "I'm just helping Him out." I know how Dennis feels. I want to do the right thing, walk the straight and narrow, but I'd also like to lay down the smack on many of mine enemies. God's work is my own, right? I keep talking about putting the past behind, forgetting the dirtbags who screwed me over, and getting on with my life. But that forgetting part hasn't been working so well and I suspect that this is because I'm not really forgiving any of these mutts. (The word "mutts" is a big tip-off, isn't it?) I was in church recently-- really --when the subject of forgiveness came up during the sermon. The gospel for that day was from Matthew, ...

It seems we stood and talked like this before. We looked at each other in the same way then... But I can't remember where or when... Some things that happened for the first time seem to be happening again... And so it seems that we have met before, and laughed before, and loved before... but who knows where or when...? Had enough? Click here...

I might have forgotten that today was Valentine's Day if I hadn't gotten on the subway this afternoon. I had sent out the cards to the women in my life, like my aunt, my sister, my nieces--and I heard all the love songs and love-themed programs on WNYC. Now that I'm out of work, I listen to the radio all day long. But the day really didn't register with me until around 4 pm when I got on the train to go to Manhattan. I saw a young couple on the Bay Ridge R station and the girl was holding on to a huge bouquet of roses. Oh, yeah , I thought. I've got to put up with this crap today. Notice how I take random incidents personally. I don't want to sound bitter or anything, but how come I have to lose my job while that little winged putz Cupid gets to fly around shooting love-sick idiots in the keester and pissing off people like me? Why doesn't somebody give that arrow-slinging monkey his walking papers? I'd love to run into his scrawny ass on the unemploymen...

Roy Scheider Nov. 10, 1932 to Feb. 10, 2008 I was so sad when I heard that Roy Scheider died. He was such a tremendous actor, a guy who came off as real, even if the particular film he was appearing in wasn't that good. I remember seeing him in The French Connection , where he had the unenviable task of playing Gene Hackman's partner. I think a lot of other actors would have been overwhelmed by Hackman's blowout performance as Popeye Doyle, but Scheider held his own. He went on to star in several films, including Jaws , of course, All That Jazz , and Blue Thunder . He also did a flick called The Seven-Ups , which I didn't like too much when I first saw it in the theater. However, I saw the movie again a few years after that on television and I enjoyed it a lot more. It's been a while, but as I recall it was a very gritty cop movie that took place in all these grungy locations in the outer boroughs--the kinds of places where you really believe that bad people would g...

" Of all the gin joints in all the towns in all the world, she walks into mine. "--Humphrey Bogart Bogey sure knew what he was talking about. I was sitting in the office of a Wall Street-area company today waiting to go into a job interview. I felt tired, still cold from the brutally frigid temperatures that have descended upon this city, and a little edgy. It's been a while since I've on an interview and I felt nervous. I was filling out the application form--something I truly hate, as I have to cram my entire work history into tiny little boxes. Isn't that what resumes are for? I had to wait for another applicant to finish her interview, which rubbed me the wrong way. I know I'm not the only person who answered the ad, but when I walk into a company, I like to pretend they're not seeing anyone but me, that I'm the only person they'd even consider hiring. What can I say? I want to be loved. When I know someone else is ahead of me, I feel like I...

I went to the monthly Brooklyn Blogade yesterday and had a great time. This is a group of really cool Brooklyn bloggers who get together, eat, shoot the breeze and exchange fabulous ideas. I was tempted to stay home because I was still getting over my cold, but I didn't want to lay around the house by myself all day. The event was hosted by Eleanor Traubman and Mike Sorgatz of Creative Times and they did a terrific job. We met at Faan Restaurant, a really nice Asian fusion place on Smith Street. I had forgotten that I had eaten there several times in the past and, upon seeing the name, assumed that this was an Irish place with some Celtic moniker. You know what happens when you assume, right? Good, then I won't repeat that cheesy old chestnut. I had left the address home--yep, yet again--and I was wandering down Smith Street, looking up at all the signs until my fellow blogger Chris of Flatbush Gardener flagged me down and pointed me in the right direction. Now it's time ...

Is there any way we could make February even shorter? I have always hated this second month of the year and nothing in the 2008 version has happened to change my opinion, what with being sick and unemployed. And there really seems to be something going around. In the last week alone, America has been hit with tornadoes, a factory explosion, and a series of multiple fatal shootings that must have the staunchest NRA members diving under their couches--until it's safe to come out, of course. Just google "shooting" and then stand back as a tidal wave of news stories, blog postings and other such material will burst out of your monitor. Here are some of the week's greatest hits...you should pardon the expression: Los Angles, CA: a man killed his father, two brothers and a highly respected police officer before being killed by an LAPD sniper. Kirkwood, MO: a gunman invades city hall and shoots five city officials dead and injures two others, including the ma...

A guy came out of my neighbor's house a little while ago with a bottle of beer in his hand and stood in the middle of the street. "Giants!" he shouted to the dark houses. " Whooo! " And who could argue with that? The New York Giants, who actually play in New Jersey, had just beaten the heavily favored New England Patriots in a nail-biter of a game that went down to the last 10 seconds. Just a few minutes ago, a car came down the block with its horn blaring, the occupants clearly celebrating a Giants' victory. I guess tomorrow we'll see stories in the newspaper about rowdy fans being arrested for celebrating a little too much. Outside of mixed martial arts, I'm not much of a sports fan, but I always cheer for the New York teams, so I'm feeling pretty good--even though I'm sick as a dog with a godawful cold. I hated football when I was growing up. It seemed that's all the kids at school would talk about, while I preferred to ta...

I was working on the computer the other night when someone knocked on my side door. It was dark, I'm alone here in this big old house and people who have legitimate business normally come to the front door in the day time instead of sneaking up the alley after sundown. I grew up on a steady diet of horror movies and these are all the right elements for a gruesome killing. But it was only my next door neighbor stopping by to tell me there was a light on in our upstairs apartment. The apartment has been empty for nearly a year after the last tenants skipped out on us and we had a work crew go up there last week to clean out all of their crap. The debris included toys, clothes, fireworks and what looked like crack spoons--no wonder they couldn't pay the rent. The crew did a great job of getting the junk together and hauling most of it away. However, they apparently left the kitchen light on and it had been burning bright for the last two days. I thanked my neighbor and went upstai...