Rich Man, Poe Man.
This is the time of year when I pull out my copy of The Complete Tales of Edgar Allan Poe and peruse some old favorites. What’s your favorite Poe tale?
Here’s mine.
This is the time of year when I pull out my copy of The Complete Tales of Edgar Allan Poe and peruse some old favorites. What’s your favorite Poe tale?
Here’s mine.
That in cross-ways and floods have burial…
A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Act III, Sc.2
The Greyhound bus was packed. This was unusual, especially for the late run that left the station at 10pm. I’d been close to the front of the line so I’d snagged a window seat, which I preferred, but I was also close to the driver so I could also see out the front window. I wasn’t paying attention to the bus filling up until a man spoke to me.
“Is this seat taken?”
He wore a tweed jacket, a purple shirt, jeans, and a badly beaten leather hat with a large feather sticking out of it. He also had on dark glasses. A long gray beard trailed down, almost obscuring his bolo tie.
I said no and he sat down.
“I didn’t think it was taken but I asked anyway out of courtesy. Courtesy matters, especially to me. I’m an old hippie.”
He held out his hand and I shook it, wondering if I’d misheard that last part. Maybe “Old Hippie” was his name.
We chatted a little bit and then both got quiet. I read and he put his head back. I assumed he was asleep until I heard him say something.
“What was that?” I asked.
“We passed through a haint,” he said. “In the road. “At night whenever you pass through a foggy patch in the road that’s a haint and you should say the words to protect yourself:
Stay away, haint, stay away haint,
Your soul is damned but mine ain’t.”
I thought he was kidding but he looked so serious I didn’t question it. I watched the road ahead. There are many low places where small patches of fog collect on cool, humid nights. The next time we passed through one I repeated the words with him. If nothing else I thought it would be courteous to do so.
I’m an old skeptic now but whenever I’m driving through the night and pass through a patch of fog I still repeat those words.
Stay away, haint, stay away haint,
Your soul is damned but mine ain’t.
Technically this isn’t graffiti. In fact it’s not even art, although as Gilly Maddison has pointed out the question, What is art? is a thorny one that’s occupied artists and philosophers since at least the early 20th century although the term “art” could be applied to almost anything. How do you sort out what’s art and what isn’t? Well, there’s an art to it…
Anyway, what you see here is a trick of the light. The sun hit this car just right so it produced a projection that looks like—well, what does it look like to you? Remember that this is entirely subjective and a matter of opinion but if you said anything other than a skull then you’re wrong.
Skulls have been a popular subject in art possibly as long as there has been art. The iconography of skulls is wide and varied although they usually represent death. Death has also long been a popular subject in art. As Spinal Tap’s manager Ian Faith said, “Death sells!” Death also smells which makes it even more baffling than Smell The Glove’s sales stank in spite of the all-black cover but that’s another story.
If you don’t see a skull please share what you think you see in the comments below. And if you do see a skull maybe it’s because it’s that time of year. October is the month of Halloween, a celebration that, even in some early pagan traditions, was considered a time when the division between the living and the dead was narrowed. It was, and still is, a time of transition. In the northern hemisphere it’s autumn, the time of harvest and the beginning of hibernation, a time of death.
So if you see death in that picture that’s understandable because this is a time of year when death is on many peoples’ minds. The disturbing thing is I took the picture in April. Why death was on my mind in the spring is, to paraphrase something said by Spinal Tap’s Nigel Tufnel, a mystery best left unsolved.
True Stories Behind Common Urban Legends
The Legend: The Vanishing Hitchhiker
A driver picks up a young woman hitchhiking. The driver takes her to the address she’s given but finds on arrival that she’s disappeared. The driver goes to the house, knocks on the door, and is informed that a young woman of that name and description died. There are many variations with the time of the young woman’s death ranging from one year to twenty years earlier.
The Truth
Magician’s assistant Beatrice Weir (September 5, 1897-June 30th, 1987) was an accomplished escape artist and magician in her own right. Frustrated in her efforts to gain recognition in a the male-dominated field she attempted to generate publicity for her performances by playing “The Vanishing Hitchhiker” trick on unsuspecting motorists, leaving her card behind. Her efforts were unsuccessful and caused more confusion and concern than positive publicity. She would eventually quit magic to pursue a career as a corporate accountant. In her later years she retired to Uruguay after embezzling more than three quarters of a million dollars from several companies. Described in her will as her “best disappearing act” the money has never been recovered.
The Legend: The Killer In The Backseat
A young woman pulls into a gas station. After she’s fueled her car the attendant calls her into the station, claiming a problem with her credit card or other concern. In earlier versions he claims to have noticed something wrong with her car or that she’s handed him a counterfeit twenty. In many variants she finds something about the attendant disturbing and is afraid to be alone with him. Once inside the station he informs her he’s called the police because there’s a stranger in her backseat. The attendant either noticed the stranger slip into the vehicle or saw him while filling the gas tank. Either way tragedy is averted.
The Truth
Journalist Eunice Phelan dropped her car at a service station for an oil change. She picked it up later in the same day and noticed one of the technicians asleep in the backseat. She would turn the incident into her first crime novel, Trunk Show, published in 1977. The novel follows police efforts to find a killer who selects victims by hiding in the back seats of cars. Although fiction in second and third hand retellings people began claiming the event had actually happened to an acquaintance.
The Legend: Alligators In The Sewers
New Yorkers returning from Florida vacations with baby alligators find the pets too much to handle and flush them down the toilet. The alligators then grow to adulthood and infest the sewers.
The Truth
In late March 1957 a handful of New York City Sanitation Department employees “borrowed” three adult alligators from the Bronx Zoo for a planned April Fools’ joke. The reptiles escaped and spread quickly, feeding on rats, stray cats and dogs, and, in a tragic incident, several Rotary Club members. The alligators proved difficult to eradicate. Animal control employees conducted semi-annual sweeps over several decades. Officials are currently happy to report that an alligator has not been seen in New York City sewers since 2013.
The Legend: The Babysitter Cooks The Baby
Frustrated or intoxicated a babysitter puts the baby in the oven and cooks it. In later versions the baby is cooked in a microwave. When the parents come home the babysitter presents them with “a special dish”.
The Truth
Jonathan Swift’s “A Modest Proposal” was intended as satire but taken seriously by some English landholders. Chester Easham, Seventh Earl of Wessex, reportedly ate more than twenty children alone. Some were mere newborns but Easham is said to have preferred them “on puberty’s eve”. Fearing a backlash King George II had a story planted in The Times of Dublin that placed the blame on incompetent maids and greedy scullery maids.
The Legend: Black Market Organ Harvest
A young man traveling alone joins a group of strangers at a club. They drink and party late into the night. At some point he is drugged and has no memory of anything until the next morning when he awakes in a bathtub filled with ice. A note informs him both his kidneys have been removed. In some versions a phone is placed within his reach so he can call the police. The thieves are never caught and his kidneys presumably go to wealthy individuals in need of a donor.
The Truth
In 1986 Heaverton University student David Kimson wanted to donate one of his kidneys to his girlfriend. Concerned about the cost he convinced friend and pre-med student Kevin Jenkins to put together a rudimentary operating room in a hotel bathroom and perform the surgery there. In spite of flunking his classes and planning to drop out Jenkins agreed to perform the surgery. Unfortunately instead of a kidney Jenkins removed his friend’s prostate. Kimson refused to press charges when police, alerted by a hotel maid, found him attempting to relieve his agony by squatting in the ice-filled bathtub in his room. Why he wanted to donate a kidney to his girlfriend remains unclear since she only had a yeast infection.
Kevin Jenkins has since kept a low profile. He resides in Titusville, Florida, where in 2004 was named Best Substitute Chemistry Teacher.
It’s that time of year and also time for another quiz. Halloween is the season of monsters and death and ghosts and skeletons and demons and scary clowns and also the only time I can get the Monster Cereals, all of which makes it my favorite holiday. The candy is just, er, the icing on the cake. And the cake filled with blood and entrails and releases bats and ravens and tarantulas and hideous creatures from another planet when you cut into it, but that’s another story.
For this particular quiz I reached into the darkest, deepest, most horrifying recesses of my subconscious–in other words to my childhood.
Pop Quiz: Horror Film Or Children’s Game?
As a teenager with my first computer I played a lot of text-based games. They’ve stuck in my memory, maybe because I spent entirely too much time on them. The three main ones were Colossal Cave Adventure, Planetfall, and The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy. The Hitchhiker’s game, like the novel, was written by the late great Douglas Adams, and was extremely difficult, even for fans of the books. The most seemingly inconsequential actions at the beginning of the game, such as feeding a cheese sandwich to a small dog, could have consequences much later in the game. That small things can have a large impact and you should never pass up the chance to do something nice are, I think, two major tenets of Douglas Adams’ philosophy. Colossal Cave Adventure was an open-ended fantasy treasure hunt that I never really got into. Planetfall was the one I spent the most time on. For some reason its plot of saving a lonely castaway on a distant planet appealed to me. And I was thrilled to learn the robot Floyd–spoiler alert–has to die as part of the game’s solution and will never again ask if you want to play Hucka-Bucka-Beanstalk but that’s another story.
It occurred to me while riding home one day that public transportation would make a pretty good text-based game in itself. I don’t have the computer skills to write a game but I thought it would make a funny story. So I’m foisting it on you, the patient, intelligent, thoughtful people who drop in here regularly. Even if you’ve never played any of the games I’ve mentioned you might recognize a few details.
You are standing on a desolate area of sidewalk that stretches from EAST to WEST. In front of you is YON BUS.
>BOARD YON BUS
You board YON BUS. The driver is a surly looking peasant and demands payment before he will allow you to take a seat.
>PAY DRIVER
With what?
>INVENTORY
You check your pockets. You are currently carrying KEYS, a PHONE, a WALLET, and a small amount of LUCRE.
>USE LUCRE
You don’t have enough.
The driver scowls at you.
>LOOK WALLET
Inside the wallet you find PICTURES, ID, CREDIT CARDS, a TWENTY-DOLLAR BILL, a TAKE-OUT RECEIPT, and a BUS PASS.
>USE PASS
The pass slides effortlessly through the slot in the fare machine which rings merrily.
The driver grunts and closes the door. He tells you to take a seat.
>TAKE SEAT
The only available seat is across from a woman with a small dog in her lap. The dog growls menacingly at you. However the seat is currently occupied by a cold half-eaten CHEESEBURGER.
>TAKE CHEESEBURGER
The bus lurches forward. You’d better take a seat!
>TAKE SEAT
You sit down. Unfortunately you are still holding a CHEESEBURGER. Cold sauce of an indeterminate origin trickles onto your hand.
>DROP CHEESEBURGER
You don’t see any appropriate trash receptacles and you don’t want to be guilty of littering.
>GIVE DOG CHEESEBURGER
The small dog greedily devours the cheeseburger and gives you a look of intense adoration. You will be its best friend for the remainder of the journey.
>LOOK PHONE
Your phone is the pinnacle of modern technology. You can play games, listen to songs, perform calculations, send and receive emails, or catch up on the latest news. A small icon in the upper right hand corner indicates that the only thing you can’t do with it right now is make a phone call.
>SHUFFLE SONGS
Your phone begins to play a jaunty medley of ‘80’s one-hit wonders. You lean back and enjoy the ride.
You don’t remember exiting the bus but you now find yourself in a dark cavernous room. The word DING glows from the far wall in bright red letters. Looking around you see a BAG and a JAVELIN. A grue is also in the room and advances menacingly.
>GET JAVELIN
You now have the JAVELIN. The grue continues to advance menacingly. It asks if you want to play Hucka-Bucka-Beanstalk.
>PITCH JAVELIN
With stunning accuracy you throw the javelin. The grue disappears in a cloud of greasy green smoke.
>GET BAG
You now have the BAG. It’s full of copper ducats!
>LOOK ROOM
There are no exits. The word DING continues to glow on the far wall.
>DING
The sound wakes you up. Someone has pulled the cord to request a stop. You are still on the bus and have been dreaming.
>INVENTORY
You check your pockets. You are currently carrying KEYS, a PHONE, a WALLET, a small amount of LUCRE, and COPPER DUCATS.
>EXIT BUS
You look out and realize you’ve passed your stop. The bus is now speeding along a desolate stretch of interstate. The woods are dark and likely infested with grues. Are you sure you want to stop?
>SHUFFLE SONGS
Your phone begins to play a lively medley of ‘90’s one-hit wonders.
The bus rolls into the DEPOT. The driver announces that everyone must leave the bus. Exits are BEHIND and FORWARD.
>LEAVE BEHIND
You exit the bus via the rear doors avoiding a scowl from the driver.
It will be at least fifteen minutes before the bus departs. You begin to feel hungry.
>LOOK DEPOT
You look around and see a VENDING MACHINE. Across the street is a COFFEE SHOP.
>USE VENDING MACHINE
The machine contains a delightful array of tempting snacks. Unfortunately it does not take LUCRE, TWENTY-DOLLAR BILLS, or DUCATS.
>GO COFFEE SHOP
There’s a long line at the coffee shop. You’ll have to wait and might miss your bus.
>WAIT
The line moves briskly. You get to the front and order a triple-espresso mocha topped with whipped cream, chocolate shavings, caramel drizzle, and chives. The barista hands you your DRINK and CHANGE.
>TAKE DRINK
You now have a DRINK. It weighs approximately six pounds.
>TAKE CHANGE
You now have CHANGE.
>GO DEPOT
You return to the depot with two minutes left before the bus leaves. A voice over the intercom reminds you eating, drinking, and smoking are now allowed on the bus.
>QUAFF DRINK
You guzzle the combination of coffee, sugar, and dairy in record time. You are now refreshed for the remainder of your journey!
>BOARD BUS
The driver insists you need to pay to re-board.
>ARGUE WITH DRIVER
Nice try bucko.
>USE PASS
Your pass is expired and there are no valid charges left on it.
>USE CHANGE
Luckily you received exact change at the coffee shop. You insert the correct amount in the fare taker. The driver scowls and tells you to take a seat.
>TAKE SEAT
The bus lurches forward.
>SHUFFLE SONGS
Your phone’s power is critically low and playing songs would be an unnecessary waste of power. You lean back and pretend to enjoy the ride.
Up ahead on the left you see your HOME.
>PULL CORD
You pull the cord. There is a satisfying “Ding!” An automated voice reminds you to remain seated until the bus comes to a complete stop.
>STAND UP
You are pitched forward onto your face as the bus comes to a halt. The driver cackles merrily as you pick yourself up off the floor.
>EXIT BUS
The driver scowls as you disembark.
You are standing on a desolate area of sidewalk that stretches NORTH and SOUTH. Behind you is an EERIE CASTLE. Ahead of you is HOME.
> GO EERIE CASTLE
The Eerie Castle has been bringing down neighborhood property values for years. With great sagacity you decide that midnight on a Tuesday is the ideal time to explore its premises. You enter hesitantly. The door closes behind you. Ahead you see two large eyes glowing in the darkness. You recognize the small dog from the bus, only now it is thirty-five feet tall and weighs approximately six-hundred pounds.
The dog recognizes you as the person who gave it a cold, rotten cheeseburger slathered with a sauce of pure salmonella extract and brown, slimy, rotten lettuce. It therefore considers you its best friend in the entire universe and stares at you with infinite adoration.
Obvious exits are FORWARD, BACK, and STAIRS.
> GO STAIRS
Because you forgot to activate the flashlight app on your phone you don’t see that large sections of the floor are missing. You fall into the basement and are eaten by a horde of zombie alien okapi.
You have died.
Total points: 171
Boons acquired:
‘80’s one-hit wonders medley
‘90’s one hit wonders medley
Copper ducats
Extremely large small dog
Now he was master of the world, and he was not quite sure what to do next.
But he would think of something.
-Arthur C. Clarke
Outside only a rocket, a combustible dream, walting for the friction of his hand to set it off. In the last moment of sleep someone asked his name. Quietly, he gave the answer as he had heard it during the hours from midnight on. “Icarus Montgolfier Wright”.
-Ray Bradbury
To boldly go where no one has gone before…
Kate: Hello, and welcome back to Cauldron Cooking, the show that puts the magic back in your kitchen. I’m your host Kate. Earlier in the show we talked about new uses for poison ivy, and I also want to tell listeners who are just tuning in that our recipe for cream of vulture soup is on the show’s website. Check it out.
All right, now it’s time to take some calls. We have Diane from Salem on line seven. Hi, Diane, what’s your question?
Diane: Hi Kate, thank you so much for taking my call. This isn’t exactly a cooking question but I have an issue with my stepdaughter and I wondered if you could suggest anything.
Kate: Oh, yes, kids. They’re always hard to deal with, aren’t they? Especially when they grow up.
Diane: Right. That’s my problem. She’s getting older and she’s starting to really get in my way.
Kate: But you don’t want to kill her.
Diane: Well, I did, but not anymore. I’d just like something that’ll, you know, take her out of the picture.
Kate: Let me think. Okay, I have just the thing for you. We have a great recipe for a poison apple.
Diane: That won’t kill her?
Kate: No, this is perfect. It will just put her in a coma. Have you got a crypt or something where you can put her while she sleeps?
Diane: I’ve got a crystal case that rests on a plinth out in the woods.
Kate: Fabulous. She’ll be perfectly preserved there for as long as you want, and here’s the good part: she can only be revived with a kiss from a charming prince. And it’s not like there are a lot of those wandering around the forests, am I right?
Diane: Yes. That sounds absolutely perfect. Thank you so much Kate!
Kate: No problem, and good luck. Email us some pictures so we can see how it’s worked out. We’ll put them on the website. Thanks for your call, Diane.
Well, it looks like the witching hour is almost up, so I’ll just leave you with this: When shall we three meet again, in thunder, lightning, or in rain?
Of course you know it’ll be the same time next week. I’ll see you then.
For a while I grew carnivorous plants. It’s funny to me that they’re sometimes described as violating the rules of nature when really a plant that eats animals is quite natural. Once we shuffle off our mortal coil we’ll become fertilizer. The expression “pushing up daisies” has it wrong. We’re really feeding the daisies, but that’s another story. Carnivorous plants just take a more active role in the process when they trap and digest prey.
Even from my earliest days I also loved weird monster movies so I was thrilled when I first discovered Little Shop Of Horrors. And, appropriately enough, I started with the original Roger Corman classic and a few years later was able to see the musical version directed by Frank Oz in the theaters. And that might make you ask, which do I think is better? Honestly I can’t say. I think they both have their strengths and weaknesses, and while the original was hastily thrown together—the legend is someone bet Roger Corman he couldn’t shoot an entire film in twenty-four hours and Little Shop was the result—it still has some great moments. I’d argue its greatest strength is its subtlety even though it hardly seems subtle, but, really, compared to the musical, it is. And there are enough differences between the two films that comparing them is like comparing apples and pineapples. The 1986 film would also be popular enough to inspire a Saturday morning cartoon that turned Seymour and Audrey into schoolchildren, the plant into a rapper, and for the sake of mercy I’m going to stop there. It had a cute opening theme song and that’s about it.
The most obvious difference is the 1986 film is a musical while the 1960 film isn’t, although that’s kind of like pointing out that one is in color and one’s in black and white. The 1986 film is also not really a remake of the 1960 film but an adaptation of the stage musical by Alan Menken and Howard Ashman, a couple who also did a few notable things for Disney. The musical takes the bare bones of the plot and makes some major changes—most of which I think are improvements. Seymour is made an orphan which makes him more interesting and writes out his mother who, in the 1962 film, is completely superfluous. It also adds impact to Seymour’s murder of Mr. Mushnik—the closest thing to a father he’s ever had. In the original Mushnik survives in spite of knowing the plant’s secret. The musical ramps up the intensity of Audrey and Seymour’s romance and complicates it with Audrey’s relationship with Skid Row’s dentist.
In the 1960 film the dentist was named Dr. Phoebus Farb—a name I wish they’d kept for the musical instead of renaming him Orin Scrivello—and it’s questionable as to whether he’s a sadist or whether inflicting pain is just part of the job description. The musical makes his sadism unbelievably explicit and in the 1986 film he’s played with over-the-top brilliance by Steve Martin. The fact that his whole introductory sequence is one of the funniest things I’ve ever seen suggests that I’m not the nice guy people seem to think I am but a dangerous sociopath who should be locked away and subject to rigorous psychological testing, but that’s another story.
There are also smaller changes. The detectives investigating the series of mysterious disappearances in the 1960 film are dropped—they’re as superfluous as Seymour’s mother. A few things shouldn’t have been cut: Mr. Mushnik’s hilarious malapropisms unfortunately get lost in adapation. Dick Miller as a guy who eats flowers in the original is replaced with Christopher Guest in the 1986 film as a customer who just wants to buy some roses. This is a real wasted opportunity: Guest is a comic genius who doesn’t get a chance to say anything funny, and if Miller had appeared in the 1986 film it would have been a nice tribute to his status as king of cameos, as well as linking the two films. The 1960 also has a very young Jack Nicholson as Wilbur Force, a masochistic dental patient. Having already murdered the dentist Seymour is forced to drill Wilbur’s teeth, providing a great sight gag. The 1986 film replaces Wilbur with Arthur Denton, played by Bill Murray, who’s always brilliant. His screaming “I’m gonna get a candy bar!” is hilarious but since he’s operated on by Orin it’s not clear why he’s even there.
Oh yeah, Levi Stubbs as the voice of Audrey II is brilliant. The biggest weakness of the original is the plant just lacks personality.
In the original Seymour’s plant is a crossbreed of a butterwort and Venus flytrap which he names Audrey Jr. In the musical and 1986 film the plant is from outer space–a smarter move–and Seymour names it Audrey II.
The biggest plus of the adaptations is the trio of singers–Crystal, Ronette, and Chiffon–who provide backstory and commentary and are everything a chorus in a Greek tragedy should be. And Little Shop Of Horrors, as funny as it is, is a tragedy–or at least the 1960 film and stage musical are.
When I first saw the 1986 film I was disappointed that they’d changed the ending. I didn’t mind that they cut the final body count down from five to two–a robber, a drunk, and a prostitute from the original are eliminated–but instead of Seymour sacrificing his own life he electrocutes the plant and he and Audrey live happily ever after, escaping to the ideal someplace that’s green Audrey has fantasized about.
That was also not the ending director Frank Oz wanted. Home releases, starting with the DVD, include the original, significantly darker ending: the plant kills Audrey. Seymour, seeing no future for himself, steps into the plant’s mouth. What follows is an extended sequence of Audrey II’s multiplying and spreading across the world. The fact that I find this so funny suggests that I’m not the nice guy people seem to think I am but a dangerous sociopath who should be locked away and subject to rigorous psychological testing, but that’s another story.
This is taken from the stage version which ends with the rousing musical number “Don’t Feed The Plants”, and is, I think, an improvement on the 1960 film. In the original Seymour grabs a knife and dives into the plant’s mouth but the ending is so abrupt it’s not clear what happens afterward, although presumably Audrey Jr. is destroyed.
Studio executives and test audiences found Frank Oz’s elaborate–and extremely expensive–ending too dark so they ordered a new happier ending. And rewatching the 1986 film I think they got it right. Audrey’s death is damned depressing and even though Seymour is a murderer it’s hard not to root–er, feel for the guy. A major difference between stage and screen is a film can give us closeups, creating an emotional closeness to the characters. Films also don’t end with the cast coming out to take a bow.
The 1986 film really has the perfect ending: Crystal, Ronette, and Chiffon, dressed as bridesmaids and smiling knowingly, stroll past Seymour and Audrey’s garden where a tiny Audrey II looks up and smiles. It’s a clever and subtle way of saying evil can never entirely be rooted out. Both endings are below so you can judge for yourself.
Because of my lifelong fascination with carnivorous plants I also like it that the plant survives. And since that I’m about to be locked up and subjected to rigorous psychological testing I’ll just leave you with this: which ending do you think is better?
The original ending:
The theatrical ending:
And a bonus: Little Shop! Word!
There was a new bus driver. Apparently he was very new because he didn’t exactly know the route and took us on an unbelievable detour. One of my fellow passengers even questioned the driver about it but was quietly told something something construction and that if she wanted to get off right in the middle of nowhere that was fine.
When we got close to my stop I pulled the cord. There was no “ding!” The indicator light didn’t come on. The friendly bass baritone voice that says, “Stop requested. Please remain seated until the bus comes to a complete stop” didn’t come on. I walked up to the front.
“That’s my stop at the corner,” I told the driver.
He looked up from a pile of papers in his lap that may or may not have been the bus route.
“Good thing I was paying attention!” he said.
Yeah, good thing.
That in itself might make an interesting story but what was really interesting–and what might have made me miss my stop is that someone decided that on this particular day the riders in my route should get a double bus instead of one of the usual singles.
To those in the UK and other aliens: we don’t have double-decker buses here. Well, we didn’t. We have them now for tour groups, but that’s another story. Instead of double-decker buses someone had the harebrained idea to smash two buses together end-to-end. And like most harebrained ideas the result is actually kind of cool.
It’s Nashville, Jake, so of course the seats have a musical theme. Can anyone out there recognize the tune?