Lucydom

When I think of Lucy, I think of hair brained schemes and wheedling. You know who I'm talking about right? Ball, married to Desi (both dead). If you're under 30, when reruns became scarce, you're likely to have missed this American gem, dare I say, genius. Some of my earliest childhood images involve my parents watching Lucy, me in a crib nearby. I'm sure I've seen every episode several times and if I were on a desert island with a viewing device, I would take the boxed set of I Love Lucy, wouldn't you? I don't actually own a set of the tapes, but wouldn't mind starting to collect them now.

Lucy moments abound in our household. Hair brained schemes are my specialty, and wheedling Serge's. One of my get rich schemes when we first moved here was the Outhouse Calendar. I spent the summer of 2000 cruising around to outdoor events in search of rows of outhouses to photograph. I was photographing the contents of the outhouse, not the exterior. It was to be part of a series of the Vile Truth calendar series, with the following year slated to have been Scabs. I sought out the most disgusting and full outhouses after having gotten the idea from my father. We were driving in Utah and stopped at a scenic lookout. He used the outhouse, and when he came out he said, "hey Rick, check out that outhouse" and when I did, I snapped a picture of the grossest pile of shit cresting above seat-line. My head swirled off to Lucydom and spun a tale of the riches to be had by selling these kinds of images. I was finally satisfied to have found twelve images, one for each month and set it up on the computer. I had 5 made at Kinkos, with a run of 1000 possible from the local printer if I could sell some. I set up a website and sent off letters to radio personalities, friends, and family etc. I sold one. To my father. Looking back, I have to say it was fun, lurking about the outhouses, trying not to be noticed as I went into each one. But hair brained scheme nonetheless.

Yesterday, I thought of Lucy when I came home and Serge said, "So can we ask the balcony guys (we had the 2nd and 3rd floor balcony wood replaced - it was getting really rotted) to build our deck?" And I asked, knowing he had some grandiose plan for the fabulous deck of life "the big one that you drew?" He didn't answer that and went on, "We'll enjoy it so much, and we can have people over for a BBQ," and I said, "Did you talk to them about it? How much is it?" He said, "Oh it doesn't matter because I already signed the contract."

Now here ladies and gentlemen, was a Lucy moment. I was not in the Lucy role, however, and blew my top. He whined and wheedled and wore me down. Then I laughed at how absurd it was, contract signed right? So we will have a new deck next week, and all I can think is "that costs a month's salary". I guess I'll just put in an extra show at the nightclub.

I'm waiting for the next hair brained scheme to attack. Could it involve the blog somehow? Serge keeps saying lately that we have to find something that generates money without us doing anything. And I keep saying, yeah, it's called a savings account. But I'm keeping my eye out anyway.