The Other Half

He calls
himself Skid Row Joe From Kokomo. His conversation is rambling and
disjointed. It doesn't seem to make much sense. Yet when you put it all
together it does. Like some of William Faulkner's writing.

"You
made a crack last week," he began, "about a lady who claimed government
agents were shooting invisible rays at her. I've been hypnotized by
some invisible force myself. I had dreams where I was supposed to cut
my throat but when I woke up it was a false alarm.

"Another
time I had the feeling I was being forced to concentrate like a mind
reader does to a person. Think what it would do if used on a banker to
force him to reveal the combination of a safe or on a scientist to make
him reveal secrets about our defense.

"NOW
DON'T think I'm a wino or cokehead. I don't use either one. If I have
the price I buy a drink of Bushmill's or John Powers' or Jack Daniels.

"I
see where Superman killed himself. Man, am I glad I'm only a bum. A lot
of people think us dumb slobs need psycho treatment. What about
Superman and all the other people who have everything that wealth will
give them? Look what they do with it.

"Compare
their lives with us Skid Row bums who have to sleep in box cars or
anywhere we can and mooch off the belly robbers. You don't believe me?
Okay, on your vacation dress like a bum, travel from coast to coast and
see for yourself. I say instead of so much foreign aid, give every
unemployed American over 45 $35 a week to spend on food, clothes and
shelter."

A
CLEANING MAN, hired for the day, came into a home in South Bel-Air and
gaped. "Look at all those books!" he exclaimed in awe, "I never saw so
many books!" Then he turned to the lady of the house and said softly,
as if in apology, "We just watch television."

IMMINENCE
of July 4 reminded Bill Richardson of the S.C. Gas Co. of a playful
serviceman on holiday detail who some years ago created some Grade A
consternation. Placing a firecracker in a metal wastebasket, he phoned
the company and pretended to be a customer asking instruction on
relighting his furnace. After telling the girl he had a 50-ft. phone
cord, he reported, "OK, I'm going downstairs … I'm in the basement in
front of the furnace … I'm striking a match…" Then, blooie! Moaning
as if in pain, he asked, "What do I do now?

"Just a moment," the poor girl exclaimed excitedly, "I'll let you talk to my supervisor!"

LET
US CLEAR the file on the subject, raised here recently, why, in an era
of wrist watches, do clothing manufacturers still put watch pockets in
men's trousers?

"Because,"
Railroad Wife replied, "railroad men still use them for their watches.
But not all of them have them. I've had to sew in dozens of them."

Tom Cassidy of KFAC called to say radio announcers carry their stopwatches in them. They use them to time scripts.

L. Davis of Torrance and three other persons insisted they're no longer watch pockets, they're lighter pockets.

Others
find the pockets ideal for coins and tokens. A man in Reseda who hasn't
carried a "turnip" for 25 years has been campaigning quietly to have
them called coin pockets. Furthermore, when he selects a pair of
trousers that doesn't have one he refuses to buy.

AT
RANDOM — The hired hands in a Hollywood office are using the "Anatomy
of a Murder" ads showing a disjointed silhouette of a man as a voodoo
symbol — sticking pins in them. . .There's a truck amok in town with
the inscription, "Cheeses that pleases" … Girl named Jane reports
that in a dim, dusty old saga of the West on TV the hero reckoned the
villain was head of a band of "wrestlers" …  Sudden thought: A lot
of innocent, peace-loving sharks are going to get killed before the
current shark scare is over.