The following forecast is applicable to all twelve astrological signs, and also to three or four of the far more reliable signs in the Blodgett Zodiac.
“You are followed by an obbligato of hoots and grimaces from a derisive posse of ragamuffins.”
This prediction first appeared in Wanderings Of A Globe-Trotter In The Far East by Lewis Wingfield, published in 1889. One hundred and twenty years later, it shall come to pass.
Green Apple Books on Clement Street in San Francisco had been recommended to me as one of the finest bookshops it would ever be my pleasure to visit. As it happened, I was staying five minutes’ walk away, so I availed myself of a number of opportunities to pop my head in the door. They sell both new and used books, and we all know that a splendid selection of reasonably-priced secondhand books is basically what makes life worth living. Here is a list of my purchases, carted back to Blighty to take their places on the tottering bookshelves at Haemoglobin Towers. In no particular order:
H L Mencken : Disturber Of The Peace by William Manchester
Sartor Resartus by Thomas Carlyle
The Post-Office Girl by Stefan Zweig
Lolly Willowes by Sylvia Townsend Warner
The Coming Race by Edward Bulwer-Lytton
The Sinking Of The Odradek Stadium by Harry Mathews
The Case Of The Persevering Maltese : Collected Essays by Harry Mathews
Schnitzler’s Century : The Making Of Middle-Class Culture 1815-1914 by Peter Gay
Treatise On The Gods by H L Mencken
The Sardonic Humour Of Ambrose Bierce edited by George Barkin
Lost Prince : The Unsolved Mystery Of Kaspar Hauser by Jeffrey Masson
Raymond Roussel And The Republic Of Dreams by Mark Ford
Signs Of The Times : Deconstruction And The Fall Of Paul De Man by David Lehman
The Making Of Americans by Getrude Stein
Oddly coincident with Mr Key’s presence in the United States, the latest edition of the Drabblecast features a Hooting Yard story. Bubbles Surge From Froth is read by Norm Sherman, the man who made the words “magnetic mute blind love monkeys” sound so eerie and lascivious.
Norm gives a splendid rendition once again, so many thanks to him, and to whomsoever is responsible for the delightful picture of the captain Communist, smoking a cigarette and leaning insouciantly against a cow while birds flock in the sky above.
Lots more here.
Dear Mr Key, writes Vlasto Signalstrength, I read Hooting Yard mostly to keep up to speed with the doings of the Woohoohoodiwoo Woman, upon which you occasionally report. I wonder if you could tell me if she is in any way related to Willie “Woo Woo” Wong, after whom a San Francisco children’s playground is named? My tiny daughter has grown fond of Willie “Woo Woo” Wong’s swings, and is often to be heard screaming and gurgling with delight, noises which in an uncanny way remind me of the eldritch wailings of the Woohoohoodiwoo Woman as she skips and trudges around in the dark dark woods on moonlit nights. What can it all mean?
