11/04/03’s illustrious band:

Bring Your Truck

Brought to you by Phantasm, a B-grade horror movie from 1979 that I saw on Halloween.

A Web page I found sums up the plot of Phantasm thus: “A teenage boy and his friends square off against a mysterious grave robber known only as the Tall Man.” It’s a good thing somebody explained it, because otherwise you might sit there in the dark wondering what this movie is about. Is it about flying metallic balls that pierce people’s skulls, liberating impossible amounts of gore? Is it about severed fingers that spew yellow ichor and turn into insects until you jam them down the garbage disposal? Is it about a shape-shifting alien that seduces young men, then stabs them through the heart? Is it about interdimensional slave-dwarf traffic? Is it about giant tuning forks? Is it a showcase of bad hair?

None of these things matter. It also doesn’t matter that the three heroes and the villain appear to be the only people living in their town (small budget for casting, evidently) or that there’s a gratuitous folk music scene thrown in. What matters is that Reggie brings his truck.

Yep, that’s the entire plan for capturing one of the yellow-blooded slave dwarves. The teenager’s older brother is going to restrain him in Reggie’s truck. “Bring your truck,” he says intently. Very, very intently. And what’s so special about Reggie’s truck? Reggie is the local ice cream man. He drives the ice cream truck -- perfect for slave dwarf transport.

Don’t get me wrong; I enjoyed Phantasm. But I can’t say I watched it with a straight face. And the dialogue reminded me of other horrifying inanities my friends and I have heard uttered over the past couple decades. My personal favorite: When I was working a retail job, a customer once picked up one of our fine items and asked, “Is this the biggest one you have in this size?”

Other gems:

• Heard by Senor Editor when he worked at a dive shop and lead scuba-diving expeditions for tourists:
  
  Is there water on all sides of the island?
  
  Is there an ATM at the coral reef?
  
  When is the sunset celebration held? Is there one every night?

  
  

• Inquired of The Other Amy while hiking:
  
  Are there bathrooms up there? “Up there” was the top of a majestic mountain in a remote state park.

  
  

• Questions asked of Datura 1.0, a security guard at a museum/art gallery:
  
  Do those stairs go down?
  
  [pointing at objects visible through window] Do I have to go outside to see those sculptures?
  
  Picasso?
  
  People asking this question want to be directed to the Picasso exhibit, but they usually say only the one name. The museum staff’s favorite response is to stick out a hand and say, “No, I’m [insert name here].”

  
  

And, just when I thought it couldn’t get any worse, I picked up today’s newspaper. There, on the front page of the Metro section, is a story about a new addition to the Department 56 catalog. Department 56 is “best known for its light-up Christmas villages, Snowbabies figurines and other seasonal doodads,” according to the article. It’s a replica of the Spam Museum, which was the subject of yesterday’s blog. This newest collectible is about 7 inches high and sells for $63.25 plus shipping. (This poor reporter must have really, seriously hacked somebody off to get stuck with this assignment. Can’t you just picture the staff meeting? “Which of you serious journalists wants the light-up miniature Spam Museum story? Anybody? No one? Well, since Jill’s not here . . .”)

To see more Spamorabilia, ranging from glow-in-the-dark hair scrunchies to tacky-within-tacky Spam snow globes, visit Spam Gifts.

Make it stop!

E-mail the Media Sensation: BandNameoftheDay@hotmail.com

Visit the BND archives at http://jugglernaut.blogspot.com.