Ken comes out of his Hobbit hole…

Kathy Evans already has earned a small bit of Jabootu immortality; she was the last person I ripped off using my ‘sponsored’ review scam.  She sent me some money and asked me to review Voyage to the World of Prehistoric Women.  Easy enough, except that I learned it was one of two movies Roger Corman fashioned out of stock footage taken from a Russian sci-fier called Planeta Bur.  Being basically like Rain Man, I then insisted (on a paid review, I again emphasize) that I would review all three films.  Kathy was such a good sport she even bumped up my compensation to pay for a gray market copy of the original film.

Anyway, that would have all be fine, but then I typically didn’t get around to actually writing and posting the reviews for like a year or something.  At that point it was clear I was far too feckless to ever ask anyone to sponsor a review again, and thus have subsided on Amazon links, which I guess some may feel clutter up the site, but which glean me a little cash without costing anybody anything extra.  More important, they don’t lay on onus on me that I’m clearly too moronic to see through in an expedient fashion…or at all.

Anyway, Kathy recently informed me she was going to be visiting her aunt in West Chicago, and we made plans to get together for some pizza.  Fulfilling another woefully tardy promise, I brought her the copy of Planeta Bur she had bought for the review.  I’d like to think it was just because I thought it would be nice, although in the back of my mind I may have been hoping it would making her less likely to deck me for hijacking her review.

So I drove out to West Chicago, which is weird because a) it meant I actually left my house to voluntarily hang out with another human being instead of staying home, standing around naked and crying like Harvey Kietel in Bad Lieutenant, which is usually how I spend my evenings (unless I instead watch a Cubs game on TV, although the effect is entirely the same), and b) actually drove somewhere, even though I break out in a sweat if I’ve driving five miles away from my house, and avoid highways like the plague.  Luckily, the route basically involved driving down stretches of only two streets, so it wasn’t that bad.

Anyway, I went to the home of Kathy’s aunt Louise, who is quite a pistol (and who supposedly is 90, although I find that extremely hard to believe).  We all yakked a bit about the road tripping she and Kathy had just been doing, stories that involved cops and fresh baked pies, and then Kathy and I headed out to the St. Charles Gino’s East pizzeria.

There followed a very convivial meal accented by some great deep dish pizza and interesting conversation.  Kathy had spent the day in Chicago doing touristy things (such as overpaying for parking), and we yakked about family and, unsurprisingly, movies now and then.  I can’t say the success of the evening has turned me into a rampaging social animal, but it certainly wasn’t the Sartrean horror I had instincitvely feared.  And I managed not to spend too much time looking at the TV monitor behind Kathy’s head, which was a triumph of sorts, as it was telecasting what turned out to be a very rare Cubs victory.

Anyway, thanks again to Kathy for a pleasant evening.  And if any of the rest of you get to the area, drop me a note and we’ll see if we can’t throw something together.

  • fish eye no miko

    “I actually left me house to voluntarily hang out with another human beings instead of staying home […] even though I break out in a sweat if I’ve driving five miles away from my house, and avoid highways like the plague.”

    [blink blink]
    Did I write this…?

  • Ha! Blessings be to the Interwebs, which allow folks like you and me to hang out in the exact manner we find most congenial.

  • Pip

    Ken!

    This reads like a romance novel written by the Post Office combined with eye-rollingly obvious evasions as when a disheveled teenager arrives home late saying she did “nuthin” all evening. We want details Ken.

  • Beckoningchasm

    Awesome, and congrats!

    –woulda been much worse if you’d met RVHorrOR OF Kiss Meets the Phantom fame…

    –I kid of course, and restate my enduring respect for the Master of Jabootu. (And I have RVH chained in the basement!)

  • Pip — Believe me, that pretty much covered it. We came, we yakked (and ate pizza), we went home.

    Even so, it was one of my more adventurous evenings in a while. Although I really pushed the envelope last night, staying out until 1:00 AM to watch a Godzilla movie in a theater (so work should expect me to be even dopier than usual today). Two more nights of Godzilla movies *and* a trip to Houston/Dallas–it’s my craziest month ever!

    Sadly.

    RVHorror!! Is that who I owe the Kiss review?! Indeed, that last debt much be laid to rest. Thanks for the info, BC.

  • BeckoningChasm

    Ah, it’s all good. I remember when I requested that, and nothing happened for a long time, and I thought, “OMG I broke Jabootu!”