...AND SOME OF HIS SONS WERE HORSES!

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THE GLOVES COME OFF IN THE HAND HOTEL

when

ZACK KOUNS,

adventurer and serious journalist,

Asks the Tough Questions

and “hands” in his report

thereby forming a

Poignant Profile of Prolific Music Legend and Famed Entity,

STARDADDY DIXIE.

ZACK KOUNS

Look, Stardaddy, I’ve got a good one for you: lately, I find that my bad boy attitude isn’t really up to snuff. You’re a real testy guy how do you keep your edge? Ever tried Yoga or crystals?

STARDADDY DIXIE:

I like to pick on the bad ones while throwing back a few brewskis. Making scowls at my reflection in the pisser. Getting all riled up and pissing vinegar right up the world’s asshole.

No, man, I don’t do Yogi or any sort of anti-American type thing. The only Yogi I know hangs out in a park and has a lot of picnics.

I’ve been reading all about the Hand Hotel in all the major papers with a caption that reads “kiss my ass, United States!” I thought it was just a nice little mom and pop place, why are you guys pushing the envelope for? I just want to hang my hat up at the end of the day and not deal with any big mouth opinions.

Listen pal, I am as American as MKULTRA and whoever wrote up that little caption can meet me down at the front desk. Probably forged from those rip-off school boy liberal punks in Athens. I don’t move so fast, and I blurred so fast that this one guy I call tall boy yanked my songbook right off the paper and now is blackmailing me on underground message boards so you just tell him Daddy’s waiting at the front desk near the Coke machine and you bet I didn’t write that…

Who is this?

…Is this the tall boy again?

Hey, I’m as tall as I am long. I’ve pushed a few papers myself, I know that being a night auditor or whatever in the hell you’re trying to say you are is a tough job, I guess. Stardaddy, ever play catch with your daddy in the 20s, 30s, 40s, however the hell old you’re trying to say you are?

You got it all wrong and twisted up. I’m just doing fine here in the lobby having myself a little Coke and a smile, just waiting for a punk to come around. Lila won’t let me in. She’s lit my stagewear on fire. Why don’t you tell me I have a lovely voice?

Look. I’ve never heard your voice, I’m getting taller by the minute and I hope to be tall enough in 2 hours to never hear another person jibber jabber at me about the way they look at life. I like to come home after a long day, lick the floor as deeply as possible and rub what hair I have left against the wall. So sue me, why don’t you?

Two cacklers in the night - one is Lila and the other is who gives a damn? I ain’t too scared of cacklers but Lila will give me a little chill anytime.

Look, a lot of my audience has wet noodles between the ears. Who’s this Lila gal and how much money does she owe us all just for being alive and wiggling?

You mind your business about Lila. She burned the morsels. I am curled up in the lobby, crunching the can to look for my voice and my songbook. Porter Wagoner dressed up as a cop wandered in, kicking lint in his belly button then making a wish. Porter’s been starting all sorts of new age trends, so you two would get along. I am sending him your way.

If Wagoner ever gets out of the rubber room and starts talking about ascended masters and metaphysics college then I’ll hear him out. Until then, he’s just another Dolly Parton devotee looking to smoke in the mountains, and that isn’t my problem. My problem is Lovely Lila and I want to hear a full Handy report, or my name isn’t Dolly Wagoner Dixie Weaver Hamami Garrett Kouns.

When I was a child, a guitar pick was my way up. It paid for this Coke and it paid for a wiggle or two with Lila and Lynn and now they’re having a time trying to set each other on fire and out cackle one another. Meanwhile, my pick paid for the room and I can’t get in but nobody wants to hear about the good times anymore.

I am trying to get back to Dixie my home but I am stuck in this New Jersey podunk. Might as well get a pizza.

Lila and I like to play a little game with Lynn called “the human turkey.” But nobody wants to hear about the good things anymore. I am a dinosaur and this kid films me snoozing just so the world can have a laugh right before I piss up its ass.

What do you consider Dixie, tall tall guy? What do you get on your pizza? Ever thought about telling New Jersey to stick it?

Dixie is home. I get the dough and Lila and I dress the pizza any which way from pill box to pepper corn from bean bag to ash tray from maxi pad to mush room from cool ranch to goldi locks. You ever fuck with the Ramones?

Who’s the kid and how do we kick his ass all over the place?

I call him Cap ‘cause he wears a cap to the game and he reminds me of Cap, my favorite detective, in that I see a puzzle in his mysterious ways. He is quick and gets out of the way of danger, maybe because he is light in the loafers.

I also call him Express and he throws hot coffee on me every night but I don’t wake. I see the stains in the morning, then I hear a cackle.

Where is Dixie, dixhead? Give me geography or give me Summer Sausage Saunders. Look, I’m as mad as I have ever been and I’m ready to come out of the box saying, “I accept your apology for being alive”/what was your dad like, dumbass?

I can see you’re a big talker but why don’t you come down to the Pizza Hut and try that talk to my face? I will stick that Yogi so far up your ass and then use the mat as a pizza crust.

Daddy don’t have a Dad, and Dixie don’t have a home ‘kept Dixie and Dixie is a mood, a church, and it ain’t got a number on the mailbox.

Look, it’s really simple. I’m at the Pixel Hut or wherever you were wanting to kiss my fingers? Go ahead. Kiss them. Live for the first time in your undead life. No one is stopping you Stardummy or whatever in the hell you want all of us to call you these days.

King Kouns, you stuck-up reporters are all the same: young, dumb, and balding. They must call it Yellow Journalism ‘cause that’s what you are - yellow, the coward’s color - as yellow as my stinking piss ass vinegar pie hole.

What if you were just a woman and being a woman had Divine meaning?

I poked at my third eye ’til it blurred in just so I wouldn’t ever think up stupid questions like the one you just asked.

Hello America: Stardummy got his little feeling hurt. Let me emphasize: NOT MY PROBLEM, LITTLE BUDDY.

I’m drinking beer over here, you New Age Nimrod, so unless you got any more questions for Daddy, we will call it a night.

I got one more for you: what’s your problem, moron? Live a little and show some teeth while you’re at it.

You want to know my problem?

Spill the beans, Garbanzo.

My problem is this: What makes Toronto tick?

Sounds like a personal problem. I stay away from those, as a serious journalist.

Well, it’ll just have to stay a mystery I suppose. You know how many bars I have thrown out of for asking about that wild little Ontario town?

I’d say around zero but I’d guess around one. What does make Toronto tick? This guy tried to come up to my friend Rory’s apartment to find that out after he dug my car out of the snow. The answer was “more Green Peppers” and I don’t buy that, because I’m a law abiding citizen.

Hate to cut you off, blabbermouth, but I’ve beer to drink. Come over behind the Hut if you want to slam a couple.

I’ve lived. I’ve loved. Don’t try any fast tricks on me Startrixie. I’ll be there. I’ll sleep in the dumpster. Looks like we’re getting smoother with our love lives.