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February 22, 2005
Who is Fat Charlie?
Fat Charlie played with Minnesota Fats and Benny Goodman at the Twiddlestick club down in North Wabash. He is 5 foot eleven inches tall and twenty feet wide. Please ignore his goiter. He's having it removed next Thursday.
When Fat Charlie was young, he used to twirl the world on a stick. Now he just takes gum off other people's shoes. But it's a living. He can solve a rubix cube like a motherfucker. There is no stopping him now.
He witnessed both Nixon inaugurations from the back of a pick-up truck. They were delivering melons. They had the wrong address. You can have your Frank Capra and your Oliver Stone, but Fat Charlie can drink a margarita, drive stick and shoot on Super-8 without leaving his bathroom. He's brilliant that way.
David Letterman booked him as a guest, but at the last minute he had to drop out due to inflamed joints. Been to China, been to France, been to Oslo, been to the TikiTikiTavern Inn off Route 12 in Hot Springs. Nothing impresses him anymore.
He's a sad lump of bones, our "F.C." No more melons for John Dean or Bob Woodward. But when the lights go up on Broadway, he can still remember the soft tap of his shoes and when the world was young, when the world was new, Fat Charlie was sitting in the Garden of Eden. Or was it Olive Garden. These things are unimportant.
Posted by emily at February 22, 2005 11:45 PM