Real Stories of The Blues, Part I: Miss Carbon Monoxide Copyright 1998 Leonard Richardson ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Starring: Stuttering Willie Richardson and Dirty Shoes Willie [The parts that are laid out like song lyrics should be sung and have a blues riff played after each line.] -------------------------------------------------------- [blues riff] Stuttering Willie Richardson: My name is Stuttering Willie Richardson, and I've got the blues! [blues riff] SWR: On my right is Dirty Shoes Willie, and he's got the blues! Ain't that right, Willie? Dirty Shoes Willie: Oh, you know it's God's own truth, Stuttering Willie! [blues riff] SWR: And on my left is Steamboat Willie. Willie, you got the blues? Steamboat Willie: Hnn-hnn! You bet I've got the blues, Stuttering Willie! I'm as blue as blue can be! SWR: Get out of my blues band, you terminally happy Miskatonic freak! SWR: You don't have a clue What it means to be blue! You don't even stutter Or have dirty shoes! SWR: So I got the blues, you know, I got all kinds of blues, I went down south and got them southern blues. DSW: Oh, oh! Went up north, caught those northern blues! SWR: I hear you, Dirty Shoes Willie, seems everywhere I go those blues just get me down! SWR: I went to Des Moines Went to Lincoln, Nebraska From Melber, Kentucky To Anchorage, Alaska Seems every town In the U S of A Has got the blues In a different way DSW: Stuttering Willie, just how blue are your blues? SWR: My blues have a wavelength of exactly 434 nanometers! DSW: Man, that's blue! SWR: You said it! DSW: Actually, you said it. SWR: No need to quibble Over something so minor I even got the blues from Michael Yount Down in South Carolina! DSW: Why, it's enough to make you scratch your head! SWR: I reckon it is, Dirty Shoes Willie. What on earth could be behind this epidemic of the blues? It seems to have permeated every facet of our everyday lives, the very American Way! DSW: The blues! [blues riff] SWR: All except for that coke fiend I kicked out! [snorts] But even recreational drugs can't save us from the pallor of blues that hangs over this fair nation! DSW: Why, Stuttering Willie, I reckon... SWR: What? What do you reckon? Out with it, Dirty Shoes! DSW: Stuttering Willie, you ever hear of Miss Carbon Monoxide? [blues riff] SWR: Wha--well stick whiskers on me and call me a Louisiana catfish! Miss Carbon Monoxide! DSW: Then you have heard of her? SWR: Never in my life! DSW: Why, she roams around the country inflicting on innocent people the horrible fate which we were only now discussing! SWR: She sticks whiskers on people and calls them Louisiana catfish? DSW: I speak rather of the blues! [blues riff] SWR: The blues?!?! [blues riff] DSW: You'll meet at a bar Or a sleazy hotel With a skin-tight dress And a degree from Cornell There's really nothing That you can do 'Cause when you're not looking She'll take off and leave you blue! SWR: Dirty Shoes Willie, have you been burned by this woman! DSW: More than once! SWR: More than once? DSW: She it was who made me blue! Blue as a Smurf I am! Mark my words, Stuttering Willie, she travels in many disguises! It is her I suspect of spreading the dark cloud of the blues into every corner of this land of liberty! SWR: But Dirty Shoes Willie, if what you say is true, how can one distinguish between one of the many manifestations of Miss Monoxide and any of the other women who inevitably torment, string along, and/or kill us blues musicians? [blues riff] DSW: It is inevitably the county coroner who first discovers her mischief during the course of an autopsy! A blues man may die by stabbing, by gunshot wound, by exposure to the elements; these are routine and arouse little suspicion. But do the nasty with the Blues Queen of Death, and your ultimate fate will be death by the blues, pure and simple! [Sotto voice person:] Effective on household stains, yapping toy poodles, and that pesky crabgrass that just won't seem to go away. [blues riff] SWR: Some good it does to know this, after the fact! DSW: Ah, there is one other sign, Stuttering Willy! SWR: And what would that sign be? DSW: A blues man who has struck up an acquaintance with Miss Carbon Monoxide can be recognized by the subtle changes such a relationship inevitably brings to the lyrics of his songs. [Someone singing in a lounge singer type voice:] Oh, I got a woman And her teeth are pearly white I got a woman And her teeth are pearly white, yeah! Well she comes to all my gigs And she puts out every night SWR: This man hardly sounds blue! DSW: And the longer the set-up, the deeper the plunge into the bottomless pit of the blues when Miss Carbon Monoxide takes the first train out of town, leaving you alone in a fleabitten motel room with nothing but a ten-cent harmonica to your name! [Cheesy harmonica, interrupted by Stuttering Willy screaming.] SWR: AAAAH! Man, I remember when ten cents would buy you a _good_ harmonica! DSW: Those days are gone, Stuttering Willie Richardson! SWR: Man, I must be getting OLD! [blues riff] DSW: It's inflation, Stuttering Willie Richardson! [blues riff] SWR: Oh that inflation It's just no use They print more money Than the value we produce DSW: You realize that this has gotten completely off the wall! SWR: That's what the blues is all about! DSW: The blues is about pain and suffering! There is no room in the blues for your petty sentimentality! SWR: I'm gonna have me a cup of cocoa With a big ol' marshmallow! DSW: Now you're just being weird! SWR: Darn right! Take us out! [Blues solo.]