12-9-01

Here's something weird. I found out from a friend who lives in L.A. that Death by Zamboni was mentioned twice in the LA Times recently. I had no idea. So I search LATimes.com, and I found it mentioned by some guy named Steve Harvey in a column called "Only in L.A." He hadn't read my book, but the first reference was as follows:

October 24, 2001

Steve Harvey
Only in L.A.
In This Chilling Mystery Tale, the Body's Not the Only Thing That's on Ice
The Zamboni--Southern California's gift to the world--is no stranger to literature.

The ice resurfacer, a colorful performer during intermissions of pro hockey games, regularly appeared in Charles Schulz's "Peanuts" strip.

Woodstock, for instance, would often ride a tiny Zamboni atop his birdbath to replenish his ice rink there. Other artists took notice of the machine too. A sports cartoonist in USA Today once depicted a player who got five minutes in the penalty box for fighting. With the Zamboni.

Now, the gizmo, invented by Paramount businessman Frank Zamboni, has found a new genre. Bob Patterson writes that author David David Katzman (yes, yes, that's his name) has published a detective mystery titled "Death by Zamboni."

I haven't read it yet, but I assume the climax of the book involves a low-speed chase.

I'm sure Woodstock is not a suspect.

The second mention was about a month later when the same guy mentioned me in his column again:

Cold reception: I mentioned a new novel that seemed to be about a lethal ice-resurfacing machine: "Death by Zamboni."

It probably won't come as a surprise that the book, by David Katzman, will not be marketed by the Zamboni Co. of Paramount (which sells cute little likenesses of the machines).

That's probably just as well from a truth-in-advertising standpoint. The book, according to one summary, follows "antihero Satan Donut through a world of mimes, TV stars, zombies, blockheads, mad scientists, riot girls and werewolves."

But no hockey players. Zamboni spokeswoman Paula Jensen informed me that apart from the title, the book "actually has no other reference to Zamboni that we could find." I detected relief on her part.

Weird stuff, peeps.

PS. A shout goes out to our lovely friends Seth & Michele. They came by last night and a lovely time was had by all. We're going to be hair models for Michelle's final exam in March. Wheeeeeee!

PPS. Recent news reports finally acknowledge that there is proof Henry Kissinger and Gerald Ford gave Indonesian Dictator Suharto in 1975 approval to invade East Timor where the Indonesian military slaughtered over 200,000 people. Talk about having blood on your hands! Wheeeeeeeeee! And people wonder why I think absurdity as actually a realistic way to represent society.