September 2004 Archives

So it's Saturday at Coventry, I'd been trudging around in mud up to my ankles for over twenty four hours now when an inspiration hits me.

Why not take a picture of my muddy feet?

So I sit down and snap a few photos. These will be forgotten until I return to civilization a few days later. Finally I pull the pictures off my camera, and I came up with this picture:

Awesome! I loved the picture, so I ordered some prints of it, including some 18"x12" posters, which I wanted to sell on E-Bay. I get the prints in, and I put one of the posters up on E-Bay for a test run to see if it would draw any interest.

The E-Bay auction can be found here. (Please note that the auction may be over by the time this is read.)

Now here's where things start to get interesting. After a few days of having the auction up, I get an e-mail with the subject Question for item #3837209702 - Phish COVENTRY Muddy Feet Poster - 18"x12" - LE. The body of the e-mail said:

Dear phishvt,

Thank you,
mrspontanaity

A bit amused, I responded like this:

I can see two parts of this being possible: a) I met you at Coventry -- I met LOTS of people there and b) that Teva made more than one pair of that model sandal. I can guarentee you though, they are not your feet. I'm sorry for the dissapointment. If you feel you need to pursue this any futher, please feel free to have the appropriate people contact me.

Apparentally this didn't convince this person that I wasn't snapping pictures of his feet while he wasn't paying attention. Upon coming into work the next morning, I found this e-mail in my inbox:

Mickey,
I am not interested in having my people contact you're people but I've though of a solution, I can either send you a picture of my feet, pointing in the same direction in the same shoes to prove it or you can send me a poster. I don't think I 'm asking much considering these are my feet and you're making a significant profit off of them (I know they are gorgeous) but do you really think that I would go though this much trouble if the picture was not of my feet. My feet have certain characteristics that are indistinguishable and will help you make the connection to you're chosen vehicle for art. I think the poster is great and fortunatly I do collect posters myself but that picture is of my feet! I guarantee it! I am known to walk barefoot everywhere or in sandals and I have now had over twenty people verfiy my beauties on the print. If you need to have the cost of making the print and shipping to be covered then I will bow down and do that but I think that is being more than generous. Please don't blow this out of proportion, like I said, I'm flattered, I just want one of the prints so I can show it to my peers. I think you'll do the right thing and I will send you a sticker or some discs or something for you're troubles. O.K? Thanks

Eric
mrspontanaity@hotmail.com
2617 Colfax Ave S
Minneapolis, MN 55408

To be honest, at this point I didn't know what to think. I knew for a fact that the feet in the picture were mine, but it had crossed my mind that this person may be crazy, may actually think that his feet were for sale on E-Bay. I decided to put an end to it, I wrote one last reply to this person:

I can't believe I'm even having this conversation.

Regards,
Mickey

Since that last e-mail, I have not heard from this person. The e-mails were not altered in any way, just copied and pasted. As far as I know, the e-mail address and mailing address are real, and to be quite frank, I don't feel bad posting them for the entire Internet to see and use as they see fit.

Overall, I guess I'm kind of honored that someone would go through this much trouble to try to get a print of my feet. I like the picture, I was unsure anyone else would.

If you'd like to purchase a print of my feet, please contact me.

A bear walks into a bar in Billings, Montana and sits down. He bangs on the bar with his paw and demands a beer.

The bartender approaches and says, "We don't serve beer to bears in bars in Billings." The bear, becoming angry, demands again that he be served a beer. The bartender tells him again, more forcefully, "We don't serve beer to belligerent bears in bars in Billings."

The bear, very angry now, says, "If you don't serve me a beer, I'm going to eat that lady sitting at the end of the bar." The bartender says, "Sorry, we don't serve beer to belligerent, bully bears in bars in Billings"

The bear goes to the end of the bar, and, as promised, eats the woman. He comes back to his seat and again demands a beer.

The bartender states, "Sorry, we don't serve beer to belligerent, bully bears in bars in Billings who are on drugs."

The bear says, "I'm NOT on drugs!"

The bartender says, "You are now. That was a barbitchyouate."

Hehe.. thank you Julianne!

Hey Folks -

I promise I'll finish my saga about COVENTRY soon, it's certainly a work in progress. It's not like James Joyce wrote Finnegan's Wake in a few weeks.

So just an aside, a few comments on my last night's Chinese dinner.

First off, it was excellent, made me want to Wok and Roll all Night; but things were unfortunate for Sarah. When she opened her cookie, there was nothing inside.

Then, this morning, bringing my leftover General Tso's Chicken into work for lunch in a plain, white, very opaque styrofoam container, a woman with whom I work with says while nodding at the vessel containing my lunch, "Mmmm.. that looks good!"

If styrofoam is that appetizing to her, remind me not to bring in chili in a bread bowl.