Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Next one in 1996.
[00:00:02] Speaker B: Oh, no, you gotta say your name first.
[00:00:04] Speaker A: Oh, do it again.
[00:00:05] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:00:06] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:00:06] Speaker B: Just the intro.
[00:00:07] Speaker A: Okay. Hi, my name is Dawn Vavic. I work for Latrobe Parks and Recreation. In 1996, Tom Petty and Johnny Cash, two icons worth a combined $190 million, came together to make an album called Unchained. That they didn't call it Petty Cash is, to me, a bitter disappointment.
[00:00:26] Speaker B: Okay, thanks and welcome to season two, episode two of the use all the Crayons podcast, a podcast that tells you how we're always keeping it colorful right here in Latrobe, Pennsylvania, birthplace of Arnold Palmer, Fred Rogers, rolling rock, beer, and relevant to today's topic, the banana split. We're going to recap the annual festival talk with local marketing executive Shelley Oler of the Latro Bulletin, and recap the greatest songs in rock'n roll history. If all the greatest songs in rock and roll history were all about monkeys, I apologize in advance for all the sloppy transitions, the dead air, the Burps, the farts, the sneezes, and mysterious moans you're about to hear. I'm now doing this podcast all by myself. I listened to last weeks, and I gotta tell you, it was rough. How rough? It was so rough that all its tattoos had tattoos. And some of them even had tattoos. They were three twos tattoos.
This week, I'm going to do one of my favorite county fair colorful living tips of the day again, and I hope it'll tide me over for a year.
Stand outside the rabbit exhibit and sing in a very loud voice. Can anybody find me somebody to love?
This one's from 2013, back when we tried to set the Guinness World Record for most people simultaneously peeling bananas. And mom used to wonder if I'd ever amount to anything. It was the finale to La Trobe's first great american banana split festival. Highlights included a banana split themed sock hop, a banana split themed street festival, a banana split themed song contest, and a bank robbery.
Can you believe it? I mean, that the bank robbery was not being banana split themed?
Yes. While many were attending a downtown ceremony where the historical marker was being unveiled, a crafty robber seized on the inconvenient logistics and held up the Citizens Bank 1 mile away before racing away to, I guess, the great American Crystal Meth Festival. Oh, how I wish I could report the culprit was apprehended after slipping on a bank parking lot banana peel. He and his driver got away with an indeterminate amount of cash, which is now, like the suspects themselves.
Reports say the radio transmitter controlled die packets exploded. The same thing happened to Gail and Evel snotes in raising Arizona. I can't believe any would be bank robbers. Haven't seen it. It's a great movie, very funny. And parts of it are like vo tech school for stupid crooks.
These exploding die packs are very sound deterrence to criminal activity. They either stain or destroy the money, burn the robber with heat and tear gas elements, and leave the getaway vehicles and the robbers themselves covered in indelible disperse red number nine Inc.
Too bad they don't have an equivalent to turn to the Wall street bankers who use clever accounting tricks to rip off banks and taxpayers of untold millions of oh wait, they do. It's none.
With reward money on the line, I'm on the lookout and am beginning to frustrate police with numerous citizens arrests. Note for a person to be considered a suspect, more skin than just his or her neck has to be red.
It has me wondering if anyone will take extra precautions next August when Latrobe intends to again celebrate its role in the creation of America's heirloom dessert. For ceremonial purposes, I'd at least like to see if sponsor dole fruits will pay to fill the packs with dispersed yellow number nine ink.
Either way, I'm glad no one was hurt. I was in that very bank the previous week at the very time of the robbery. That's my mother's bank, and I use that branch when I need to administer to her meager funds. So naturally, I spent a good deal of the weekend wondering how I would have reacted had the crime happened before my eyes would have tried to be the hero. Not a chance. Run. After all, turning yellow and splitting was, for at least this weekend in Latrobe, the civic thing to do.
Spotlight on books this is the segment where I talk about some of the books I've written. I've written eleven books now. Four of them are so bad I don't even acknowledge they exist. Do you know how bad a book has to be for the author to not even acknowledge it exists? It's like having a kid so ugly and stupid you won't put his picture up on the mantel.
But this book I'm very proud of. It came out in 2013. It's the last baby boomer, the story of the ultimate ghoul pool. The last baby boomer will be 112 years old in the year 2076. People are going to be so sick of baby boomers, they're going to put him in a museum, charge $25 to be with him for 15 minutes. If you're in the room when he dies. You in the jackpot. I thought this book was really going to do well and make me famous, actually, and I think it still might one day.
I was so proud of it that I started putting I'd see these other books that had stickers for awards they'd won, and I thought the books were all inferior to my book, so I could have made up my own sticker and put it on the book. It's the Tanara award. I won the 2018 Tanara award. Tanara stands for this is not a real award, and that's made its way around the Internet now. Some people think of it as legit. If you'd like a copy of the last baby boomer, call me or get in touch and it's $20. I'll be happy to sign it and send it to you. People really like the book, too, because everyone has to die, but only one of us gets to die last.
This is from 2017.
I mentioned to a friend a while back that I was self conscious eating a banana in public. Like I was afraid someone would snap a picture and invite cruel captions.
I don't know what you're doing with your banana, he said, but you'd need to just bite it.
Since last year, I've probably spent more time thinking about how to eat a banana than most people. That was because back then our fourth grader came home and said, look, here's how Mister Walker says monkeys eat bananas. She took a perfectly good banana, turned it upside down, and squeezed the scab until it was nothing but peel and pudding. Then she handed me the mess.
I don't know how she expected me to react to her little demonstration. Perhaps she was hoping to engage me in some discussion of evolutionary quirks. Instead, I said, what the hell are they teaching in school these days? Get your ass into your bedroom and don't come out until mommy and I are good and drunk.
At home, we lead by example. Hate probably a banana a day. I love them. Here's a the flabby aerodynamics of a banana peel make it impossible to heave one more than 20ft from a second story window across a tavern's gravel parking lot. That's what I do with all mine. It degrades so quickly. No one's ever said, geez, how come there's always a hazardous number of banana peels in the pond parking lot? I guess we can blame the stooges for the mistaken belief that stepping on a banana peel can knock the legs out from under dimwits that happened all the time with the Stooges, and it happened with the old battle acts played by Ethel Merman in the near perfect 1963 screwball comedy. It's a mad, mad, mad, mad world, but I've never seen it happen in real life. Seeing it happen to someone like Elon Musk is way up there on my bucket list. I don't know whether or not monkeys eat bananas upside down or not, but I know adding monkey to anything improves everything.
I was thinking about this as I was listening to a string of great monkey rock songs, and wouldn't that category improve the Grammys? There's monkey man by the Stones, one of their finest. Shock the Monkey by Peter Gabriel, punish the monkey by Mark Knopfler and the cheeker cheeky tweeter and the monkey man by the traveling wilberries. Delbert McClinton has monkey around chorus. You made a man into a monkey that monkey's gonna monkey a round.
I saw Bruce Springsteen monkeying around with a background singer the very night I heard him sing his great monkey song. The obscure part man, part monkey. It was 1988, the tunnel of Love tour. I remember seeing him actually making out on stage in between songs with a bandmate. And it wasn't little Stephen. I know what you're thinking. Shocking. A rock and roll singer kissing a girl who wasn't his wife.
Yes, my prudish friend, I remember thinking the exact same thing. At this time he was married to the luscious Julianne Phillips, an eighties vixen who had more hair than the floor of an unswept beauty salon. The on stage woman with whom he was making out, Patty Scalfa, Springsteen's wife since 1990. Part man, part monkey, references the scopes monkey trial and comes down squarely on the side of the chimps. And who can forget inherit the wind, the Spencer Tracy Jean Kelly movie about the historic trial. Outstanding. So there you have it, a comprehensive story about monkeys and bananas. Whereas Troy McClure said on the Simpsons when he performed the musical version of the planet of the apes, it has everything from chimpanzee to chimpanzee. And now it's time for me to peel and eat my banana. But first, I'm closing the drapes. I think we've all had enough monkey business for one day.
[00:09:43] Speaker A: This is Shelley. I work for the Latrobe bulletin. Oh, okay. Want me to. What did you say these were called?
[00:09:48] Speaker B: Colorful living tip of the day.
[00:09:50] Speaker A: Colorful living, tip of the day. Okay. Hi, this is Shelley Oler. I work for the Latrobe bulletin. And our colorful living tip of the day is to do something you love to do each and every day, just because it's something you love to do each and every day.
[00:10:02] Speaker B: And what do you do each and every day that you love to do?
[00:10:04] Speaker A: I am in marketing for our bulletin here, and I do all kinds of different advertising for tons of local businesses. And my strategy and my purpose there is to help everybody get their products and service out to the market and let them know why people should shop local and support our community.
[00:10:22] Speaker B: So when people see you coming in the door, they're happy to see you.
[00:10:25] Speaker A: Yes. At least I hope so. I can always say that most of the people I work with are absolutely fabulous, and I get to have so much fun getting to know their business and their services and what they offer us here. There's a lot of stuff around that I don't think people, people necessarily realize we have here. I think everybody sometimes takes for granted that the local stuff we have is more available than what they think. I think you think of chain stuff for a lot of products and services, but we have a lot of people here who are more than skilled and able to provide those same things. And sometimes in better windows.
[00:10:56] Speaker B: Yeah. I'm the Latrobe Bulletins favorite author by Latrobe bulletin readers.
[00:11:02] Speaker A: Yes. So we recently ran our community Choice awards, and it recognized businesses, services, and individuals in tons of categories with over 150 different ways. And you came up as our best local author, voted by the community.
[00:11:14] Speaker B: I'm flattered by that.
[00:11:15] Speaker A: I'm glad to share the news. It was very exciting to go around and share with everybody. But John Grisham called and complained, no, we didn't have anything.
No, we didn't have anybody bad mouth at anybody. Everybody was very supportive and happy to share in the news, and it was great to have so much recognition, so much participation from the community. We broadened it this year greatly, and there were so many people that had fun taking part.
[00:11:38] Speaker B: What was the most oddball category that you had? Do you remember any?
[00:11:40] Speaker A: Oh, I don't know of anything off the wall. We did a lot of stuff that was pretty, pretty standard for things that you would recognize. We didn't do anything too crazy. I guess it depends on how you look at it, what you think might be a little bit out of the ordinary, but yeah.
[00:11:57] Speaker B: How was the banana split festival? Did you have anything to do with that?
[00:11:59] Speaker A: This year we did. So our publication actually does the official program for the banana split of festival. So we put out the little booklet that gives you the schedule of the events and some fun pictures and things of the history of it and years before.
[00:12:11] Speaker B: What was the most historic thing that's ever happened that you know of?
[00:12:15] Speaker A: Oh, that I know of.
[00:12:16] Speaker B: Oh, boy.
[00:12:17] Speaker A: That's a good question. Um.
I don't know offhand. I would want to pick something.
[00:12:22] Speaker B: Were you here for the 2013 great banana split bank robbery?
[00:12:26] Speaker A: I was not.
[00:12:27] Speaker B: Have you heard about that?
[00:12:28] Speaker A: I have heard of some of it, but I don't know the whole. Whole thing. To be educated on it as I would like to be.
[00:12:33] Speaker B: It's fascinating. Well, it's not fascinating, but the timing was odd that they decided to rob the bank the moment the banana split festival plaque was being unveiled.
[00:12:43] Speaker A: Yeah. Where you'd get the idea that that should be when you strike.
[00:12:46] Speaker B: Yeah. And I wish for the sake of irony that somebody would have been tripped on a banana peel in cabbage.
[00:12:52] Speaker A: That would have been good. I think that would have been the nice little icing on the cake.
[00:12:58] Speaker B: How long have you lived in laitrobe your whole life?
[00:13:00] Speaker A: I've been here most of my life, yeah. When I was little, I lived out towards Irwin, and then we had moved out to Laitrobe, and I went to school mostly in Laitrobe and St. Vincent. And St. Vincent, yep. Proud to be an alumni.
[00:13:11] Speaker B: That's good.
[00:13:12] Speaker A: So, yeah, absolutely.
[00:13:13] Speaker B: What do you have going on next? What's the next big project?
[00:13:16] Speaker A: We do a lot of stuff coming up for the fall. The next big thing with us is Fort Ligonier days.
[00:13:21] Speaker B: Yeah, that's huge.
[00:13:21] Speaker A: Yeah, we'll be focusing on that and a couple of the other fall events around. We've been broadening some of the things we do to encompass more of the local stuff surrounding us. So we can give you kind of like a heads up on what's coming around the area so you don't miss it.
[00:13:35] Speaker B: The family days are doing well, correct?
[00:13:37] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah.
[00:13:38] Speaker B: The banana split has been bigger and better every year.
[00:13:41] Speaker A: Yeah. It seems to be building great momentum. Same with 4 July. They really broadened that this year. It was bigger than it ever has been.
[00:13:48] Speaker B: Is there an event that isn't getting spotlit enough? It does get enough attention that you think.
[00:13:52] Speaker A: I don't think that there's anything at the moment that lacks in another. But do we have opportunities to build on them for sure? Yeah, there's definitely.
[00:13:59] Speaker B: When you meet somebody, they're not from Lake trip and they find out you are, what do you tell them or what are they most interested in hearing about?
[00:14:05] Speaker A: Everybody's number one thing is always Mister Rogers or Arnold Palmer. And I always say those are great legends, and those are wonderful things to know about the area. But there's so much more. So I always invite them to take a deeper dive if they get the chance to take a look around town. There's more here than just those two big names.
[00:14:20] Speaker B: Yeah.
How many years? What's the most consecutive winners that you've had in one category for the Latrobe's favorites?
[00:14:29] Speaker A: Oh, my goodness. That's a good question. I haven't been with the bulletin long enough to answer that accurately, but I know we have some that are over 15 years, so they've definitely held their spot for a long time.
[00:14:40] Speaker B: So if they stop winning and I keep winning, I'll have to keep going until, like, 2038.
[00:14:43] Speaker A: You'd have to go at least to 2030.
[00:14:46] Speaker B: I don't know how many books I have left in me to see how.
[00:14:49] Speaker A: Far you can make it. How far can we stretch it? Can we go that long?
[00:14:52] Speaker B: Could you do the writing category twice a year?
[00:14:54] Speaker A: We could possibly look and do a spring and a fall version, maybe. We'll see what we can do before I get a whole.
[00:14:59] Speaker B: Thank you very much. I'm flattered to be chosen.
[00:15:01] Speaker A: I really am absolutely happy to share the news. Yeah, it's great. I'm so happy to be able to recognize a lot of local great people. We have a lot here that we can stand to recognize.
[00:15:11] Speaker B: Do you want to read another colorful living tip of the day?
[00:15:13] Speaker A: Would you like me to? I'd like you to, sure.
Let me see here. What do we've got?
[00:15:23] Speaker B: I think the people who listen to my podcast are used to dead air, so take all the time you want.
[00:15:27] Speaker A: Gotcha.
[00:15:31] Speaker B: Now the big question will be whether I hit record on the.
[00:15:37] Speaker A: I gotcha.
I like this one. I think this is a good one. To kind of be a humorous little tip to the day, I propose they rename the phone book, the big book of names and numbers of people you don't know will never meet and will never call.
[00:15:57] Speaker B: Thank you very much.
[00:15:58] Speaker A: Absolutely.
[00:15:58] Speaker B: Pleasure having you on. I look forward to seeing you next year for the same ceremony.
[00:16:02] Speaker A: Absolutely. For sure. We're gonna put all the votes out for you.
Thank you.
[00:16:07] Speaker B: Let's see what he has here.
Did he explain this to you?
Bel and I had such a great time at the great american Banana Split festival. I vow to no longer refer to it with my snide alternative that being the great American B's festival. But the Laetrope festival, now in its 10th year, is becoming a rousing success. A highlight for us was the yellow tie gala at the Laitrobe Arts center. One of the festival organizers told me the gala was a hit. The only complaint I heard, she said, was some guests saw a couple of young men sneak into the open bar to steal beer. Steal beer? I said, suddenly alert. How many? Just a couple. No big deal.
I had to stifle a laugh. In the grand scheme of things, just a couple amounts to little more than spillage. I know because I once took part in the great Columbus draft beer heist.
I'm ambivalent about revealing the details here because it was, I guess, a criminal misdemeanor, and I'm reluctant to encourage others in the ways of crafty theft. And I know a lot of people think drinking is bad, as societal woe and drunkenness shouldn't be celebrated. To those thoughtful contrarians, I say, get your own damn podcast. These are tense times. I think it's good for people to know that the free drunk still exists. I helped make it happen in Columbus back in the late 1980s, back when my life was playing out like one long beer commercial. It was one of those music festivals where they make you wait in line to buy beer tickets before you can wait in line to buy beer, and then they lead you to wait in line to urinate before you could start the whole tedious process.
As this arrangement would not do for impatient sophisticates like my friends and I. We found an enterprising looking guy working for the Budweiser taps and made him an offer. We'd give him $20 up front, and he'd give us free beers whenever we were empty. Deal.
And for an hour it worked like a charm. But then he abruptly announced his shift was ending and it was time for him to vamoose. I thought we were screwed, but my buddy Bob had an idea. He said, follow me, and made a beeline for the busiest beer table on the lot. Once there, he scampered beneath the barricade as the frantic bartender began to object. What the hell do you think you're doing? He said. I'm Frank, Bob said. Bill told me you were swamped out here and I should come and help out. The beleaguered bartender said, start pouring, Bob. Frank had been touched by genius. He poured two beers and handed them to me, seeing his genius had inspired mine, so I promptly threw the beers to the ground. You call that a beer? I screamed. I paid for 20 beers, and damn it, I want 20 beers. 20 full beers.
My tirade immediately earned my friend the crowd sympathy I'd made myself out to be the bad guy so none of the other bartenders would want to wait on me. Bob Frank poured me two more and said, please, sir, understand we're doing the best we can. Please be patient. What happened over the next hour was like the miracle of the loaves and fishes, only with red solo cups and cheap domestic beer. He handed me the two beers and I'd pass them back to our friends, who'd eventually pass them off to nearby girls or other friendly strangers. A good time was had by all. Still, I understand there was some moral ambiguity to this tale. We stole no money, no gems, but clearly we took something of value in the eyes of the thirsty recipients, stealing foamy beers and giving them to young inebriates. It wasn't like we could claim the mantle of Robin Hood, more like Robin head. Of course, none of this troubled us at the time. Me, Bob, Frank, and all our friends enjoyed a good giggle, and when an organizer showed up asking to see the receipts, we just did what came natural. We made like bananas and split.
This was from 2016, when the presidential race of that year was going pretty strong.
I was annoyed all weekend after hearing cable news channels promising real slugfests and then tuning into the presidential debates that didn't feature real slugs. Snakes and jackasses certainly were not a single terrestrial gastropod mollusk in the bunch. I have for years been to many various sporting events that were later described as slugfests where I never saw a single slug. None of them were all that festive to boot. How come slugfests never involved slugs? I love a good offbeat food festival and have, through many of the years, written many stories about them. There's the Frog leg festival every January in Fellasmore, Florida, followed, I guess, by the legless frog wheelchair festival every February.
The Calf Fry festival motto, 24 years of turning bulls into steers, is in Stillwater, Oklahoma. Each April, calf fries are bulls or calf's testicles that are peeled, sliced, breaded, and deep fried, presumably after they've been removed from the animal. Each June, Zilker park in fabulous Austin has the bug eating festival, featuring fried grasshoppers, wasps, hissing roaches, and grass scorpions. Val and I had one of our best meals ever in Austin at the famed Driscoll Hotel. It took place over an hour, over 4 hours, and featured 18 decadent courses. It was all very sumptuous, and if there was any, and if there were any buggy entrees, it was purely accidental. Many charming seaside communities have yearly oyster fests. I'd attend every one of them if I could. I just love oysters.
But what makes the slimy oyster ocean slug so culinary superior to the slimy slug? After all, escargot is served in all the fanciest restaurants for about a buck a bug. And what is a slug but a snail with selfish pretensions? Shellfish pretentions?
The Eat the Weeds website says slugs are perfectly edible as long as you cook them thoroughly, or else they can kill you. Big whoop. You take your life in your hands going into Chipotle these days, I propose laitrope community leaders rally around hosting America's first actual slugfest. It could mirror our great american banana split festival, but instead of banana splits, the feature would be slugs.
We could have slug eating contests. Our talented local chefs could create recipes to see who makes the tastiest slugs. How about slug racing? You could paint tiny numbers on the sides of slugs and set up a slug racetrack to see which is the speediest slug in greater Lake Row. Rules will have to stipulate provisions in case none of the contestants slugs make it across the footlong finish line before the conclusion of the three day event.
And it could artfully incorporate all the uses of the term slug that have nothing to do with slugs. We could have sluggers from the local saloon league baseball softball teams, see who could slug the ball the farthest. Craftsmen and women could make folk art from slugs gathered at the ranges. Out of our many local guns clubs, I foresee scholarly presentations by slug experts familiar with arclane slug facts. For instance, you know slugs have 27,000 teeth. It's true. And to honor the fact, I suggest we find a slug dentist to serve as the grand marshal of the first annual slugfest parade. The slugfest dance would be a huge hit with those too normally shy to shaganhe. Why? Slugs are hermaphrodites. They're sexual independence and don't need partners to reproduce. So you could dance with boys or girls all by yourself and still wind up satisfied. That's all for now. I can't devote another second to thinking about ways Laitrope can make this event the success I'm sure it is destined to be. For some reason, I'm all of a sudden feeling really sluggish.
32 being a world class juggler takes real balls. Or pins or clubs, etcetera.
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My colorful living tip of the day is learn the fine art of knowing. John Jamison, retired sheep farmer, Crabtree, Pennsylvania we'll be back next week with more humor and heart, and hopefully less, hopefully fewer human errors coming to you from the heart of the lovely laurel highlands in western Pennsylvania. And if we're not the heart, we're at least one of the vital organs. Latrobe, Pennsylvania have a great day of the day is learn the fine art of knowing precisely when to quit. Thank you. Yes. Sage advice, my friend. I should have quit about 20 minutes ago.
