Washing Under Things

            On Wednesday morning I found the lyrics for “Lui Encore” by Serge Gainsbourg and started translating it. Actually more of it has to remain in French because it presents a person walking through Paris and naming the streets and landmarks, which of course have French names. Each stanza ends with her turning as she walks and noticing the same guy following her. In the last verse she is home in bed, turns and he’s beside her. I assume that this has been her boyfriend all along.

            I’ve almost finished memorizing “Je Suis Snob” by Boris Vian.

            I washed the area of the living room floor where my dresser sits and about half a meter in front of it. Either because the floor is more stained in that area or because the dresser is white the cleaned floor doesn’t look as bright next to it as it does elsewhere.

            I did some exercises and took a bike ride. Just up O’Hara was a box full of a nice set of plates and bowls but they weren’t my style. I rode to Ossington and Dundas, south to Queen and then home.

            I went out to Fullworth and bought ten CR2032 batteries. On the way home from there I stopped at the liquor store to buy a six-pack of Creemore.

            For the last twelve days I’ve been downloading all twelve episodes of an anthology horror show filmed in the 1950s called “The Veil”. It was hosted by Boris Karloff and it’s been called “the greatest television series never seen” because it was cancelled before it aired. It was not shown until 40 years later. It finished downloading today and I’ll start watching it over the weekend.

            I finished my revisions of my “Paranoiac Utopia” manuscript by adding the “marrying mutilation with / music” to the end of the last poem. I emailed Albert Moritz to see if he has the time to look at it again.

            I made a hamburger on a bagel for dinner with tomato, cucumber, a slice of pickle, ketchup, mustard and hot sauce. I had it with a beer while watching the final episode of the first season of The Untouchables.

            With Al Capone in Alcatraz and Prohibition over, his enforcer Frank Nitti has gotten into the extortion business. The story begins with the owner of a small theatre getting acid thrown in his face. Other small cinema owners begin to pay protection money and emboldened by this Nitti decides to expand. He tries to sell protection to the owner of the Star Theatre chain, which has 1000 theatres across the country and makes $100 million a year. Nitti’s salesmen are an alcoholic lawyer named Lennox and a smooth talking liaison named Rogers. They talk to Dockstone the general manager and when he refuses to comply his car is blown up. Miller, the president decides to cooperate and pay $5 million but Macintyre, a reporter for Variety Magazine finds out and begins to humiliate Miller in their headlines. Macintyre gets beaten but he’s not intimidated. Ness forces Miller to testify. An attempt is made on Miller’s life and Agent Cam Allison, who became an Untouchable halfway through the season is fatally shot. The feds find that Rogers under his real name of Bresnovitch is wanted for violation of the Mann Act. Ness arrests him. Nitti could get Rogers out right away but decides it’s safer for him to be locked up. But when things get too hot he changes his mind and orders Rogers’s release to kill him. After Lennox gets Rogers out he warns him to get out of town. Rogers calls his girlfriend Ellie and they plan on getting out of town but Nitti arrives at her apartment before she can leave. She is killed after calling Ness to get him to save Rogers. Nitti is ordered killed by the unseen mob bosses. He tries to get away but encounters Ness and during a shootout falls in front of a commuter train.

            The real Frank Nitto was born in Angri, Italy and was Al Capone’s cousin. He came to Brooklyn with his mother and stepfather when he was seven. He left home at 14 because he didn't get along with his stepfather. At the age of 27 he moved to Chicago and worked as a barber. He got to know the local gangsters. He moved to Texas and married Rosa Levitt. He worked for but had a falling out with Texas mobsters and fled to Chicago. He became a bootlegger and began working for Johnny Torrio and Al Capone. Nitto ran Capone’s liquor business and proved to be a shrewd businessman and a strong leader. He also served as Capone’s ambassador to the Sicilian underworld. When Capone went to prison he named Nitto his head of operations. In 1928 Nitto divorced Rose and married Anna Ronga. They adopted a son named Joe from the Tennessee Children’s Home Society. In 1931 Nitto went to prison for a year and a half for income tax invasion. Upon release he became the new boss of the Capone gang. Nitto branched out from gambling and prostitution businesses to control of the labour unions. In December of 1932 Detective Sergeant Harry Lang and a team of cops raided Nitti’s office. He shot Nitto three times in the back and then shot himself to make it look like Nitto had fired first. In court it was revealed that Lang had been paid $15000 to kill Nitti. He was fired from the police force but only fined $100 for assault. Nitto’s wife Anna died in 1940. In 1942 he married Annette (Toni) Caravetta. While Nitti did extort money from the film industry it was not from the theatres but from the big studios. Nitto and several other members of the organization were indicted. The mob decided that this was all Nitto’s fault and so he should be the one to go to prison for it. Nitto was chronically claustrophobic and did not think he could handle a long term behind bars. On March 19, 1943, the day before his grand jury trial Nitto had breakfast with his wife and then she went to church. He got drunk and went to a railroad yard where he shot himself in the head. Only the cops, the media and the general public called him “Nitti”.