Yvette DuGuay

            On Tuesday morning I started posting “Rocking Chair” by Serge Gainsbourg on Christian’s Translations.

            I worked on typing and researching my Indigenous Studies lecture notes.

            Around noon I washed and scrubbed the two removable shelves from the set of shelves in my kitchen hallway. I think I sawed those shelves from a board I’d found many years ago. It had wood wallpaper on it and I finally peeled some of it off today.

            I had a can of tuna with green salsa and potato chips for lunch.

            I did my exercises in the afternoon while listening to Amos and Andy. This story begins with Kingfish’s rich uncle sending a telegram that he’s coming to town to see “the little one”. It turns out that Kingfish told his uncle that he had a child because his uncle has a policy of always giving $500 to any of his close relatives that have a baby. Now Kingfish has to find a way to keep his uncle from finding out that he is childless. He finds out that Andy and his girlfriend Gertrude will be taking Amos’s baby daughter Amosandra for a walk the day his uncle arrives and so he arranges for Andy to bring Amosandra around to pose as Kingfish’s daughter. Gertrude is to pose as Kingfish’s wife Sapphire. They meet Kingfish’s uncle in a park but Gertrude is not very convincing as the mother of the child. When the uncle says, “George didn’t tell me you had a little girl” Gertrude responds, “He didn’t tell me either.” The uncle thinks she’s just being funny. When the baby starts crying Kingfish tells Gertrude to “Go to our apartment to get the baby some food”. Gertrude asks, “Where’s our apartment?” Kingfish has to explain to his uncle that his wife is dumb as a stump.” The uncle leaves and Kingfish is sure he’s pulled off the ruse, but later his uncle comes to Kingfish’s building to bring the baby a toy. On the front steps he sees Andy smooching with Gertrude and he begins hitting Andy over the head with his cane. Kingfish and Andy later convince the uncle that Andy is Gertrude’s brother and theirs is an extremely affectionate family in which everyone is always kissing each other. Kingfish goes home to Sapphire and assures her that he’s definitely back in his uncle’s will. He and Sapphire embrace and begin to kiss but then suddenly Kingfish’s uncle walks in and wants to know who this woman is.

            I finished typing my lecture notes.

            For dinner I had a potato, a chicken breast and some gravy while watching Zorro.

            In this story, Luis de Guerro, the new commandant of Monterrey is an extremely vain man and he does not take kindly to being publicly humiliated. Ricardo the practical joker is standing beside the outdoor blacksmith shop when he sees Diego coming down the street. He prepares to blast Diego in the face with a bellows full of soot but does not realize that the commandant has rudely stepped ahead of Diego. Guerro gets his face blackened instead. Later Ricardo has set up a straw man in the plaza and is demonstrating for Anna Maria and Diego his skills on horseback with a lance as he charges the target but misses. He challenges Diego to a contest but before Diego can compete the commandant sees this as an opportunity to impress Anna Maria and he enters the competition himself. He charges the straw man on horseback and his lance hits it dead but Ricardo has placed solid wood under the straw and Guerro is knocked embarrassingly from his horse. This had been another of Ricardo’s practical jokes that had been meant for Don Diego. Later Ricardo lets Diego in on a plan he has to sour Anna Maria’s affections for Zorro. That night he plans to dress as Zorro and to serenade Anna Maria’s cousin Milana. Later still Sgt Garcia tells Diego that the new commandant has blamed him for all of the humiliation he has suffered lately. Diego asks if it would help get back in the commandant’s good graces if he were to capture Zorro. Diego tells Garcia he happens to know where Zorro will be that night.  That night Ricardo indeed dresses as Zorro and sings to Milana beneath her balcony. He has timed it so that he will be there when Anna Maria and Diego come back from their date. Anna Maria knows immediately that it’s Ricardo and not Zorro. Garcia arrives to arrest Zorro but when he is unmasked he knows that it must be a practical joke because Zorro and Ricardo have been seen together. Diego convinces Garcia that arresting Ricardo as if he were Zorro would be a good joke to play on the joker and he might learn a lesson. But when Guerra learns that Zorro has been captured he immediately orders a scaffold built for his execution. He refuses to be convinced by Garcia, Anna Maria or Diego that Ricardo is not Zorro. It seems that he is simply killing Ricardo in revenge for all of his jokes. Ricardo is about to be hung when Zorro hits the noose with a flaming arrow. He duels with Guerro and defeats him, carving a Z in his shirt. He warns him that if he tries to hang another man without a trial he would cut his Z deeper next time. Zorro also warns Ricardo not to impersonate him anymore and then dunks him in a horse trough.

            Milana was played by Yvette DuGuay, who came from France with her parents to New Jersey when she was an infant. She became a child film star and her success continued in adulthood.