Jeannie Bell

            On Thursday morning I felt a lot of tension in my chest. It seems it came from thinking about my landlord's threats but maybe that was combined with the prospect of having to ride all the way back to The 12th Fret today to get my guitar set up. It went out of tune more today since Gian started trying to set it up yesterday but then deciding it would take too long for him to do it when the dealer should be dealing with it. I don't understand why The 12th Fret didn't set it up in the first place. I've never come across a dealer that has set a guitar up before I took it home but it makes sense that they should. 

            I worked out the chords for the fifth verse of "La Dernière valse" (The Final Waltz) by Boris Vian. 

            I finished posting "The Ashes of Our Love", my translation of "Quoi" by Serge Gainsbourg. That completes his songs from 1984. He didn't publish any songs in 1985 and so I started the first song from the 1986 list, which is "Mon père un Catholique" (My Dad Was Catholic). There are fifteen songs in the 1986 list, ten in 1987, ten in 1988, but 23 in 1990, which was his last year of productivity. So there are a total of fifty-eight songs left in my Gainsbourg translation project and then his short novel. I might have it all done before the end of this year. 

            I weighed 85.5 kilos before breakfast. 

            In the late morning I packed up my Martin and rode out to The 12th Fret at Danforth and Woodbine. For a normal bike ride downtown at today's temperature of around 13 degrees I probably would have worn my leather motorcycle jacket. But I felt it would be too heavy for such a long ride and so I just wore a long sleeved shirt and one scarf with my hoody on top and my spring gloves. I stopped just before Logan to pee at the Second Cup and then continued on. At The 12th Fret I didn't have to leave my guitar and someone worked on it right away. He said the action on my high E string was ridiculously low and spent about twenty minutes adjusting it. I asked why they don't set up guitars before buyers take them home. I was told that if I had played it before I bought it and noticed something wrong they would have fixed it. I said I'm not an expert and I can't tell about whether a guitar is working properly just from noodling on it in the store. The guy told me that the concept of a "set-up" is subjective and that it's more about the customer playing it and finding something specific that doesn't sound right. I find these guys intimidating because they seem to look at me like I'm from Mars when I say something that isn't knowledgeable about how a guitar should sound. I think that guitarists look at someone my age with a guitar and expect them to have the expertise of someone whose been playing since they were young, which is not my case. Anyway, after the adjustment it sounded okay to me. At least I impressed him in having a gig bag that would fit over my backpack while riding my bike. 

            When I told them I'd ridden my bike from Parkdale I was told that a guy who works in the back of the shop cycles there from Parkdale every day. 

            On the way home I stopped at Freshco where the grapes were all soft and so I bought two bags of oranges. I also got a pack of blackberries, a pack of blueberries, a pack of five-year-old cheddar, a bag of kettle chips, three bags of milk, a jug of limeade, and a pack of Sponge Towels. The cashier Amelia asked how I was and I said it was past my nap time. She said I did look tired. 

            I weighed 84.1 kilos at 15:00, which is the lightest I've been at lunchtime in twenty-seven days.

            I took a late siesta and got up at 17:00. 

            I weighed 84.8 kilos at 17:00. 

            I was caught up on my journal at 18:05. 

            I reviewed the videos of me singing "Baby Pop" and "Dance to Baby Pop" from June 21 to June 28. Each version had two takes that worked out fairly well. One of each was pretty good with smooth traffic noise and one of each was pretty good with hardly any noise. 

            In the Movie Maker project for creating a video of my song "Instructions for Electroshock Therapy" I synchronized my latest insertion of Brian Haddon singing "shock therapy" with the studio audio and I gave his part a sepia tone effect. Next I worked on trying to synchronize the concert video of me singing "refer to current literature" with the studio audio. I kept on shaving off parts of the video but so far I couldn't get it to fit. Then I realized I had two copies of that part of the video sitting on the timeline, so I deleted the first one and started shaving the second one. I'll try to get closer tomorrow. 

            I finished scanning the set of negatives of Amsterdam that I started a couple of days ago and started another set, mostly of canals, bridges. and houseboats. 

            I grilled two T-bone steaks and had one with a potato. There's was no gravy so I used margarine. I ate while watching season 8, episodes 18 and 19 of The Beverly Hillbillies. 

            The first story takes up from where the previous one left off. Shorty had gone for a ride in Jane's car with Gloria when he was supposed to leave for Las Vegas with Elverna to get married. Elly's chimp Bessie had gotten into the back seat of Shorty's car, put on Shorty's hat and gone to sleep under a blanket. Elverna had thought that Bessie was Shorty and so she decided to let him rest while she drove to Las Vegas. This story begins with Elverna backing the car back to the house after realizing that Shorty was not the one in the back. Elverna goes into the house and then Shorty returns with Gloria. She invites him for dinner at her place that night and he accepts, having entirely forgotten about Elverna. When Elverna confronts him he says he can't get married until he's had his bachelor party. He says Milburn Drysdale is throwing it. Jed calls Drysdale to ask if he's throwing Shorty a bachelor party and Drysdale thinks he's asking him to arrange for one and so he says yes. Seven women from the secretarial pool are brought into Drysdale's office. One of them, named Jean Bell, is the first black woman and the second black person to appear on this show in the eight years it's been on. Drysdale says one of them will get a bonus for the best idea for a bachelor party theme. He tells them they'll be working late and Jean asks if they get paid extra. Drysdale says, "You are new! You work because I order you to!" She says, "I thought slavery had been abolished!" That gives Drysdale the idea for the bachelor party to be themed after an oriental slave auction. Jean says, "Oh goody! I get the bonus!" But later Drysdale tells Jane that he's giving himself the bonus and not Jean. Drysdale sends two harem girl costumes to the Clampett house in case Elly May wants to play a slave at Shorty's bachelor party. But Granny and Elverna intercept the costumes and decide to sneak into the festivities. Jed and Shad also decide to go to the party. 

            At the party Drysdale is dressed as a sultan and Shorty as a sheik. Shorty gives Gloria a hug as he comes in and it looks like they really like each other even though she rejected him a few episodes ago. The first entertainment is a belly dancer. Jed and Shad arrive also in costume as shahs. Three slaves come in and step onto the stage. Granny and Elverna arrive. Elverna steps onto the auction block. Jethro arrives but Jed tells him to leave. He decides to grab one of the girls on his way out and unknowingly carries Granny away. Elverna reveals herself and breaks up the party. Shorty gets another warm hug from Gloria. 

            Jed and Shad are really distastefully pushy about getting Shorty to marry Elverna. He should be able to do whatever the hell he wants, like be with Gloria. 

            The second story directly continues after the previous one. Over the next night Shorty keeps trying to sneak away but Jed keeps catching him. Jed and Shad wake Shorty up in the morning and he locks himself in the bathroom. Jed puts Elly's bear in a tree outside the bathroom window so Shorty can't get away. 

            Meanwhile at Drysdale's bank Jane reminds Drysdale of Jean Bell the secretary who he cheated out of the bonus she was supposed to get for thinking of the slave girl theme for Shorty's bachelor party. She tells him that Jean's little brother Cooky wants to see him. Drysdale says to bring him in because he's expecting a child but Cooky is a very large and muscular black man. Then her big brother comes in as well. They confront Drysdale about the slave auction he had. Drysdale explains it was just pretend and has the three secretaries who posed as slaves come in, including Jean. The brothers confront Drysdale about the $100 bonus. Drysdale asks which of the women is their sister. Drysdale writes a cheque to Jean for $100. 

            Back at the Clampett mansion Shad removes the bathroom door to get Shorty out. They tie him up until it's time for him and Elverna to leave for Las Vegas. They untie him and almost convince him that it could be great running the Silver Dollar Hotel with Elverna until she comes in and kisses him. Now he's sure again he doesn't want to marry her. 

            Back at the bank Jane shows Drysdale the bills for the party. He wonders how he's going to explain it to the board of directors. Jane has the idea that they can turn it into an ad for the bank. "Don't be a slave to debt. Save your money the Commerce Bank". Drysdale likes the idea but doesn't want to pay any of the other women and since he's already paid Jean he wants her to put on the slave girl's outfit again and reshoot the ad. 

            Meanwhile as Elverna and Shorty are getting ready to leave for Las Vegas, Shorty overhears Elverna declare that she can't stand gambling. Shorty pretends to accidentally drop his poker deck and then reveals his dice. He says the gambling fever has got him. Elverna tells everyone she's reluctant to marry him now. Jed and Shad say Shorty's spit the hook again. 

            Back at the bank Jean is in the slave girl's costume again and Drysdale, posing as Debt is standing over her with a whip. Then her brothers walk in and say, "I wouldn't hit her with that if I were you!" 

            Jean Bell was played by Jeannie Bell, who starred in TNT Jackson. She was the first African American to participate in the Miss Texas pageant. She was the Playboy Playmate of the Month for October 1969 and the second black person to have that feature. In January, 1970 she appeared on the cover of Playboy with four other playmates, making her the first black woman to be shown on the front of the magazine. She lived with Richard Burton for three months in Switzerland and helped him quit drinking. She posed for Playboy again in 1979. She married multi-millionaire Gary Judis and retired from her entertainment career.