Duluth

When I was 14 my father paid a doctor $250 to sedate me heavily and then had me shipped via air freight to a museum in Duluth, MN. The awkward part was, of course, that the shipping company disregarded the “THIS END UP” on the box and transported me with my head down and my feet up. When I arrived, I kinda looked like the old Dick Tracy comic strip villain “Flat Top”.

When I woke up five days later (heavy sedation, as I said) I found myself posed in a diorama of “Early Man” dressed in a funky-smelling fur, holding a spear, posed as though fighting off a local smilodon. At least, that’s what the placard in the exhibit said the thing was — my theory is that it was the local bartender’s big-ass tomcat, Sparky, also heavily sedated (if not worse). Cats can get to be pretty big in that part of Minnesota.