only ten more days

[franksolich]

Only ten more days until nominations open up for the TOP DUmmies [PRIMTIVES] OF 2010, and as an ongoing reminder to those interested, to keep their eyes open for candidates, I thought I'd share the insight given all of us last year, by the late Tangerine LaBamba.

It's tragically possible that conservativecave was the last site on the internet on which the late Tangerine LaBamba, who succumbed to cancer (she had cancer, and it was possibly an overdose of her pharmaceuticals that caused her departure from this time and place) two days after showing up here.

franksolich remembers her appearance here well; it was late at night, or very early in the morning, near Christmas-time, that he had to get out of bed to let one of the cats inside the house.  Purely by chance or accident, I turned on the computer, to see what might be happening.

Talk about an exquisite, wonderful, delightful, early-Christmas present.

Tangerine LaBamba was here; she had shown up just a couple of minutes before I did.

I was enthralled.

Most here are familiar with franksolich's romantic--but utterly platonic--pursuit of the kind, beautiful, gracious woman who always seemed out of place among the ugly snarling primitives of Skins's island.

Anyway, that's neither here nor there; during the middle of the night, those few who were here, engaged in several delightful--and touching--exchanges with her.

Our esteemed colleague Mr. Wiggum asked her about the nominees for TOP DUmmies [PRIMITIVES] OF 2009:

I may not be qualified to judge, not having been a DUer for a long time, and I kept my interactions with most of the people there to a bare minimum, although I was never rude to anyone who PMd me, unless they had taken the time to tell me, in private, that they thought I was a flaming asshole.

Actually, the late Tangerine LaBamba had been twiddling with the truth here; she had been a member of Skins's island for a long time, and under different screen-names, including that of the left-handed attorney who gave the Bostonian Drunkard so much well-deserved grief during his Fitzmas Debacle.

But, has anyone here ever read California Peggy's poetry?

Just on the basis of that, she deserves the top prize.  I'm pretty sure it was directly responsible for a number of the fires and landslides that took place in California, probably gave Charlie Manson one of his migraines, and even made Arnold Schwarzenegger think that maybe he was living in the wrong state.

Don't get me wrong - her poetry isn't bad.  It's awful.  It's the kind of thing that would blind God if He had to read it.  It's a collection of words that should be machine-gunned down, one by one, preferably out in the desert, with no witnesses, and a nice young girl who could be counted on to claim that she'd been shooting jackrabbits.  It's so bad, mirrors crack if anyone looking into a mirror while thinking of one of CP's poems runs the risk of permanent scarring, even blindness, while thinking of it as he peers into the mirror.

I don't want to say that it's the worst thing I've ever read, because I also once had to read a chapter of a book written by my dermatologist's brother-in-law (this happens when you have your first book published, and everyone suddenly has a manuscript they absolutely NEED you to read - it's a sure-fire best seller) in which every woman - and there was a new woman on every page - had the most amazing orgasm as soon as the man entered her.  Every time.  One stroke.

CP's poetry isn't that bad because I don't have to go to her and tell her that there are parts of it that need some work.

Her poetry needs immolation.  She needs to have all writing impletments and keyboards, paper, blank walls, toilet paper, paper towels, margins in newspapers, and even the blank part of framed works of art removed from her home until this idea that she's writing "poetry" passes.  Maybe medication will help.

franksolich then quoted a love letter to Tangerine LaBamba he had posted in the DUmpster some weeks previously, getting this:

That's a very lovely letter, and if you were referring to me in it, I am beyond flattered.  Thank you very, very much.

After which the late Tangerine LaBamba described her legal career among the politicos of Washington, D.C.

And then again, in response to franksolich:

Yeah, I was treated with chemotherapy for an autoimmune disorder (do you guys miss ANYTHING?), but it worked really well,and I'm feeling pretty good most days, thank you for your concern.

Uh oh.

franksolich has run into a problem here, while writing this.

The posts of the late Tangerine LaBamba seem to have for the most part evaporated; there used to be several pages of her sparkling witticisms, but now there's just one single page.  Her name was "T LaBamba" here.  Would anyone have any idea what happened to all the rest of her delighful insight?

[franksolich]

This is from December 30, 2009, franksolich reminiscensing about the late Tangerine LaBamba, in a Bostonian Drunkard-length piece--but I'd rather be quoting T LaBamba than myself, if those lost posts of hers can be found:

While sitting here in the Sandhills of Nebraska, the only human being within six miles of myself, with snow inundating the prairies, covering up the existence of anything but snow, and with a new year coming on one being reminded how fleeting is youth, how fast one ages, I find myself grateful to God that I was not born with a rock-hard mind, upon which first impressions are engraved forever.

In fact, first impressions, second impressions, third impressions, and so on, are about as permanent in this mind as the surface of the snow, constantly shifted by the wind and melted by the sun.  God gave us the gift of judgement, and judgement is meant to be exercised in sizing up other people.....and most importantly, judgement is meant to be adapted, adjusted, as one becomes more and more illuminated about other people.

Such as my own history here, where at first I was utterly enthralled by the warped primitive, who seemed to know so much about everything.  But over time, the warped primitive became more and more bitter and ugly, and so I was compelled to adjust my judgement of her downward. 

Or Mrs. Alfred Packer, once fondly called "Grandma," whom at first I found to be an appealing person, but in the light of recent events making it clear that Grandma wants a man so desperately that she's willing to subjugate her being, her values, her needs, to the coarser, meaner ones of his.

In real life, I've always had problems with this sort of woman; I won't even touch them with a ten-foot pole, and run away when I see one of them coming.

Of course, this works both ways; judgement can be revised upward as well as downward.

And hence Tangerine LaBamba, late of Skins's island.

I forget when I first saw Tangerine LaBamba on Skins's island, but the first comment I read of hers was of a trite, frivolous nature (we all make those sorts of comments, myself perhaps more often than others), and so the first "picture" I drew of her was that of just another typical lightweight moonbat, nothing special.

The following few comments she made, that I read, were of the same silly nature, and so I got to calling her the "tambourine Bambi" primitive.

It was some time later a better "picture" of Tangerine LaBamba evolved.  I was never into movies, but of course I've read tons of books about movies, movie stars, and Hollywood, and when looking at Tangerine LaBamba, I was suddenly seeing old black-and-white photographs of Rita Hayworth, a pineapple in her hat, swiveling her hips, and singing "Down Mexico Way."

Tangerine LaBamba was the Rita Hayworth primitive for a very long time, but it never quite seemed to fit.  I kept calling her that, hoping that a more-appropriate monicker would evolve, but one never did.  "Gloria Swanson," without the "primitive" attached seemed better, but still not appropriate.

I first became aware of the great age of Tangerine LaBamba in the cooking and baking forum, where she counseled Mrs. Alfred Packer, at the time Grandma, that cheese food would do just as well for a certain recipe, as real cheese, thus drawing upon her shoulders the wrath of Grandma and the scorn of franksolich.

Tangerine LaBamba graciously back-tracked from Grandma; given the nature of the recipe, it was pretty much irrelevant whether one uses real cheese or cheese food, but so as to make Grandma feel better, Tangerine LaBamba admitted that it had been 45 years since she last purchased cheese food, herself.

Wow, I thought; given that Tangerine LaBamba surely had had to be an adult at the time of that purchase 45 years previously, well, it was obvious Tangerine LaBamba was no young woman.

Additional clues were provided by her references to meeting Averell Harriman, who was a contemporary of Henry Stimson, who was an intimate of Colonel House, who worked for Woodrow Wilson.  So this was no young primitive.

I paid attention to Tangerine LaBamba only sporadically, but over a year or so, the attitude adjusted itself in light of new illumination about her.  I still referred to her as the Rita Hayworth primitive, but midway through this slowly-dawning illumination, I began calling her Gloria Swanson, dropping the "primitive."

What I was seeing was something I had seen many times before in my own life, in real life.  Myself being deaf, and flung onto the cruel shores of real life at alas too young an age, I am not bashful about admitting that, without the help of so many others, so many others now gone to the Eternal time and place, I would have never made it.....and that Tangerine LaBamba seemed remarkably similiar to such people.

My flaws are my own fault; my virtues are gifts given me by such people.

The outstanding characteristic of such people seems to have been their attitude, "Yes, I'm willing to help you, but you yourself need to do 90% of the work."

The more I read of Tangerine LaBamba, the more I got the impression that not only on the internet, but in real life, Tangerine LaBamba was such a person.

It's no wonder so many primitives loathed her.

This "picture" of Tangerine LaBamba evolved long before speculations arose about her being the left-handed attorney, the "OldLeftyLawer" primitive, who gave the Bostonian Drunkard so much grief during Fitzmas, and long before her pinning the greenbriar primitive to the mat; by the time those things came to pass, I had already developed a fondness for her.

Since her death, I have seen a photograph of Tangerine LaBamba, taken in her serene old age; oddly, excepting for that her nose was different from what I had imagined, she pretty much resembled how I had "pictured" her.

It's only the internet, not real life, and Tangerine LaBamba and I had just one fleeting encounter via e-mail, the sum total of both messages being less than a dozen words, and so not much should be made of my feelings about Tangerine LaBamba.

However, there remains this sense that despite that her politics sucked, in real life Tangerine LaBamba was undeniably an exceptional person, with a particular sort of grace and class and charity sadly lacking in the world, and which never existed among the primitives on Skins's island.

[Carl]

She made her appearance in the thread for either nominating or voting on DUmmy of the year and it seems to be gone.
Found a link to it in the DUmping ground but it was dead. 

[franksolich]

She made her appearance in the thread for either nominating or voting on DUmmy of the year and it seems to be gone.

Found a link to it in the DUmping ground but it was dead. 

She had a really good exchange with you, sir, as I remember.

Maybe some archived things disappeared so as to save space; I dunno.

But if that's the case, better had the 1,223 pages of franksolich's comments here been erased so as to save space, rather than her precious words giving decent and civilized people a special insight on the primitives.

[franksolich]

If I recall correctly, there were seven pages, none of it air and fluff, all of it meat-and-potatoes.

[Chris_]

Shoot, I've only got three picked out so far.

[franksolich]

Shoot, I've only got three picked out so far.

Now, my knowledge of how a web-site works is, of course, nil.

I imagine a web-site as being a room of some specified size.

Over time, the room gets filled up with things.

When the room is stuffed full, one has to either (a) sort through things in the room and throw some things out, to clear up space or (b) expand the room.

I'm assuming that (a) happened, and perhaps stuff by now-gone-away members was chucked out, as those people are gone, and so it doesn't matter any more.

But this is a tragic loss.

The late Tangerine LaBamba chastised Mrs. Alfred Packer pretty good, thrashed Doug's stupid ex-wife, and complimented us upon our accurate understanding of the defrocked warped primitive.

Among other things; she also dealt with primitives not familiar to me at the time.

She did think, however, we were being "too harsh" (ahem) on our assessment of Lord Horatio Nelson, the sparkling husband primitive, whom she considered a good friend of hers.

There was a lot of good stuff, a gold mine on the primitives, during her one-night stay here.....and as mentioned, sadly, conservativecave was perhaps the last site on the internet Tangerine LaBamba visited before she left this Time and Place for the Eternal one.

[true_blood]

This is my first DUmmie of the year.
Should be interesting.

[franksolich]

This is my first DUmmie of the year.
Should be interesting.

It will be.

Late November through all of December's the best time to hang around the DUmpster.