Thursday, May 31, 2012

Mr. Pictures Goes International

Today's Mr. Picture was sent to me by fellow author, Dana King. As he explains:

Corky and I visited relatives in New Jersey over the weekend and stopped by to see Charlie and Ann Marie Stella for lunch. Driving thorough Charlie’s town, I spotted a Mister location and Corky took a couple of pictures.




I really wish I was at that lunch ;).

Dana's latest novel, Worst Enemies, is available from Amazon. The subtitle is, "A Penns River Novel," which is the name of a small town in Pennsylvania. Reading Worst Enemies (which is very good, by the way) I was reminded a little of the K.C. Constantine, "Rocksburg" books from the 1970s which also take place in a small town in Pennsylvania (I bet there are a lot of Mr. Businesses in these - fictional - towns).

Most of K. C. Constantine novels seem to be out of print, but I hope they'll show up at least as ebooks soon. Here's his Wikipedia entry: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/K._C._Constantine

And Charlie Stella has a lot of great novels available. So far my favourite is Johnny Porno (which inspired my own 1970s-set book I'm working on now) but I'm really looking forward to his next book, Rough Riders, coming out July 31st from Stark House. We used to have two teams called Rough Riders in the Canadian Football League but Ottawa is gone now leaving only the Saskatchewan Roughriders.

Someday I'm going to talk Charlie into co-writing a novel with me about football....

Sunday, May 27, 2012

Mr. Towel

It's a beautiful Sunday here in Toronto and I'm about to get my kids to wash the car. Years ago at a car wash I saw this Mr.:
Now I wish I had a towel dispenser in my bathroom. "Bath Size," wow.

Tuesday, May 22, 2012

Mr. Tint

We had a beautiful long weekend here in Toronto with lots of sunshine. So, lots of sunglasses. And tinted windows. I wonder if this guy was busy?

Friday, May 18, 2012

Mr. Tomato

On a family vacation years ago (with my sister and cousin) my brother recommended a highway through the middle of New Brunswick that seemed to be an old logging road. We drove for hours and never saw another car or a house or anything and then, suddenly, we saw:
New Brunswick is supposed to be bilingual, but I guess in the middle of nowhere it wasn't necessary to add, "Monsieur Tomate."

Monday, May 14, 2012

Mr. Mister

All right, I'll admit when I first saw this I didn't get it and my wife had to explain to me that sometimes you mist plants with a little water.





Of course, when most of us hear Mr. Mister, we think of this:

Monday, May 7, 2012

Friday, May 4, 2012

Mr. Photo

Years ago, before there were cameras in cell phones - before there were cell phones - I somehow came to the decision that I needed a hobby so my wife gave me a camera as a Christmas present. I really had no idea what to do with it.

Then one day we were driving somewhere and she saw a sign for a business called, "Mr. Post Hole," and she said, "I guess when Mr. Lumber and Mr. Plumber and Mr. Landscaper need a fourth for Bridge they call Mr. Post Hole." And as often as these silly things do, it made me laugh.

And it also got me noticing how many businesses are named "Mr.... something." And for some reason I liked that, it seemed old fashioned and a little silly but also kind of formal. And I remembered that old TV commercial for Mister Big candy bars, "When you're this big, they call you mister." So, he doesn't just dig post holes, he's, "Mr. Post Hole."

And my hobby was born. And now, because I had to buy a printer for my kids' homework and every printer seems ot have a scanner built-in, I thought why not put my Mr. Photos on a blog?

So, here we go, the first Mr. Photo I took, appropriately enough, Mr. Photo:


Followed by:



When I was taking this next picture, a woman came out of the store and demanded to know, in very broken English, why I wanted the picture. I tried to explain it was, "For my hobby," but she just yelled that she was calling the police and want back inside the store. I have no idea what she was upset about, but it turns out she isn't the only, "Mr. Smoke and Variety."




As we'll see later...