Established Marvel : a Monk by Abbreviation

93. TED'S PERFECT HEALTH:

And sometimes he'd seem as drunk and stupid as a fish but he never really was - it was all play acting - he'd go along testing everyone just to see what he could get away with and I suppose to see where it would lead him too and he had this silly tophat he'd wear and some greatcoat in the winter made out of some horrible Yugoslavian fabric and it was as thick as a cask and heavy to boot and he'd wear it everywhere no matter and the cigarettes he smoked would curl the air around him and he'd leave everyone else choking but no effect was seen on him and his hair had turned a wild gray seeming always ready to just go off in every direction and he was loud and boisterous and just never shut up and he'd have people call him Ted - the ones he really didn't know - he'd just say 'hi my name is Ted' and that was that they'd believe him and take him at his word and no one knew the difference (because remember to him his ABSENCE was essential) and it just always worked - he'd bark orders out and people would listen he'd call down from upstairs just to say 'I'm coming down and if anyone asks just tell them 'it's Ted' and leave it at that' and then he'd come slamming in as noisily as possible and slap down his arm on the counter and say 'who's what and where?' as his opener and he'd just start eating - see he'd order ahead and it was always ready when he got there - and it seemed he never paid and he wanted it that way although he really did pay on a tab they kept open for him and he'd have people thinking his 'Greatness' was what got him free food and all that crap you think about when you consider a liar weaving his stories BUT it was always right and ready for him NO FAILURE no loss - he'd go about telling people to 'EAT! have some food! by God a Hungry man is an ANGRY man!' like that was some sort of biblical affirmation he'd gleaned through some intense reading : in his own way the man was a menace (as I saw him) a menace to any real thought and intelligence but he'd always be ready to spout nonetheless and then to have people - even myself - listening wide-eyed and gaping to whatever was coming next and I thought to myself often things like 'if this man had a gun and it was about to go off he'd be sure enough and able to convince people first to legalize the possession of that gun and its bullets and its firing right into their faces' and I never for a moment doubted that for NO MATTER WHAT nothing ever went wrong for this guy - he had the looks the mouth the brawn and the brain and everything was chiseled perfectly for good health and long life HE HAD IT MADE was what it seemed and - any lackluster performance ignored - there just was never a failure if he was involved : which brings me back again to those horrid paintings or whatever he'd made and hung and showed and as I've said already they were mostly God-awful but he could talk accentuate pump and cajole until even they were considered as some outlandish Picasso late-development and worth every penny of a few thousand measly dollars (guess who collected art guess who bought the crap guess who touted it all as 'arriving greatness on a ship-load of folly' ? why none other than that same Dennis Hopper himself and if you don't believe me go ahead someday and look up the Dennis Hopper Collection on some art-site somewhere GO AHEAD I dare you!).