Yellow Dog: Hank, tell me about your mother.
Hank Friedlander: She used to kiss me. And then she tucked me in. Sometimes
she read my a story.
Yellow Dog: Hank, is that your real name?
Hank Friedlander: As far as I know, Isaac. I don't remember receiving it.
Are you wearing perfume?
Yellow Dog: Yes. Hank, and I call you Hank out of some sort of assumption
that you really are Hank, why do you dirty our door step each day? Once, I stepped
in a Publix bag full of your cat's poop. Why, Hank, why? Isn't this life cruel enough
already without having to step in another man's cat's feces?
Hank Friedlander: Isaac, I hate you bastards. You have tattoos and drink beer
and walk around naked. Then you play Jim Nabors records. What gives you the right! This is America, damnit!
Yellow Dog: Hank, you can't hold an entire journalism team responsible
for the actions of its editor. He's been to prison, you know.
Hank Friedlander: I wouldn't doubt it. And what was that chicken festival all
about? Feathers everywhere if you ask me.
Yellow Dog: Yes, but the nude egg drop was fun. Hank, let's get
serious. Let's be direct. Have you ever had sex with a man?
Hank Friedlander: I'm tired of the lies. I'm tired of the rumors spread
about me at Yellow Dog. That was my son, damnit.
Yellow Dog: But you do wear nylons?
Yellow Dog: Cut to the chase, Hank. You're a Rectatarian, aren't you?
Hank Friedlander: I'm not going to dignify that question by answering it. But
I will say this: Rectatarianism is a misunderstood religion. They almost killed
the Buddha too, you know. One day, people will look back on the persecution of
the Rectatarians with great shame. They will regret their actions.
Yellow Dog: Hank, those are the words of a man with a dream. Do you dream, Hank?
And are they wet?
Hank Friedlander: When I left Biloxi, I was as naked as the day I was born.
I walked out of my day job at G.E. with only the blank stare of a thirty five year
old man. Today, I'm seventy. You see what I'm getting at? It's I Love Lucy in the
third world. You can write your interviews. You can mock me for my bathroom habits.
You can harrass Donny Osmond. But I won't break, damnit. I just won't. You
and your five year old writing. Go color your own damn books. And turn down
that music. Three o'clock in the afternoon and that damn Metallica blaring out of the walls.
Yellow Dog: Hank, you make us journalists out to be nothing more than
drug using, wife abusing, chicken fetishing lunatics. Not all of us are that way.
Just Morely Safer. But I, Hank, I understand you. I understand your soul. You
can tell me. Will you please stop leaving cat poop on our front door step? These
are new shoes I'm wearing.
Hank Friedlander: I'm tired of our children being raped. I'm tired of
family values being flushed down the toilet. Someone's got to speak up, and it's
going to be me. I'll win a Nobel Prize for this, or I'll die trying. You haven't
heard the last of me; that's for sure.
Who is Hank Friedlander, and why does he continue to leave his garbage on our door step?
Upset, troubled, perplexed, Yellow Dog set out to understand our neighbor. Does
he really know Paul Stanley? Is he gay? What's that mole doing on his lip?
Why nylons? Sure, he may not be famous, but Hank Friedlander has a story to tell,
a disturbing, emotionally terrifying story.
Hank Friedlander: I care about my legs, you bastard. Is that a crime?
