Another Segment of the O’Banion’s/Liquid Sky/Butterfly Night

Cute couple, n'est-ce pas?

After absorbing all we could of O’Banion’s aural tempest and surreally punk atmosphere, we stopped at a nearby diner. When you work nights, meal times get odd. It was 3 AM so I guess that made it “dinner” for us. The guy who took our order, looking disturbingly familiar, yelled out to the grill dude “Cheezborger, cheezborger, cheep, cheep!" “But I asked for fries,” says I "No fries! Only cheeps!"

Which came first -- John Belushi or the Olympia Restaurant?

After our greasy, yummy banquet it was  back to the midway for a few hours sleep before the show opened.

Did I mention that the neighborhoods our carnival played that summer were less than fabulous and not terribly safe even for residents?  It was closing in on daylight but still dark when we stepped off the bus.

The midway was a few blocks off when we noticed a group of young tough guys swaggering in our direction down the otherwise empty street. Doug, who’d grown up in Chicago, told me not to say much -- he’d handle this. “Wut? Are we in trouble?” asked the low melanin count country mouse.  One of the young toughs asked Doug what we were doing in his neighborhood and did we have a cigarette to spare. Carnival and yes. “Carnival -- where? when?” Things seemed to be going pig-in-shit groovy...and they were too. We stood on the corner chatting with the nice young men for a while -- joints shared all around plus a sip of whatever brown bag adult bev they were imbibing.

After very warm farewells and promises to come by and visit us at the show, we were on our way. And stopped on the next block by a couple cops in a cruiser. Joy. Carnies are always guilty of something whether they are or not. But we usually are. They were concerned though, worried even--“what are you doing in this neighborhood at this hour. You could get hurt or dead. Couple a block over just got mugged and beaten.” We promised we’d head straight home.

Home that night was the pony trailer. I don’t know how the ponies tolerated it. The place stank, there were only bales of hay to sleep on and NO flush toilet!

My friends wonder why I hate camping with a venomous fever to light a thousand suns.