Horrible, Horrible Salami (Part the Second)

[bcholmes]

Ross Johnson awoke with the taste of salami in his mouth. He had had another of his slami dreams. There was the huge packing plant -- dirty, dimly-lit, with blood all over the floor, impossibly long cobwebs hanging from the ceiling, and the smell, oh, the smell! On one side was the animal pen, full of squealing, grunting, bleating, squirming animals -- badgers, armadillos, goats, snakes, llamas, zebras, sloths, hedgehogs, squids, worms, toads, turkeys, and, of course, pigs and cattle. They were taken indiscriminately by blood-stained lunatic slaughterers (non-union), who hacked them into pieces and sent them along unskinned and uncleaned into huge vats in the middle of the floor. [...] The last machine affixed the different labels, either generic or name brand, for the companies that would sell these horrible, beastly salamis. And Ross Johnson was there as a tester. He did not merely nibble but gorged himself on this unholy flesh. It was obscenely horrible stuff, but he loved it! Yes, he loved it! And it was so real that when he awoke he could still taste it.

-- "Horrible, Horrible Salami", from Nice Stories for Canadians by Crad Kilodney.

Crad Kilodney used to be a staple of downtown Toronto. His bio from Suburban Chicken Strangling Stories reads:

Crad Kilodney was born in New York in 1948, earning a degree in astronomy at the University of Michigan, and moved to Canada in 1973. In 1978, he walked out of his last job (as a warehouse worker) with the intention of being a writer and nothing else from then on.

Since 1978, he has published and peddled his own books on the streets of Toronto, and he is very likely the only writer in the world who sells his own books on the street as his sole occupation.

In 1991, he was charged for the first time with "exposing goods for sale without authority," and later that year (during Arts Week in Toronto), he was convicted in the by-law court, thereby becoming the first writer in the history of Canada to be convicted of selling his own books on the street.

[...]

The bureaucrat responsible for his prosecution is Eddie Gunraj, supervisor of Metro's legal prosecutors, and his phone number at City Hall is (416) ... ....

I first heard of Kilodney in about 1986/87; my then-girlfriend had bumped into him on the streets of Toronto, and had bought a copy of Foul Pus from Dead Dogs, which is a gross and funny attack of the Ontario Film Review Board. I, myself, have copies of Blood Sucking Monkeys from North Tonawanda, Nice Stories for Canadians, Junior Brain Tumors in Action, Suburban Chicken Strangling Stories, and Cathy (Cathy is a rare "traditional" story from Kilodney).

One used to be able to find Kilodney on the streets, usually wearing a sandwich board that read, "Simple Stories for Illiterate Canadians" or similar messages. His books were mostly chapbooks, although he did publish some square-bound anthologies that were available in some downtown bookstores.

Sometimes, he'd wear a tape-recorder and tape some conversations he'd have with people on the streets of Toronto, and sell the funny bits on collected tapes. I never purchased one of those tapes, sadly, but I grin when I think of some of the stuff he did.

In the early nineties, he disappeared from the streets of Toronto. I happened to bump into him somewhere around 1996/97 while I was walking to an appointment. I passed him, then it clicked: that was Crad Kilodney! I turned and called out: "Are you Crad Kilodney?" He stopped and his body just sort of sagged. Then he turned and we had a brief conversation. He told me that he'd stopped writing chapbooks. He was selling stocks, instead. As evidence, he showed me the business section of the Globe and Mail, neatly folded to the stocks page. It was like an era had ended.

I've just today discovered his website, where he apparently posts a monthly story. So all is not lost. But you can't find him on the streets of downtown Toronto hawking his latest demented stories.

Comments

[the-siobhan.livejournal.com]

I have Lightning Struck My Dick somewhere around here.

Link plis?