The Big Picture

Joseph Tornatore at the premier of Bazookas, the Movie.

Last night, I went to the premier of Bazookas, the Movie. Sitting in the front row of the sold out theatre to view the high definition film, equisite bare-naked DD cup breasts supplanted the big screen from the opening scene…on a racquetball court. The bevy of buxom actresses going topless in risqué scenes juxtaposed by the campy comedy seemingly mesmerized me. Sterioid injected chicken seemed like it had found a home in tinsel town.

The full-length movie, no pun intended, was so entertaining to view that I literally forgot that I played a fully clothed bartender in this film. I was almost surprised to see myself, however brief my part. Appearing in one scene, fleshy cleavage and comedic laughs were not enough to distract me from serving my single line. As an able bartender my juices were flowing. The breast is history.

I linked local press coverage from the Maplewood Patch on the movie’s release and how to order a DVD.

Taking A Stance

Too old to do push-ups on the beach, I could only assume the stance - Memorial Day weekend in Atlantic City, NJ 2009.

Backyard Bounty

More backyard splendor. I can almost hear the trickling water.

A Bird's Eye View

This is me on a bird watching jaunt right in our backyard. A member of the Audubon Society, my tour guide identified over 25 different bird species on our wooded property. Our acreage is on landlocked protected wetlands so the pristine woods has been virtually untouched and unchanged from the way nature shaped it. What sights I beheld.

A Mountain Called Ozark

Danny Ozark with Joe Tornatore

Former Philadelphia Phillies manager Danny Ozark’s passing this week at the age of eighty-five was a life that spanned extra innings. His stellar managerial career came within a big inning in a decisive playoff series of ultimately managing a champion. Almost tragically, the Phillies team he built, spoon-fed, and managed from basement dwellers to perennial contenders won the 1980 World Series only a year after his firing. This is how the ball bounces in the fatality of life.

I met Danny Ozark on a gorgeous day for baseball in 1997. By age seventy-three, however, the rawhide of baseball had been woven through his life yet somehow his forty-something inch waist still proudly stuffed into the pinstriped Philadelphia Phillies uniform like a throwback to yesteryear. As I approached the dapper uniformed don in a hideaway restaurant, Danny was hungrily eating his way through a stack of flapjacks perched in his counter seat.

I introduced myself then said, “Danny, I just came from the park. There are no children, no spectators for the charity softball event.”

As he fathomed this scenario, maple syrup seemed to suspend drip from his fork. Showing his genial leadership qualities, Danny Ozark expressed to me in parental tones that the game must be played. Unfulfilled charitable contributions aside, two dozen former major league baseball players did not travel across the country to not pick up their gloves or grab a bat.

During the ballgame, it was an awestruck sight watching the old man bearing red and white pinstripes register putouts from infielders Al Oliver and Bert Campaneris on a lumpy field of weeds and clay. I knew firsthand that Ozark would be taking to the grave his lifelong love for baseball. Like any fallible human being, it would not be without regrets.

With Ozark’s death, I only have my own personal memories of him to hold onto. I can almost hear him smack his floppy first baseman’s mitt on this day, field the sea of criticism he endured for not making a late inning substitute for fielding liability Greg Luzinski after Game 3 of the National League Championship Series, or uttering classic malapropisms during post-game interviews.

If I ever visit his gravesite, I might be tempted to draw chalk lines atop the dirt that buries Danny Ozark because this was a thoroughbred baseball man. Rest(in Peace) assured, Danny Ozark is asking dearly departed Harry Kalas now if half this afterlife is ninety percent transcendental. Life like baseball contains errors, the least of which are syntax.

Danny Ozark 1923-2009

The Cocker in Spaniel

Brandy Tornatore

About twenty years ago, an adorable picture of my dog Brandy disappeared from the desktop of my office that was located in a sheltered workshop. Soon after surrendering hope that my dog picture would surface, Desmond J. Brentwood sauntered from the bathroom looking rather ragtag even for him.

After reminding him to pull up his zipper and tuck back in his shirt, I made the mistake of asking Desmond if he had dollar bills to make change for a ten spot. He stopped and removed his wallet on a chain. Behind a row of worn dollar bills, his fingertips grazed across something conspicuous. His eyes flashed mine. He is all thumbs now as the beloved picture of my dog falls out of his upside down wallet. My photo had wound up in the hands of a wayward mildly retarded young man who often admitted to engaging in acts of bestiality through a crooked smile. Our minds both race ahead to the unfolding event. Desomond picks up the picture as if it were his and not rightfully mine.

“Desmond, you stole a picture of my dog?”

“Joe, I know what you're thinking. I should have asked you to bring me in another picture from home. That’s all.”

“No, that is not what I'm thinking and that's not all. Desmond, you weren’t….Oh my God…you weren’t….to my dog?”

Desmond showed about as much remorse as boundaries. “I'm afraid so, Joe. You got a nice looking dog here. I love Cockers.”

I swiped the worn picture from his active clutches. I mouthed incredulously, “Leave Brandy alone.”

“I didn’t touch your dag gone dog.” He head nods back to the bathroom he vacated. “I only use the picture like a normal guy would a girlie magazine.”

“Oh my God!”

"Joe, you look like you're going to barf....Do you need to use the bathroom?"

Spring Blossoms

Taking this picture in front of our house may have been the last I saw of the sun.