Interview by Jay Blackwood Q. Say, I notice that you are wearing a jacket with "Hells Tunas" on the back. A. Wanna make somethin of it? Q. Well... could you explain what that means? A. Probably not. Q. Can you tell me anything about the Hell's Tunas? A. Mostly its secret stuff. Like the world ain't ready for anything this powerful. But you want an answer, so let'ss just say that we're the ones most affected by the Hovde Effect. Q. Which is...? A. Glad you asked that, Jim. Originally it was called the Rubber Band Theory and stated that the farther you get away from Lafayette, the greater the force pulling you back here. This strange force, that we now call the Hovde Effect, has been recently described with a field model. Q. What kind of field? A. Oh, sorta like gravity, with Lafayette being the lowest point in the universe. Q. In other words, leaving this town is always an up-hill struggle? A. Right. Except when the polarity of the field reverses. Q. How's that? A. Well, if you was say in California and WANTED to get to Lafayette, then the field would reverse and it would be an up-hill trip to get here. Anyhow, the General Theory of the Hovde Effect is that the force will always act against you. And that all Tunas are perpetually trying to get away from or back to Lafayette (neither very successfully). Q. Does this force affect everyone? A. Somewhat. However, its effect is more or less insignificant unless you're consciously aware of the Hovde effect. Sort of "He that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow". Mostly Tunas tho. Q. Are "Tunas" the same as "Hell's Tunas"? A. Not quite. You see, the "Hell's Tunas" are the activist-hardcore of the "Tunas". The Jesuits, you might say. Instead of just being affected by the Hovde Effect, they do something about it. Q. Like what? A. Well, again most of that is confidential. But we do have systems of dealing with THE FORCE, mostly through Alchemy. Numerology, and Music. It was in this connection that the Great Tuna inspired the Hell's Tunas Blues Band. Q. Can you tell me any of that? A. Well, particular types of employment seem to be easy to get into around here, and they pay real good. Q. What do you do for a living? A. I'm a toad fucker; a lot of us Tunas do that. Others are into stump worm farming and stylesetting. Q. Stylesetting? A. Yeah, it's like we are pretty well stuck here in Lafayette and so we figure out the easiest ways to do things around here. Then as newcomers move into town, they imitate us. Q. Okay, but how do you make a living doing that? A. Advertising. Like 10 years ago no one in this town drank Stroh's beer. But the Stroh's company hired us to make their product stylish, so we started drinking it and everyone copied us. Now it's the most popular beer around. Q. What else did you make stylish? A. Well a lot of it ain't legal, but I could say motorcycles and bell bottoms. Q. Do you folks make a lot of money this way? A. Yeah, but nearly all of it goes into our science which benefits all mankind. So it's really not a rip-off. Q. Just how does your "science" benefit all mankind? A. We have learned how to deal with certain energies which could hurt the health of all people if we didn't keep them under control. Similarly we can influence the appetites of Haram to the point of avoiding natural cataclysms. Q. You lost me there. A. Well for example, back in the reign of Eric the First it was noticed that the asteroid Icarus was hurtling toward the earth. It would either crash or pass so closely as to cause devastating earthquakes and tidal waves. Ordinary scientists couldn't explain why this wandering planet was off its normal course through the solar system. But WE knew why. And more importantly, our scientists told us what action to take in order to save the world. Eric gathered his stalwarts about him in the Hell's Tunas General Headquarters and stayed there working night and day for two months until Icarus' coursewas changed. Q. That's amazing. What other outstanding discoveries have you contributed? A. One of the most important Tuna discoveries, attributed to Good Time M. Gene Dion, is that anything taken in excess causes cancer. For instance, Smiley Smith died of cancer of the smile. The excess levels for study and work are particularly low. The level for beer drinking has been established, but no one has ever been able to drink that much. Not even Eric himself. Q. Just who was he, anyway? A. Eric the First and his consort, Clean Rita, led the Hell's Tunas through their first golden era. Eric also was founder of the Magic Theater. Q. Can anyone become a Tuna? A. No one can BECOME a Tuna. Either you is or you ain't. All we do is decide who to recognize as one and who not to. I might add that anyone who pretends to be one without ou recognition is in big trouble. Q. Ah yes; how did you happen to get the name "Tunas"? A. It was given to us by Mad Murray the Toad. Q. Who is that? A. Well... The Legend of Mad Murray the Toad Once upon a time about two years ago in the strange Land of What there lived a curious young creature called Mad Murray the Toad. What was a very unusual land, as it was only the basement of a church in a very staid little community by a very dirty old river. Many unusual creatures inhabited the land of What, but practically none of them had much to do with staid little community or the dirty old river outside. The sun never shined in What; the only light was from the many candles scattered about the land. Instead of sunrise and sunset, everyone in What used the length of the candles to tell time. The atmosphere of What was a mixture of smoke and incense and coffeee steam and a very small amount of the thing called air that drifted in from the outside in spite of everything the inhabitants of What could do to stop it. What was, all in all, a very strange and very happy place in one way or another, and its only problem was keeping too many things and creatures from the staid little community outside from drifting into its quiet basement happiness. Of all the miraculous creatures of What, Mad Murray the Toad was the most miraculous and weirdest. all the other creatures of their subterranean paradise liked Mad Murray and liked to be with him in his table-mountain retreat in a corner of What. But, alas, it was finally Mad Murrat the Toad who, in the height of his glory and trying to save What from the horrible people of the staid little community, brought the mysterious land of What to its end. Mad Murray the Toad - weirdest of the weird, hippest of the hip, gentlest of the gentle, highest of the high - sadly saw his enchanted table-mountain paradise fall into despair and dissolution and walked sadly over the ruins of What to disappear forever. This is the story of that fateful night when Mad Murray and his magic land of What both fell together. The air in the land of What was sultry that night, which might have meant summer in another land, but only meant that it was a normal time in What; it was the time when the candles were burned half-down, and and music and smoking and talking filled the tiny crevices of the incense atmosphere. Mad Murray the Toad and several of his disciples sat at the table-mountain discussing love and brotherhood and tolerance enchanted with their own beautiful words and gorgeous thoughts and deep in the trance of their mystery world's charm. The air was quaint with its stuffiness,the music was meaningful and sometimes even good, and everone felt high, even if they weren't. Suddenly the entrance to the underground world of What opened to two horrible creatures from the staid little community outside. Mad Murray stared with disbelief- they were ugly, they were outsiders, and worst of all they were straight. The two old ladies walked to the middle of the land at the end of a song about love; their horrid bodies were only a few feet from the table-mountain of Mad Murray the Toad, and he could smell their garden-scented perfume. A frown passed across his beautiful face. One of the old ladies spoke to the mysterious people of What: "We're on the Ladies Committe of the church upstairs, and we're having a fund drive this week. We thought that since the church has been nice enough to let you use this little corner of the basement, some of you might want to contribute a little something to the fund or to help the work of the church in its missions. We're going to pass around this little bucket now; just contribute whatever you can. We'll come back tomorrow and Saturday too, and we'd like very much to see all of you in church Sunday." The enchanted world of What fell into silence from the shock of invasion. Mad Murray watched the little bucket with its few coins pass by him and back to the little old ladies, who dosappeared back to the staid little community upstairs. The candles were almost completely burned out when Mad Murray moved again. He walked away from his table-mountain in silence, nad his disciples watched him silently and fearfully. They hoped that the little old ladies of the church had not broken their leader. They feared for the sanctity of their magic land. In the silent hallways of the church, Mad Murray the Toad the door of the pastor's office. Using the knife he had always carried to cut the springtime daisies that grew in the window garden of What, he broke the lock and entered the solemnly straight room. Ina corner he found the object of his search, a small strongbox. A few short candle flames later, Mad Murray held the Ladies' Committee's fund money in his hand. The, sitting in the straight-man pastor's swivel chair, Mad Murray piled the money neatly on the desk and solemnly lit the ugly green paper. After only ashes remained on the charred desk top, Mad Murray the Toad walked into the outside air and out of the staid little community and the dirty old river and the magic land of What. The next day the pastor, the little old ladies, and some policemen chased the mysterious creatures away from What and closed the land forever. They could not find out where Mad Murray had gone - no one saw him after he left the table-mountain when the candles were almost completely burned out. Some of the inhabitants of What came back to the staid little community and found another land and brought the magic that Mad Murraythe Toad had taught them to the Theater and the place of the Cauldron, but there never was another land of What, and Mad Murray the Toad never came back to build another enchanted table-mountain.