The word from the street
TONY
“You remember the guy I told you I was coaching? Well, it turns out he’s a great cook, he’s amazing. He can cook anything. We got this nice piece of roasting meat the other night. By the time he’s finished cooking it, it was fit for a king. So now I’m a homeless guy with my own cook. Life is crazy sometimes.”
TONY
“I never told you about Judge Chamberlain. She was the best judge I ever met.
“See, when I was 13, I got sent up to the boy’s training school for 6 months because of truancy and that sort of thing. It wasn’t too bad there; I learned some stuff, and at least I didn’t have to live at home. Home was a bad mess.
“So after my 6 months was up, I got out and went before this judge, Judge Chamberlain. I asked if she could just send me back to training school since I sure didn’t want to go back home. So she sent me back to training school for 9 more months, and I got my chef’s certificate so I could cook in restaurants and cafeterias. So when I got out, I went back to her courtroom and I thanked her, right there in the courtroom. She even came down from the bench and gave me a really big hug.
“You know, there’s some pretty good judges out there.”
———
Update on Tony: He’s in the Don Jail for another 5 days, at least. His health is better (and he’s warm and fed), but he did seem pale and a bit low key when I visited him yesterday. There are further court dates coming up. Alice Barton, a lawyer with Derstine Penman, is helping Tony out. Tony wanted to pass along his thanks to everyone who’s expressed support.
PHILIP
“What did you do last night?”
TONY
“I cooked up some Kraft Dinner. Four of ’em.”
PHILIP
“Exactly where did you do that?”
TONY
“I went over to my Dave’s, my friend Dave’s.”
“Anyway, my recipe for Kraft Dinner is you start by chopping up a fresh onion. You boil the noodles the same as always, drain it out, and put in the onion and cook it ’til the onion gets clear. Then you put in the cheese. I like extra cheese so later you grate in some mozzarella, about a quarter of a brick. Then you put in the margarine and cook it up a bit more. Then you put in cream to get it to the right thickness. Most people use milk but cream’s the one to use. Then you put in the mozzarella and stir it up.”
PHILIP
“You ate your way through four boxes of Kraft Dinner last night?”
TONY
“Yup. You think four’s a lot? I should tell you about going to the buffet once when I was working for George Segal. You’d like that one.”
Homeless Man Speaks 