June 27, 2004
I Crave Smudgepots
As a child I well recall the prolific use of smudgepots at scenes of pothole filling, manhole work, car accidents. Those ominous cannonballs of alert that said Avoid At Any Cost.
Now, of course, with the advent of the long-life battery, we are waved away by the blinking amber eyeball set upon a cheap pine sawhorse. Those lights are not ominous: they are banal.
Nothing compared to the vision of an horrific automobile accident on a lonely stretch of highway at night. The fear and excitement were palpable as your father slowly cruised past the scene, the grim visages of highway patrolmen or sheriff's deputies flickering in the glow of a string of smudgepots. You could almost see the dried vomit on the corners of their mouths.
I have plenty of fancy ceramic citronella burners and pewter tiki torches deployed around the pool to keep the aerial bloodsuckers at bay, but what I really want is a half-dozen vintage smudgepots arrayed around the pooldeck, so I can stir my drink and wonder if they were ever actually used at the site of a tragic two lane bloodspill. I have no idea where to find any, however I fear an Ebay search will reveal a depraved cult of smudgepot aficianados. The bastards will probably want hellish prices for them, too. Although I don't think, say, $200 would be too much to pay for a genuine Mansfield smudgepot, or a James Dean one, or a Kopechne. Oh, right. There weren't any Kopechne smudgepots, because he didn't make the call until the next day.
Well, as they say, the search is on.
Update: Yep. Here's one. Only $19.95 on Ebay, already sandblasted and repainted. Which means the accident victims were probably only wine-stewed darkies instead of a Famous Celebrity:
Am I going to buy it? OF COURSE I'm going to buy it.