Wednesday, November 28, 2012

A Little Perk Being An Unbelievable



Is this the fiend known as "The Muffin Man" ... ???
We may never know for sure ...

One of the things about the "Socks And Drugs And Sausage Rolls" case Jeff didn't elaborate on in the previous post was why, at all, we were required to wear the colorful footwear evident in our group shot. Quite a simple explanation, really.

The Muffin Man's operation was such that no one knew the names of any of "the gang." The tell tale sign you were part of his contingent was by the socks you wore. "Blue Houndstooth" and "Chocolate Down Below" and "Orange Creamsicle" were common terms of referal for guys who were bag men or drug runners or drivers in Muff's operation. I've forgotten what our aliases were - perhaps Clark will recall later. (Wait! I remember mine! "Azure Jewels" ... !!! How could I forget ... ?!?)

Anywho, no other con man of the time was thus stylishly dressed. A flick of the trouser cuff revealing your footwear and anyone in-the-know automatically pinned you as a member of the fiendish organization. Brilliant "silent communication." Rather clever, that.

While Jeff has pretty well described the events of the case, the really interesting thing that came of the entire affair was as a result of the group shot. And it's right there beneath us in a simple, concise line: "Announcing the best-dressed men in America." Yes ... we were duped as models for modern footwear after Mitchell clandestinely began making copies of the piece and distributing to all his friends. In practically no time at all the photo landed in the hands of some advertising agency and << boom >> we were splashed in the pages of all sorts of grocery store rags and haute couture pifflely pieces as "those daring young men in their colorful footies." (Side Note: Our refusal to recreate the shot or appear live in anything but socks made us all the more popular in the day proving something The Unbelievables have known for some time: Not giving the people what they want can create excitement.)

So there you go. Just a little value added bump of being in The Unbelievables.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

P.S. I would like to point out a few  things about our photo.  You can readily see Mitchell (far left, top) was a little too comfortable in the disguise at hand (or, "at foot" as the case may be) which should have been one of our first indications he wouldn't fit in as An Unbelievable on future ventures. Scottish-Jewish-American FBI agent Schlomo McCaskill (top, in blue socks) appears a bit sheepish ... but it was his suggestion to be tagged sans clothes. (There was something just a bit "off" about that guy. But we always got some sort of photograph to put in our file for reference, so why not this one? Our proclivity toward detail can't help but make us think that way. Else ... we wouldn't have anything to show you good people, you know?) Jeff, Clark and I (from the 9 o'clock position, clockwise) are our usual gregarious and fabulous selves, if I do say so myself. 

Though ... I'm not quite certain why Clark appears a bit shy ...

No comments:

Post a Comment