The Van Blog

Hello all,

Sorry it’s been awhile, but J.T. and I are just relaxing in the sun in Arizona City while we hang out with her dad, so not a whole lot has been going on.  The only thing I do feel a need to talk about still is Roadkill!  Yes.  Really!

Here’s a fun fact:  J.T. is traveling all over the continent with a stuffed bear named Roadkill Bobby (aptly titled because he is so very flat and old now that it’s like he’s been run over a few times).  I don’t find it weird that Bobby hangs out in the back of the van… in fact, I’m rather used to him now.

This is Roadkill Bobby

While we were in Bisbee, Arizona, J.T. and I were invited to a film festival at a bar called Hot Licks (or something like that).  During the festival, a local filmmaker called “Roadkill Bill” would be showing his three short films.  J.T. and I took it as a good sign of coincidence that this man had a similar moniker to her bear, so we went.

Turns out, Bill is not referred to as Roadkill for being flat, stuffed, or old;  his name comes from the fact that he made a short film using real roadkill as marionettes.  Seriously!  Un-treated, non-taxidermy, rotting-in-the-movie-while-he’s-making-it-talk roadkill!  For 12 minutes, my mouth hung open and I was stupefied!

Here’s a clip from Youtube so you can see what I mean: Roadkill Clip

The plot is that a certain squirrel keeps borrowing everybody’s stuff and never giving it back, so this angry rabbit wants to put together a vigilante gang to go and beat the crap out of the squirrel and teach it a lesson.  Fising line is threaded through jaws and wings etc in order to animate the carcasses, and I got to see a flattened possum with a broken jaw (which still flapped about eerily as it “talked”), a super-squished and partially mummified weasel, a pig’s head, a rotting duck with a moving bill, a rabbit, and some snakes.  There’s even a house party scene where all the animals are in a little, diorama-style living room with tiny booze bottles stuck to their appendages.  Weird!  Bet you’ve never seen a dead rabbit curse like a trucker before!

These are the interesting things one can do while living in a van and mingling with locals in a small, artsy town.  Back in a few days with more tales of Arizona!