A Piece of the Big-Time

                         CHAPTER I

     The Sunset Strip was dazzling that spring night of April first in 1958.  It was about eleven-thirty in the evening and there I was, standing on the curb of that famous and glamorous thoroughfare; looking up and down it to the east and to the west, and taking in all the sights along the way with a feeling of amazement.  To a young man fresh out of the toolies, it was fascinating.

     I had arrived in Los Angeles an hour or so earlier on a white knuckle flight from Birmingham, Alabama, with a notso hotso guitar, a few clothes, about 80 bucks, and a long-standing desire to succeed in the world of music.  I was filled with apprehension, but entranced, nevertheless, by the striking display before me.

     I was standing in front of the Park Sunset Apartments on Sunset Boulevard where I was to reside.  The digs were located about half a block east of La Cienega Boulevard, a main thoroughfare that winds its way for miles across Los Angeles and ends abruptly at the top of a steep hill where it hits the Sunset Strip head-on.  I was in high spirits and talking with Al Bubis, a manager and promoter in the music business at the time, who had furnished me with the airline ticket that brought me to this astonishing city of shimmering lights.  I think Al was more than slightly amused at the way my lower jaw was resting on my navel.  Wow!  This was LA--Hollywood--and I was really here at last.  It was hard to believe.

     I was so taken in by the whole vibrant scene that evening attempting to describe it with mere ten-cent words could never do it justice.  Just saying, "It sure was pretty" wouldn’t begin to cut it, so please bear with me as I attempt to come up with a touch of silver plated prose.  Here goes:

     West of the Park Sunset (especially) there were captivating lights of icy arctic whites, delicious looking lime greens, passionate reds and stimulating hot pinks, tantalizing lemon yellows, succulent royal blues, and a soothing powder blue the color of a clear summer sky.  They glowed majestically, and to my youthful, eager eyes the whole show was truly awesome.

     Those alluring colors wound around through curves and corners of glass tubing filled with neon to form lustrous letters of the alphabet; and the letters blossomed into wondrous words.  Wondrous to me, at any rate.  There was one very select group of flashing neon tidings that caught my eye immediately.  The collection that silently and insidiously shouted, "Beer, Liquor, Wine and Spirits."  Sunuvabitch, this was the place!  I was home at last ...apprehensive or not.

One night I was in my new apartment all drunked up again and feeling awful when I got to thinkin’ about how groovy that Demerol shot for my spinal fluid check had made me feel. I was really in bad shape and thought it would be neat if I could get some more of that marvelous stuff (I had also recently gotten some more information on the proper dosage). It was about 1 AM and I knew Dr. Bleep wasn’t on call that night so I came up with a little plan, and it was