Gas Pains

Tom grew up in Milwaukee, bartended in Wauwatosa in the '70s and moved here in 1984.

Commentary, observations and musings about the outdoors, life in general and maybe Tosa politics and personalities will be the order of the day. He savors a lively debate as much as terrific cooking.

Me, Bambi, Tarzan and Kyle

Bambi, Cut And Paste Blogging, Judy Zess, Kyle Prast, Kyle Prast The Censor, Lawrencia Bembenek, Outing a Blog Reader, Paula Zahn, Strange But True, Tarzan Of The Apes

It certainly has been an interesting week.

I sauntered on over to Hart Park last Wednesday to meet-up with Brother-In-Law and have a few beers at the Red Hot Chili Pipers concert.  I saw a bunch of people I know.  Including some readers.  I even met my newest, and 66th, reader.

I just love what this town has to offer.  Don't you?

Brother-In-Law got a really big charge out of how one of my readers tried to sell me on the idea that I should run for public office.

Have you ever heard of such craziness?  The whole notion of using a blog as a tool to campaign would be so far-fetched so as to be unbelievably crazy. It's not going to happen.  No way, no how.

My week gets more interesting.

I retrieve a voice mail from an Associate Producer of Paula Zahn's - On The Case program.  Her message says that she (the producer) wants to speak with me. 

I'm thinking - Maybe Paula Zahn is a reader too. 

That's equally crazy.  I am not a solver of crimes. 

Then it hits me - Oh brother.  Here we go again.  They probably want to speak with me about my connection to Lawrencia Bembenek.

You remember Bambi don't you?

I want to make it very clear that I am not directly associated with Bambi and all of the salacious intrigue that surrounds her and the murder for which she was accused, convicted and subsequently exonerated.  However, I do share the same name as someone that was peripherally involved.

There was a guy named Tom Gaertner who also just so happened to be the boyfriend of Judy Zess.  Zess was the girlfriend of Lawrencia - the accused murderess of her cop husband's ex-wife.  I do not recall if Zess or Gaertner were suspected accomplices in the murder of Christine Schultz but I have a faint recollection of a rumor that Zess had a crush on Bambi.

Hey, I told you it was salacious. 

You have no idea what it is like to go through life with all of this sordid stuff following you around like a little black cloud.  Which is another reason to rule-out public office as I'd constantly have to explain this over and over again.

Anyway, this producer returns my call and sure enough she wants to know if I am connected to this story. 

I asked her if she was referring to the Tom Gaertner that was Judy Zess' boyfriend.

Yes.  Yes, that's the guy. 

Was she asking about the Tom Gaertner that was busted with the gym bag full of cocaine.

Yes.  Yes, that's the one.  Are you him?

I explained that unfortunately for them they had the wrong guy.  I also explained that the guy she's looking for served time in a Federal prison following the cocaine bust and after his release he killed himself in a crash with his Harley.

She tells me that they were unaware of this very useful information and thanks me for my assistance.

So, in an indirect way, I helped Paula's people solve a piece of a crime mystery.

Let me know if I am credited with this valuable nugget when Paula features the tale of Laurie Bembenek on her program.

In betwixt all of this is the Curious Case of Kyle Prast.

Kyle is a blogger over at the BrookfieldNOW home page.  However, before you click on this link to redirect to her blog I want to warn you that if you do so your personal privacy is placed at risk of great peril. 

You need to know that you might just get finked-out if you go over there.

Trust me.  Kyle the blogger is capable of this.  Last week she revealed the identity of a reader for all the world to see.

Gasp!  She outed a reader?

You betcha.  And it was me.

Here is where Tarzan gets involved.

For any of you who do not read Kyle's blog you need to know that she is one of those really conservative bloggers.  A very prolific one at that.  Her blog is chock-full of links to all sorts of other far-fetched conservative and daytime angry radio people.  Lately she has taken a page from the Tea Party rule book and fashions herself a Constitutional Conservative.

My five dozen or so readers know that from time to time I enjoy having some fun with my far right acquaintances.  So, inspired by some guy named Zorro over at the Town Square I created a Nom de Guerre for myself.

Tarzan Of The Apes. 

The ape man subsequently became an occasional commentator over at Kyle's blog. 

Mind you, not all the views expressed by Tarzan Of The Apes were my views.  Tarzan was simply the tool by which I tried to liven-up the discussion of many frequent and particularly dour postings.  And while Tarzan was never overtly malicious he was provocative and sometimes risqué.  Tarzan always got a chuckle over how some of the starchy conservative types in Brookfield got all flustered when a fictitious guy who hung out with monkeys gave them a tweak or poked them in the eye.

During Tarzan's short existence I would like to think that he increased traffic to Kyle's blog - a subject she seems to be quite preoccupied with - and should therefore be eternally grateful to the tree-dwelling vine swinger for increasing readership.

Yet with time Tarzan hung-up his loin cloth and ceased visiting.  Tarzan's jungle sense for danger raised suspicions that Kyle was busying herself with some tools that could be misused to fink on one of her readers. 

However, last week Mrs. Prast published another cut-and-paste blog post so I figured it was time to see if I might spring a trap that even the real Tarzan would be proud of.

I commented under my real-life identity.

Predictably, Kyle rose to the bait and did the Rat Fink thing all over me.

We bet that made you angry.

No, not really.  It was what I expected would happen.

Speaking for myself, I'm fastidious and respectful of an individual's right to their privacy.  With the exception of public officials and people in the news anybody I write about is known to my readers by monikers like Braumeister, The First Mate or Lawyer.  Even Girlfriend happens to be a made-up name. 

Moreover, I would never reveal the identity of a reader.  That is a breach of trust.

It may be that the blogger from Brookfield can afford herself the luxury of indulging in daytime angry radio and the extensive cross-referencing of IP addresses.  

I happen to think that obsessing over the identity of a commentator is an incredible waste of time and suspiciously unhealthy.

But I guess that is what Constitutional Conservatives do nowadays. 

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