The Fred Book - Rilegato

Fred Imus, a.k.a. "two-legged Fred," is a staple on his brother Don's "Imus in the Morning" talk-radio show, syndicated in over 100 markets around the nation and simulcast on MSNBC.  Fred lives in Santa Fe, where he runs his highly lucrative catalog company, The Autobody Express.  But before that, he mostly restored '57 Chevys when he had the cash, ragged on his ex-wife, and not much else.

Mike Lupica writes four syndicated columns a week for the New York Daily News.  He is also a contributing writer for ESPN Magazine and a regular on "Good Morning America" and ESPN's Sunday morning "Sports Reports" show.  He is the author of a number of books, the latest being Mad as Hell.

Introduction

By Don Imus
Clearly Mike Lupica and my brother, Fred Imus, asked me to write an introduction for their book hoping I'd come up with something funny--because as you are about to discover, they didn't.
Jesus, what a mess.
You would think that between two people--my brother, who's not exactly a moron, and Lupica, who is, after all, a professional writer--something amusing would have even accidentally found its way onto a page in this piece of shit. It did not.
How then did this become a book? "Book" in the loosest sense of that word, may I add?
It pretty much happened this way:
Greedy New York book publisher offers Fred cash advance to write book.
Fred takes cash.
Writes nothing.
Book publisher assigns editor to call Fred and ask about book.
Fred ignores editor.
Editor calls me.
I think call is about book I owe them.
I ignore call.
Enter Lupica.
Make that, Enter a greedy Lupica. He offers to interview Fred and write book for Fred. He does.
Problem.
Lupica writes down what Fred actually says. It is beyond idiotic.
Fred tries to fix it.
Lupica tries to fix it.
I try to fix it.
We all fail.
Now, it's your fucking problem.
--Don Imus
* * *
The way I look at things, the whole country seems to be for sale. From the White House down. If somebody had told you twenty years ago that CBS would be sold, you would have laughed. Or the Dodgers. I never thought NBC radio would ever be for sale. But everything is. You pick up the paper one day and find out that Hilton is going after ITT/Sheraton and all its holdings--including Madison Square Garden and the New York Knicks and the New York Rangers--and you feel as if you read a story exactly like it the day before, about some other mogul and some other company. But you know what's not for sale?
The Auto Body Express.
And I'll tell you why: I don't ever want to have to get another job.
* * *
The news that scientists had figured out a way to clone sheep touched off all these legal, moral, and ethical arguments that frankly confused the shit out of me. When I saw the pictures in the paper, I was just glad they cloned a pretty one. You grow up where my brother and I did, and you'd never be able to understand why anyone would feel the need to clone sheep.
With all the cute ones we had on the ranch, it's a miracle either one of us ever left home.
* * *
My brother is very particular about having stuff be in its place and having stuff be put away. That's why I look forward to his visits to Santa Fe. It's another opportunity for me to drive him insane. Remember that old movie Gaslight, where the husband slowly tries to convince his wife that she's crazy? I do it to Don by leaving open containers of food on the kitchen counter. It doesn't matter that my brother has the biggest and best show in the history of radio, I can bring him to his knees with just one jar of Hellmann's mayonnaise.
Left open on the counter, that is.
* * *
I don't drink anymore. Don used to drink so much that when he quit, I went right along with him. You've heard the expression that somebody drank enough for two people? And the one Hillary Clinton keeps talking about, it takes a village?
Well, my brother drank enough for two people and we both drank enough for a village.
* * *
Marriage to me is unnatural. Men and women aren't meant to live with each other. I believe we should be more like the animal kingdom. Lions, for example. The male lion really only comes around when he wants to get laid. Then he just wanders around for the rest of the year.
What, you have a problem with that?
* * *
The O.J. stuff is exactly like football as far as I'm concerned. If I'm channel-surfing at night and see one of those lawyers, I always stop and watch. Alan Dershowitz was my favorite. You may not always agree with him, but he never changes his story the way the rest of them do. Most of them say something one week and three weeks later you'll see them on another show and they'll be saying something else. Dershowitz is a lot more believable than the others; at least he doesn't go around whining all the time like that tiresome Chris Darden, who came across to me as nothing but a whiny loser who should have found another line of work.
Darden goes around bitching so much I can't believe he never worked for me.
* * *
Janet Reno being Attorney General of the United States is so scary and unbelievable, I don't even know what to think about it sometimes. That woman rising to the top of her field is one of the most amazing things that's ever happened in government in my lifetime. Forget about the Peter Principle. That's over. It's the Reno Principle from here on.
Put it another way, I wouldn't let Janet Reno put the tops on my damn salsa jars.
* * *
One more thing: I have only attended one awards show in my entire life, when "I Don't Want to Have to Marry You" won the Music City Song of the Year Award. It was one of the great nights of my life. I got to meet Ernest Tubb, Barbara Mandrell, Crystal Gayle, Johnny Paycheck, people like that whom I've always admired. The only bad part of the night was when I had to go up in front of all those people and accept my award. Somehow I pulled myself together and gave the only kind of speech that anybody ever wants to hear at an awards show, from the Oscars on down. I said "Thank you" and sat my ass down.
And if I win any book awards for this little gem, I promise to do the same  thing.