“… is among the many very silly holdings of the archives at the Harry

Ransom Humanities Research Center.” [A reader tells me.] “Other

’treasures’ include the green dress Miss Scarlett makes from the curtains

near the end of ‘Gone With the Wind’ and the specs and letter-openers of

various literati. Mostly junk dating from the bad old days when Texans were

still insecure about ‘not having culture.’

“When I was at UT we found one good use for the HRHRC. The building itself

offers a featureless, windowless, white facade that faces that balcony of

the apartment I used to rent across the street, and it makes a perfect

screen for late-night, alfresco, 50-foot-high showings of adult-oriented

films. Watching the cars swerve down Guadalupe as a gigantic vagina loomed

over the collegiate architecture seemed the very pinnacle of humor when I

was 19. The management of the building was less amused than I was.”

Interesting to imagine the insurance report filed after one of those cars

swerved into another. “I was proceeding south on Guadelupe when

suddenly…”