As a favor to a friend of mine (it was repayment of sorts since he lent me a cache of toilet paper at the height of the shortage back in March), I inquired after the loquacious old lummox, Simon Cycler, who in turn, told me about my friend’s friend, Rev. Leonidas W. Grinley (who may or may not be a mythic figure like Moses or Moby-Dick), living out his days in Queens County. Out where the parking lot at the temporarily shuttered Citi Field, erstwhile Shea Stadium, meets Flushing Creek’s wiliest reeds. There I'd find answers amongst the gulls and the gutter fish, the garbage and the gas tanks. Some place a person can get mud-logged loafers for the price of a hot dog. I wonder: can a pedestrian hydroplane? I don’t see why not. This is out where the chop shops of Iron triangulators slice their wares for fun and profit. I was told to ask about this Grinley and Cycler would tell me about Jim Grinley, an eminently more interesting character.
I found Simon Cycler glued to his phone, his eyes watering due to gamified bliss, in the semi-collapsing garage of an ancient autobody shop. He was playing something, as far as I could tell, with coins and apex predators. I sat down, said hello, but he couldn’t be bothered to lift so much as his pinky finger in acknowledgment. He’s a funny old man, truth be told. When the game finished and the shark or whatever ate him whole, thus ending the contest, he perked up and delivered a rousing, albeit tardy hello. I asked him about Leonidas W. Grinley and what he knew about this notorious personage. That’s when he cornered me between the jukebox and the soda machine, rattling off an uninterrupted monologue, which is found below. I just let him go, listening to each idiotic word, never daring to utter so much as a syllable in response.
There was this guy named Jim Grinley, a real animal lover, whom I met in ’87 or ‘88. Checker cabs weren’t all that uncommon in those days and I remember hailing a few with Big Jim. Grinley would sell leashes and biscuits to anyone who showed the slightest inclination towards the beastly kingdom. He had rat-pigeons, chicken gators, and tom-rats, everything you could ever want as a pet owner. But one day he caught a frog after a Mets game, took him and home and taught him everything he knew (which, in Grinley’s telling, wasn’t all that much. The man never made it past the 7th grade). After a while, Grinley got the frog to speak, who, at this point, went by Don’ld. The only trouble was that Grinley couldn’t get the thing to tell the truth. Would you believe that whatever he did, whatever he instructed him to say, the frog would say and do the opposite?
Don’ld told friends Grinley invited to the house for a friendly game of euchre that he was a billionaire, bedded supermodels, and owned casinos up and down the East coast. He claimed to have a penthouse apartment overlooking Central Park and a sprawling estate in Florida. When Grinley would pull him aside and try to talk some sense into the amphibian, it was no use. Please don't embarrass me in front of company, he said. To Don’ld, it wasn’t lying, as much as breathing, which he did quite heavily, a clear indication of an undiagnosed heart problem.
Eventually, Grinley sought to monetize his discovery, believing he had to make the most of the situation. Thinking, if all he does is lie, well, he ought to reap some of the benefits. So he and Don’ld traveled up and down and all across Queens County goading half-drunk bar patrons into tricking the frog into telling the truth. Most thought they could get him on a technicality, asking him what day it was, whether or not it was raining, or what was his name. It never worked and ol’ Grinley sure cleaned up. Don’ld lied quicker than you could drink. You’ve never seen a frog so mendacious and arrogant as he was, for he was just a liar. Still, Grinley was enormously proud of his frog, and why not? Goobers and doofuses traveled from everywhere just to see this frog lie. And lie he did.
Grinley kept the frog in a gilded box with a gold toilet and a gold cot. Sometimes, inquisitive fools would ask about it.
“What’s in the box, Grinley?”
All that deceit started to influence Grinley.
“Oh, it might be a sausage sandwich or it might be a new iPhone. But it’s just a lying frog.”
“I bet I can get your frog to tell the truth.”
“You’re on. If there’s one thing this boy can do it’s lie.”
Don’ld climbed out of the box and stared at the man.
“What’s your name?”
“Don’ld,” said Don’ld.
“Where are you?”
“Queens.”
Grinley knew he was finished if Don’ld answered another question. What’s gotten into him? He was suddenly, and without warning, telling the truth. His name was Don’ld and he was in Queens. Grinley asked for a moment with the frog. Like Angelo Dundee in the corner, he gave it everything he had. But nothing worked.
The guy leaned in between man and frog, asking, “where’s the bathroom?”
Don’ld pointed to the door. The guy chuckled and scooped up his money from the table, knowing he'd just won.
Grinley was confused, staring at the frog, mouth agape and scratching his bald dome raw, when he noticed a sudden glaze over the frog's eyelids. Poison, it just had to be. With the help of a little charcoal, he got Don'ld to burp out a tiny vial of sodium Pentothal AKA truth serum. The guy was out of sight by now and much, much richer.
“How do I look?,” asked Grinley.
“Like a million bucks,” said Don’ld.
Phew, he was lying again. All of a sudden Don'ld he took off out the door and after the guy, never seen by Grinley or anyone else again.
[This is where Simon Cycler heard his name being called. His car was getting towed.]
I had heard enough about Grinley and his lying frog for one lifetime.
“Where do you think you’re going?,” said Cycler.
"Home," I said.
“But I haven’t even told you about Grinley’s autotuned cow yet,” said Cycler, pleading with me to stay.
“Oh, enough of that,” I said, and bidding the doddering dope a genial good day, I left.
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