Peter Falk is dead. And that got me thinking about Columbo, possibly my all time favorite television character. He was a homicide detective who admittedly could not shoot straight and in fact, rarely, if ever carried a gun. He had a dog he never named and a wife he never introduced to anyone on the show (though he spoke of her constantly). He was politely impolite, if such a thing is possible, he was always smoking cheap cigars and he wore the same rain coat in every episode except one (and he eventually lost that coat). I have seen every episode and though I have little other opinion on the works of Peter Falk, I have to say that Columbo was freaking awesome and that some channel better run a Columbo marathon soon in honor of his death because all the episodes I had were on VHS and all my VHS tapes are in a landfill on the grounds that they are VHS tapes.
My friend Joe is 86. 86-year-olds have different perspectives on death than do I. When I informed him that Falk had died, Joe and I had the following conversation:
Joe: How old was he?
Me: 83.
Joe: Beat him.
Me: Nice work, Joe.
Joe: Ah, you do what you can.
I discovered Columbo around the time I discovered staying up way too late for my own health and so, unlike a lot of Columbo fans, I associate Columbo with winding down after a long night of enjoying the company of awesome night-owls. When I think of Columbo, I invariably think of fun times.
And of owning a dog you don't name. Seriously, how cool do you have to be to own a dog and never name it? You have to be super awesome cool, that's how cool. You have to be, to turn a phrase, Columbo Cool.
Columbo was so cool, he once told a female officer who was chastising him for never being at the police station, "Funny thing about that ma'am, the murders never seem to happen there."
Columbo was so cool, he once told a Mensa Chapter President, "Here I am in a house full of the smartest people in the world and I didn't even notice."
Columbo was so cool, he once drank whiskey with a murderer and told him a limerick I still tell to this day:
A marvelous bird is the pelican
His beak holds more than his belly can
He can stash enough in that beak
To eat for a week;
I'll be damned if I know how the hell he can.
Columbo was so cool, he got his boss arrested for murder.
Columbo was so cool, he could make a killer omelet without folding the eggs.
Columbo was so cool, he drove an old Peugeot that had no seatbelts or blinkers.
I could go on like this, really I could. And I just might. But I think you get the idea. Columbo was cool and smart and funny and just enough of a wiseass to make people slightly uncomfortable. If I was a homicide detective, and I won't be, I would be Columbo.
Oh, and just one more thing:
Columbo was so cool, the freaking Beastie Boys mentioned him in a song.
Beat that, Chuck Norris, you freaking stooge.