Dear Mark, Maybe you read a posting or two from Mr. Dean Randall on
MMD a while back; Dean passed on a few months ago.  I was his friend
for over twenty years and, gawd, did he have stories!  The following
is one of my favorites:

It seems that Dean saw an ad for an upright player in the Seattle
paper.  He called the number listed and asked the woman who answered
the phone a few questions about the piano: what brand, what's the case
like, etc. and so on.  Most important was this question: "Is the piano
complete?"

Response:  "Oh my yes, it's all together but the player part doesn't
work."  (Dean's eyesight was poor so he wasn't about to drive from
Tacoma to Seattle on a wild goose chase.)  Having been assured it was
complete he went up to Seattle to pay the lady the one or two bills
she was asking for it.

Upon arrival and subsequent inspection he found an ex-player!  Sure,
the _piano_ was all there, but the player mechanism had been entirely
gutted.  So Dean says to her (Dean could get quite surly at times..),
"Why the hell did you tell me this piano was complete when clearly it
is not?"  Response:  "Well sir, it _is_ complete, I'm sure!"

Dean:  "Well, if it's so !%^@%^ complete, where the hell do you put in
a music roll?"

The lady walks over to a nearby closet and pulls out a piano roll,
takes it out of the box, tightens it a little then opens the spoolbox
doors and plops the roll directly into the piano.  She then says,
"See, dammit!  I told you it doesn't work!"

True story!  Dean was one hell of a great guy.  I'll sure miss him.

Yours truly,
Eric J. Shoemaker
Tacoma, WA