I'm saddened to learn about the death of C.T. Tucker (Tucker Hartshorne), one of the strangest, funniest, most genuine human beings I've ever met. Even trying to describe WHO Tucker was is difficult, which makes me smile right there. To many, Tucker was a musician first and foremost, frontman of the legendary Blue Sparks From Hell (see pic to left). He was also a businessman and musician supporter...for years he owned Tucker's Breakfast King in Long Valley, NJ, which on weekend evenings became Rosie's Cabaret (named for his pig, Rosie). Tucker was kind and generous at times when few others were. Blunt and truthful, too. (Said to me one evening, two minutes or less before I took the stage: "You gonna tune that thing...or is that your thing? If it's your thing, to be untuned, I mean, then please get a new thing." God bless ya, Tucker.) Tucker was also an animal lover, and successful animal trainer for Hollywood and NY etc.
For my readers, you should know that Tucker played a role in my novel In Hoboken, although not in an obvious way. It's not his character in the book, but his language. The repeating line "We do what we do," attributed at various times to the characters of James and Thatcher, was classic Tucker. I believe I heard it from him a few times, but the centerpiece memory was at the wedding of Tim and Sarah Blaikie, where the Blue Sparks had agreed to be the evening's entertainment. A drunken guest at one point was yelling up requests -- can't even remember what the request was, and it doesn't matter -- and Tucker looked down on him and calmly shrugged No and said simply, "We do what we do, my friend. We do what we do."
