So I was sitting around minding my “P’s and Q’s” in front of the teleboob with my flatmate Carlton last week… Carlton was surfing through the masses of commercials trying to find anything that resembled a solid Fred Astaire movie when suddenly he skipped past the Discovery Channel.  Now I can’t be entirely certain what I glimpsed in the 1.8 seconds the Discovery Channel blanketed our teleboob, but I’m about 5-6% slightly convinced that it involved an afro, The Grand Coulee Dam and the name “John”. 

Perhaps it was the fumes seeping into the house from the gas grill outside scalding our Salmon and marshmallow feast, but this brief vision was enough to inspire me to take a weekend excursion on a quest to find the elusive “Johnfro” that resides along the beaches of Coulee, Washington.  Luckily, Carlton was able to document everything with his trusty camera.

And so begins our road trip…

Naturally, any hunt for the elusive “Johnfro” requires proper preparation and protection. Obviously a plush Viking helmet is the gear of choice for any potential “Johnfro” hunter.

A fierce wildcat that nearly tore my friend Cristie limb from limb

A statue of a goat we found in Levenworth. According to Carlton, the horns of the goat statue point towards the abode of “The Johnfro”.

A meager dust tornado?… or a treacherous deathtrap omen alerting us of the presence of “The Johnfro”?… you be the judge, dear sir.

 

Our next stop was the Grand Coulee Dam itself.

At the dam we were approached by Falkor-lite… a distant cousin of Falkor the white dragon dog thing from “The Neverending Story”. Surely a distant cousin of such a prominent childhood mythical hero could help point me in the direction of the elusive “Johnfro”, yes? Unfortunately, the rabid pup only spoke Tajikistani and bit me out of spite for my “arrogant, ignorant, West coast flair”.

  … Ouch…

Bottom line… don’t fuck with Falkor…

We eventually found our way to a Rodeo in Omak… also known as “The Armpit of Bumfuck Washington”. This crazy old wiseman whispered something entirely illegible to Carlton that we were later able to translate to “The Johnfro sips sparkling cider in the river”. Either that or “I just crapped my pants”. It was kind of debatable… Off we go…

The river

Exhausted from this endless quest, Carlton could take no more…

I pitched a tent with hopes of starting our search fresh the next morning

The next morning we renewed our search along the riverbank for the elusive “Johnfro”

A Johnfro dropping…. we knew we were close…

Now deep into the homeland of “The Johnfro” we approached these pigmies in the middle of some kind of ritual honoring their King.

This strange, sick, alien ritual was split into two parts. The first part involved them rolling down a dirt hill on some kind of “suicide run”.

The second part of this strange ritual required them to pose as if they were in an Abercrombie catalog. Go figure. I wasn’t in a position to question the mysteries of “The Johnfro”… so I pushed on…

At long last! The hut of “The Johnfro”. We all braced with eager anticipation for our first sighting.

Finally, there he was in all his splendor. The one and only “Johnfro”. Sweet, sweet vindication! “The Johnfro” exists!!

I made sure to keep my distance at first. I didn’t want to scare him off. I watched from afar as he pondered his wondrous existence as a “Johnfro”. “What could he be thinking?”, I asked myself. I can only assume it had something to do with birthing large fruit out of a cooter and wearing red rider cowboy hats to Rodeo’s in Omak. Just a hunch…

The Johnfro’s red rider cowboy hat. Legend has it that he wears these to Omak Rodeos in an attempt to “blend in”.

“Oh no! He spotted us!”. No fear…

Cristie and I did our best to camouflage ourselves as unruly natives. Our swift thinking paid off, and “the Johnfro” instantly befriended us and invited us into his danger hut.

In return for his unexpected kindness, we decided to take “the Johnfro” home…

…and teach him volleyball

BONUS BLOGIFICATION: A Meeting of The Minds: The Johnfro and David Discuss the Demise of Trogdor

“The Romance of the Fungus World”
By R. T. and F. W. Rolfe
Release date: By 01 June, 1974