Blue Room 3

Dad turned his back for a moment, humpily gruffing in disgruntlement. And do you know, when he turned back a transformation had overcome him. Off with the little spectacles and gone was the sweep's-brush beard too. Almost as though Mission Impossible-style he'd peeled off a plastic face. Now he had the vapid face of a younger man, almost of a teenage boy with fairish hair slicked back and a smug, lugubrious pus.
And yet, one could see a certain greyness in the hair, which culminated in a tight ponytail, a thickness of the neck, a glaze in the eyes, a breath of humour.
(What's worse I wonder, the old-fashioned family values work ethic dad or these insidious potsmoking ponytailed hippy dads, which more effective, which easier to live with, which harder to contain? These babyboom muthafuckas come with all their own problems. As for the old doomed World War II generation, well at least they got things accomplished).
Now this story is beginning to reach its culmination. The dad-figure paces about the livingroom, ruminating to himself, figuring. After a few circumnavigations of the lounge the old fool takes from his pocket a wee lollipop which he sticks in his gob and commences to suck cow-chewing-cud like.
And as I sit bewildered in my seat a further transmogrification takes place in daddy's features. Pensive shrewd eyes, sharp profile, hair dropped from head, thickset, calculating, suckin on his lollipop. Spitting image, in fact, of a popular 1970s TV detective.
Now Kojak is a man I mightily respect and for this reason: He got results. He hath not the stature or perspicacity of a Columbo but is worth three Ironsides any day.