more vegas characters

as if lonnie hammargren wasn't enough. the first vegas character that graced my day was the AMAZING JONATHAN. i have never seen this guy's show but apparently a famous magician in vegas was sitting across from us at lunch today.

then on the way home i got my usual dose of mr. happy on the corner of ft apache and sahara. sometimes he is in different outfits or holding different props. but one thing is for sure, he is ALWAYS very very happy. puts some kind of interest to my hour of sitting in traffic. here is a photo of him:





below is an article about this mr. happy dude i see on the corner every day:




Sorry, Mom. I know you told me not to play in traffic. But today, it's my job.

"Kick higher!" screams the 52-year-old man I'm replacing, Larry James Johnson, who dances in outrageous costumes at the intersection of West Sahara Avenue and Fort Apache Road.

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"The kick is my trademark!" he says, cackling and clapping.

Johnson, an Army veteran, works as a night watchman for a company that places him in temporary assignments. That's only his Clark Kent job, however. From 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., 7 days a week, he's Mr. Happiness, dauntless foe of all frowns.

"This world is full of negativity," Mr. Happiness says, "so I try and stamp it out."

Hundreds of thousands of cars pass each day through what Mr. Happiness says he makes "the happiest intersection in Las Vegas." He waves and blows kisses to as many as he can -- when he's not spinning like a top or balancing on his coccyx, legs flailing.

"If somebody's having a crappy day," he says, "I want them to smile for a moment."

Mr. Happiness also spreads extra-intersectional happiness via his role in infomercials for Towbin Dodge, the local dealership featured on the A&E reality series, "King of Cars."

"They call Wayne Newton Mr. Vegas," Mr. Happiness says. "But I'm the real Mr. Vegas!"

My training begins in the parking lot of the Blockbuster Video at 9420 W. Sahara Ave., where Mr. Happiness parks a white SUV loaded up like Cher's closet. The pharaoh, mariachi and samurai outfits represent only a small fraction of a collection procured from San Francisco's Pier 39 and a Laughlin hat shop.

Mr. Happiness chooses a jester cap and military jacket for me. Luckily, we're the same height (5-foot-5, or as he likes to refer to it, "5-foot-7"). He then hands me an unplugged and unstrung electric guitar. (An important part of Mr. Happiness's routine is air-wailing along to the rock music on his FM Walkman.)

Many cities sport colorful street characters. "Melrose" Larry Green stands at Melrose and Highland avenues in L.A., holding home-scribbled Howard Stern placards. Ronnie "Woo Woo" Wickers wanders Chicago's streets in a Cubs uniform, shouting supports of "woo!" for his team. Peoria's Willie York is a homeless Vietnam vet who dresses like the devil and commits petty crimes, reportedly to spend warm nights in county lockup.

At first, Mr. Happiness -- who resembles rapper Flavor Flav as a squeegee guy -- seems equally nuts. In fact, most uninitiated motorists roll up their windows.

"They think I'm homeless, asking for money," he says. (He's not, and he doesn't.)

I was apprehensive, too -- until I read that Oscar Goodman danced alongside Mr. Happiness at this corner last year, after losing a bet to KXMB-FM, 94.1 morning show hosts Mark and Mercedes. They raised $2,000 for the Make-A-Wish Foundation together. (Then I remembered who else our mayor is comfortable cavorting with. So I Googled "Mr. Happiness" alongside the words "murdered," "shot" and "stabbed," just to be safe.)

"People can call me crazy," Mr. Happiness says, "but I know what I'm all about."

And who's crazier, really -- a guy whose life mission is to make everyone happy, or the people who zoom by in their metal boxes, refusing to acknowledge him, gnashing their teeth en route to jobs they hate?

"Hey, cousin!" Mr. Happiness yells to a motorist. (Everyone he addresses is either a cousin or uncle.)

The blonde in the red Volkswagen Jetta headed south on Fort Apache flicks her thumb upward. Mr. Happiness introduces me as his apprentice. She waves as she waits for the light to change. Mr. Happiness instructs me to perform.

"Spin faster!" he commands me before asking the woman what she thinks.

"You're not retiring, are you?" she asks him.

Mr. Happiness, the eldest of six siblings, survived a tough upbringing in East Oakland, Calif. Three of his sisters were born addicted to heroin, due to his mother's habit. As an illiterate 13 year old, Mr. Happiness broke into houses -- until, he claims, something his great-grandmother said put him straight from then on.

"She said, 'Whatever you throw out in life is gonna come back to you,' " he says. "So if you treat people with love and respect, it's gonna come back to you, too."

This morning, Mr. Happiness brings a smile to a quarter of the passers-by visible behind their desert-tinted windows. And these are smiles with him, not at him, judging from all the honking and thumb-flicking. Las Vegas resident Roger Buss even makes a fast-food stop and doubles back.

"I saw you sweating, so I got you this," he says, handing Mr. Happiness an orange drink.

Reaction isn't always positive. Another guy once brought a cup of urine, which he doused Mr. Happiness with.

"But I love him anyway," Mr. Happiness says.

After the Army, Mr. Happiness spent 16 years in Sacramento, Calif., where he performed the same street act as Laguna Larry. (Laguna is a Sac Town suburb.)

"But I always wanted to live in Vegas," Mr. Happiness says. "I love the mountains. I love the 110-degree weather." Mr. Happiness relocated five years ago, adopting a new stage name inspired by something a 5-year-old girl once told him.

"She said, 'You make me happy, Mr. Happiness,' " he says. "That stuck with me."

A guy in a white Jeep flashes devil horns at me. But my reviews are mixed. Seconds later, a guy in a tan Frontier pickup refuses to turn his head while I scream "yes!" into his open window. I'm getting some smiles, but they're awkward -- like the ones my parents formed when I told them I wanted to be a journalist instead of attend law school.

I suggest a costume change. We step into Mr. Happiness's "dressing room," a shady patch between palms in a Rite Aid lot, and swap outfits. I also decide to take my act solo, to the thin island dividing Sahara's rapidly rolling eastward- and westward-bound traffic.

"Stay out of the street!" Mr. Happiness yells.

But standing next to the real deal is no way to sell an imitation. You never see Mr. Pibb alongside Dr Pepper in the same soda machine. Besides, I'm only doing what Mr. Happiness does every morning.

"I know," he yells, "but I live on the edge!"

One of the eastward-speeding cars slows. It's black and white, I notice, with letters and numbers painted on the side.

Instead of holding still and praying that a policeman won't notice a man in Bob Marley's dreads and Elvis Presley's gold lame suit standing on a traffic island, I decide to put my new training to use. I wail my guitar and flail my body, spinning and kicking like an Isley Brother. If I'm going downtown, it's for doing something.

"Uh-oh," says Mr. Happiness, who received his own $85 citation last month. (He goes to court on Tuesday.)

The officer stares me down as I wonder how I'm going to expense this back to the R-J.

But when the light changes, so apparently does his mind. He salutes before taking off.

"Yes!" Mr. Happiness yells.

The officer even smiles.

"You're spreading the joy now!" Mr. Happiness continues as he runs over to high-five me. "You da man!"

I suggest celebrating my success at Mr. Happiness' house. It's three blocks away, he says, in the Lakes. But he refuses to take me. Ironically, Mr. Happiness' superpowers do not extend here.

"Me and my wife, we're not on speaking terms right now," he says. "A marriage is up and down. One day you like her one day you don't.

"And I haven't been liking her for a couple weeks now."

Video of Levitan as Mr. Happiness is posted at www.reviewjournal.com/video/fearandloafing.html. Fear and Loafing appears every Monday in the Living section.