Popeye has always been a hero of mine, regardless if he did at one point live in a garbage can. He was strong and brave and when he "can't stands no more" he does something about it. Armed with just an over-sized can of spinach and a pair of over-sized forearms, he fought for justice, peace, and his girlfriend. That's my kind of guy.

I wondered recently what happened to America's favorite big-chinned hero. He was probably doing well financially because of that fried chicken chain and all, but was he still fighting the good fight? Did he eat some of that E. coli infected spinach? I started to worry if he was even still alive. He made his first appearance in 1929 and looked to be about 100 years old then. So that would make him like 178 now. Even a great man like Popeye has to succumb to Father Time.

For my burning desire to know and for you, my dear readers, I investigated. My first stop was the docks. I figured I'd work a shift down there and listen to what people were saying. The work almost killed me. And I don't mean that in a hyperbolic sense, I mean I was lifting stuff so heavy that my back threatened to break on me. I almost caught my eye on a crane as well, long story. Between the huffing and puffing and nearly dying, I managed to chat with the burly, hairy working men.

"Anybody heard from Popeye lately?"

I heard a few people snicker. Maybe that was their way of dealing with the depression. He must have meant a lot to them, too. Then one guy, with a skull cap and a big beard spoke up.

"Do you mean Popeye the gay-ler man?"

The men all roared with laughter, nearly dropping a sack of rice on my foot, mind you. And there it was, folks: the first clue. Popeye was a homosexual. Maybe he was tired of pretending and went into hiding. Maybe Olive Oyl was actually a man.

I didn't get anymore out of these men. They weren't very talkative, but liked giggling like little girls (I can say this now being far, far away from their crushing hands) when I asked them about Popeye.
But I did find him, folks. He was not dead, but the truth, I must warn you, is most shocking. So if you are standing up while reading this, go ahead and find a chair. If you are with child while reading this, I suggest waiting till the baby is pushed out and coming back to my column.

There were folks who tried to convince me that Popeye wasn't even real. Okay, so I doubt he could actually eat worms and then spit out germs, but his existence, never a question. They'd call him a cartoon (people and their made-up words, sheesh!), and I told them, "Yeah right!"

I found him in Houston at a bus depot. He was sitting on the ground, leaning against a dumpster, wearing dirty clothes and eating some Taco Bell out of the garbage. But I recognized that famous squint, that anchor tattoo on his arm, and folks, he was smoking a corncob pipe. I was shocked to find him like this, like a bum. I asked him what happened to the hero we all knew and loved. He said, "I yam what I yam and that's all I yam." What a sobering statement.

I sat with him and chatted, though he reeked so badly I had to throw up a few times. He held an empty spinach can out in hopes that passersby would put change in it so he could afford to buy something to eat. He refused to tell me the details of his monumental fall from grace only saying, "I'm down on me luck."

"Where have you been all these years?" I asked him, expecting to hear tales of sea battles across the world.

Instead he said gravely, "Cleveland."

Heartbroken, I mumbled out a few more questions, writing notes in a tear-drenched notebook. He smoked hard on his pipe and instead of that sweet, melodious "toot, toot!" I'd come to love, there was only the hollow sound of sucking.

"Did Bluto do this to you?" I cried. "I mean, I'll get you all the spinach you need to get back on your feet and clock him good."

He ignored me, obviously weakened and afraid, a shell of the sailor he once was. He just said, "Me pipe can smokes no more."

I offered to refill it for him as a gesture of good faith and with the smallest hope that the old Popeye would return if his pipe was tooting again.

"What do you smoke, Mr. Sailor Man?" I asked.

"I smokes me some rock."

Poor man. He had become so divorced from reality that he believed he was smoking music. It was a beautiful image, to be sure, but also a sad delusion.