The above is a picture of a man named Willie Smith. He seems to be capable of playing a trumpet or saxophone of sorts. He is different from the Willie Smith below who wrote this story for everyday yeah and this story for thieves jargon:

Here is another unrelated Willie Smith.

Anyway, sometime after he wrote those two stories and after he wrote these he answered a few questions for everyday yeah.

What would be the song playing during the opening credits of a movie based on your life? Or what would be your warmup song if you were a bullpen pitcher? Answer either question, or both. If you don't like sports and movies then what would be song playing in the last cab ride you ever take. If you don't like music then eat a pretzel and explain its significance in your life.

The opening credits "song" would be those first fifteen introductory notes to Bach's PASSACAGLIA AND FUGUE IN C MINOR. My father was an alcoholic high school dropout who loved classical music. Consequently I cut my teeth on such antiquated hogwash. Among the earliest of my memories is one of imaginary sword fighting in the living room while Tchaikhovsky's ROMEO AND JULIET OVERTURE blared on the economy Victrola and Dad ran screaming and swearing through the house, slamming doors and punching holes in the wall. I do not understand popular music. Never have, never will. I do rather resent, however, its constant intrusion into my life. If the fascists don't get me, bubblegum radio will.

What were you doing when you turned 30 (this question came from thieves jargon editor Matt DiGangi who in a few months will be turning 30)

I turned 30 in Palo Alto, California, on the livingroom floor of a musician friend's house, with a bottle of tequila, Jose Cuervo gold I believe, while watching the Pirates come back from a 3 to 1 deficit and beat the Orioles in the Series. I was a Pirate fan by default: I grew up in the D.C. area where the Senators were my team. The Orioles perennially beat up on the hapless Senators, so I to this day bear a grudge against Baltimore, despite John Waters and all he has done for that fair, fetid city. I was down in Palo Alto doing some readings with a jazz band at a local art gallery; we called ourselves THE BROWN BARKER SEXTET and featured my friend on electric bass clarinet; it was my last extended vacation as a single man, lasted a full month. I was still working on and off (mostly off) for Welfare, mostly interviewing the skid road population of Seattle for food stamps and "instant cash." Instant cash was the old "N" program (for "Non-unemployable") whereby one could get about $100 monthly, in two installments, if one could work but was out of work, looking for work, and had absolutely no other source of income. The State did away with this handout in about 1981, due to the program's excessive generosity. I met Susan two months before turning thirty-one, and the rest is marriage and psychic improvement. When I was thirty I had written only a handful of what have become my old standby short pieces, such as HOW THE COPS FIXED MY ASS, REDNECK RAINDANCE, PHILADELPHIA LOVE, HANDGUNS, FROM A DYING COCKROACH and JOE'S ANUS. Such Willie standards as ON GETTING NONE, YOUR DOG, ORESTES IN THE MEAT DEPARTMENT, LOSS OF A PET, SPIDER FUCK, etc., not to mention the novel OEDIPUS CADET, were still in the future.

Thieves Jargon fiction editor, Matt DiGangi, said you were one of the best letter writers he's known, where'd you pick up the skill?  Was it from years of writing to pretty girls or very consumer product companies?

Dear Mark,
I've always written letters. My letters are one step more coherent and less embarrassing than talking to myself, which, quiet maniac that I am, I would otherwise do continually. I usually write epistolarily about the day's events or whatever is on the top of that septic tank I call my mind.
Yesterday was the last of my three days as a financial worker at the Welfare office. I was more tired and tense than usual. This having a four-day weekend on a regular basis can be downright exhausting, especially when you are at the end of your intense three-day work week.
I had a piece of USPO returned mail on an elderly client, let's call him Lazarus Johnson (I am ever true to my oath of confidentiality). I called his phone number to get his new address, as the Post Office indicated no forwarding. A recording apprised Lazarus' phone had been disconnected. So I called his State case manager and left a message -- please call me with Mr. Johnson's new address and phone, if you know such. Then I hied my ass deep into the computer and found the agency that contracts with the State to go to Mr. J.'s home and care for him; called them & the nice lady there gave me his new address & phone number. After I rang off and began entering the new address in the computer, I realized I hadn't gotten the zip code, really needed to talk to Mr. J. anyway, so called the new number. An older woman answered the phone, and when I asked to speak to Lazarus Johnson, she let a few beats go by, then growled into my ear, "Lazarus Johnson is dead!"
"Oh, sorry to hear that. My condolences, ma'am." Then, good State worker that I am, I fished for the necessary fact: " Would you know the date of decease?" 
"July the 20th 2007!" she barked, then hung up.
Hmm. I checked my link with Social Security. They still thought Lazarus was alive, and have all along been sending his monthly $1,000.00 SSA checks to a POB. So I called this private outfit of do-gooders who are authorized to represent Mr. J. and said to the bright young lady who answered the phone, "Can you please confirm for me that Lazarus Johnson died last July 20th?"
"Well, sir, our records show that he came in to visit us last September, and there is no indication that he smelled bad or anything like that, tee-hee!"
We traded a few exchanges like: Well, I have information that he died nine months ago, and, Well, we think he is still alive and decrepit. So I gave up, rang off and went ahead & updated the computer & resent the letter to the new address, just to see if it comes back DECEASED or whatever. Meanwhile I await a call from his case manager, who probably won't know shit either. Such is the life of a part-time aging Welfare boy. Pretty boring, but at the same time ungodly tense, petty & confusing.
I love it when my elderly clients threaten violence. The other week I took a call from a gent who bellowed in my ear, "You'll regret having ever dealt with me, mister, and by God, I'm saying I'll take this all the way to knuckle junction!" Which, despite the colorful language, was easily topped a few years ago when an obese blind gent in his thirties threatened one of my fellow workers, growling over the phone that he was going to come into the office with his thirty-ought-six and blast her ass to hell and back. Quite the image, really: Blind Welfare Client Goes Postal With High-Powered Rifle.
John Martin, God rest his kind and literate soul, once took a shine to my letters and published a few in his Black Sparrow book THUS SPAKE THE CORPSE, Vol. 2. He had been reading the quirky meanderings I had been sending to Andrei Codrescu's "Exquisite Corpse Magazine," which all began "Dear CORPSE," (became a sort of regular column) and mostly detailed the goings-on in my inner city neighborhood -- the usual shootings, home invasions, drug deals, car prowls, rampant prostitution, etc., but all personalized in my tense, intense and vaguely surreal epistolary style. 
My fave correspondent, however, was Jesse Bernstein, Seattle's most famous suicided poet. Jesse lived on the other end of town, and we rarely saw each other in person, but traded letters at least once a week for about five years, before we both finally went stale. Letter writing is great fun. It has cleansed many doors for me. Thanks for asking.
Regards, Willie