Seeking Bobby's Advice; Flash Fiction Friday #37

***Author's Note*** The three people in the following story are composites of people I have known. This author doesn't encourage the behavior they are engaged in, but he is not so naive that he doesn't know that this sort of thing goes on. This tale was inspired by a comment that our good Cormac wrote some time ago and his starter sentence brought it to mind.

"As with juggling, the key to life is to keep the procession moving steady and don't look down," Bobby said before he licked the paper and wound the joint he was rolling into a neat cylinder that could have passed for a store-bought cigarette. Bobby often made these kind of sage pronouncements, and out of anyone else they would have sounded like complete bullshit, but not Bobby. He had a slow, easy way of talking that made every word he said sound like it came from Buddha himself. “The bong is in the coffee table where it always is,” he motioned with a nod of his head as his hands were full with the makings of another joint.

I got the old Blue Bomber out and took a pinch from the loose weed that he was rolling his joints from. I packed a small one and took a hit before continuing, “I just don’t get her man. She used to be this super-cool, laid-back chic who didn’t get uptight about nothin’. Now the slightest little thing and she just goes ape-shit. I just want to know what happened to that girl. What happened to the Jackie who could just roll with the flow?” I exhaled into the rays of sunlight that were creeping in through the blinds just so I could watch the smoke roll into itself before being caught in the fan.

Bobby sat back in his frumpy, worn-out easy chair and glanced at his twelve inch black and white TV that was hooked up to the camera on his driveway. “Crap. Carl’s here,” he said as the El Camino filled the screen.

“Should I go?” I asked.

“Naw man. Don’t go. He’ll be gone in a few minutes, but if I’m here by myself, that sonofabitch will stay for hours. Stick around, we haven’t finished our conversation yet.” Bobby reassured me.

Have you ever known someone who could blow into a room like there was a hurricane behind them where ever they went? Carl was like that. He threw open the door, strolled in, and without a greeting, flopped on the sofa beside me. He wore a stupid grin that was punctuated by his missing teeth. “What’s up Bobby? What are you and Pete talking about?” Carl feigned interest as he helped himself to the weed on the table. Bobby grimaced as Carl licked his lips wetly before he hit the bong.

“We were just talking about a personal problem of Pete’s,” Bobby said as he traded the finished joint for another rolling paper.

“What? Jackie startin’ ta get real pregnant and give you shit? That’s the way Yolonda tried ta play me and I just told her straight up to fuck off. This bull ain’t gonna change for no heifer, that’s for damn sure. I don’t care how well she goes down!” Carl tapped his thumb against his chest as if he thought he was quite a catch for all womenkind. He helped himself to another bong. “What’s with all the joints Bobby?” Carl eyed the neat stack of doobies.

“Cheryl and I are going to a concert tonight and I wanted to take some with me.”

“Who ya goin’ ta see? I hear Tom Petty is in town,” Carl said.

“Wagner,” Bobby said flatly.

“Are they new? I ain’t heard them on the radio.” Carl scrunched up his eyebrows as he thought.

“No, ‘they’ ain’t new. Wagner was a composer,” Bobby shook his head.

“He do anything I’d have heard of?”

“Yeah, music for a Bugs Bunny cartoon.”

“Shit, I seen all of them. Hey Bob, ol’ buddy,” Carl’s tone changed to one used by car salesmen everywhere, “you wouldn’t happen to have a dime bag you could part with would you? Me an’ Frank are goin’ ta take the four wheelers out to Buckeye Lake and I wanted some for the trip.”

Bobby fished around in the coffee table and pulled out a rolled up baggie and put it on the table in front of him. Carl’s hand snaked out and pocketed it before you could blink. “You don’t mind if I get this one on spot do you?” he said as if this was a complete afterthought.

“You cheese-dicked idiot! In the eight years that you have known me, have I ever spotted you a sack? Ever?” Bobby’s face flushed red enough to match his eyes, “No, never. What gives you the gonads to ask now?!?”

“Well, I uh-“

“Don’t tell me you ‘thought’ Carl, because you don’t think. You don’t think any more often than I spot you a sack!” Bobby huffed and sat back again, “You take that sack and weasel on out of here and if you don’t have the cash on Monday, don’t you ever come back again!” Wordlessly, Carl slunk out of the room like a scolded child. Bobby followed his progress to the Camino on the TV to assure himself that he was truly gone. “I know full well that he won’t have the money on Monday, but it will be worth the sixty bucks just to have that bonehead out of my hair for good. Good riddance. I wish I’d have thought of it eight years ago.”

Bobby took a deep breath and tried to clear the air of the annoyance that had just breezed through. “Now where were we? Oh yes, Jackie. Now Pete, as much as I hate to admit it, there is a slim grain of truth in what Carl said. Jackie is getting along in her pregnancy and her hormones are in a cocktail shaker. You have followed the most basic command of nature. You have survived to adulthood and you have reproduced. The bit that you are getting hung up on is the fact that Jackie is changing and she expects you to change as well. You can’t be out smokin’ dope and blowing your money on beer and Taco Bell at 3 am. In her eyes, you need to be a good provider for the family you’ve started and she ain’t seeing that.” I raised my finger to object but Bobby dismissed me, “A couple of overtime shifts at the factory now and then isn’t gonna do it. Now be a man and act like one. Go home to your pretty wife and quit hangin’ out with your dope smokin’ buddies. They are a bad influence,” he said as a smile broke through his long gray beard. “Besides, I gotta get cleaned up for my date with my wife!”

Enjoy your week
Doc

The Flare Gun

By Ohio law, any boat over sixteen feet is required to have a flare gun aboard. My canoe is only thirteen feet long, but I purchased a flare gun just the same. The expense was way more than I was willing to part with, but by my logic, who could put an accurate price on my life?

I have a wife and two kids who relied on the money I bring in to insure that they have a good life. Should my life be extinguished in a freak canoe accident, they are out quite a bit of money, not to mention that my kids grow up without a father and my wife will enter the dating market. Both of these I find distasteful, not to mention that I am dead. To prevent this, the forty dollars I spent on a flare gun seemed nominal.

If the flare gun itself had been only forty dollars, I would have felt cheated, but it came with a bright orange waterproof case, and a water dye pack in lime green to signal our distress to the Coast Guard. It also included two whistles that were less than a quarter of an inch thick and an inch and a half long. These were to call the attention of our rescuers when they were within hearing distance. Initially I scoffed at the whistles until Lucy got one between her lips and deafened the neighbors for six blocks. After that, I changed my position and attached one to each life vest, just in case. I have heard small bombs that were quieter.

When I was unpacking after the trip, my brother-in-law noticed the emergency orange box and asked about it. "It's for the flare gun," I told him. "Does it work?" he asked. "I don't know," I admitted.

His jaw dropped and I have never seen his face strike this position before.

"You mean to tell me that you brought this thing along, carted it over hell and gone and never tried it?" He asked incredulously.

With more than a little shame, I admitted that he was right. I had made the cardinal mistake of not checking my equipment before taking it on a long journey. How could I have been so stupid?

In my defence, I wasn't that stupid. The instructions that came with the flair gun warned that there were severe penalties for firing it off when there was no real emergency. I took these warnings to heart. I was tempted to try it out the day I brought it home, but I live in a residential neighborhood about a half mile from the freeway so it was pretty likely someone would have noticed.

The other night I staid up late writing on the computer and the cold beers kept evaporating quickly until I had lost enough of my good sense that I thought firing it off might be a good idea. Much like gunshots, it takes two to really figure out where it's coming from and somewhere in the neighborhood, some boob was setting off the last of their leftover fireworks.

"Perfect," I giggled to my drunken self as I loaded up the four inch 12 gauge shell into the chamber, " no one's going to notice this!" I stepped out my back door, aimed it straight up and cocked the heavy hammer. I gave the trigger a gentle squeeze.

The glow of the flare was mildly unimpressive as well as the zenith of it's height. The noise however was enough to deafen me in my right ear for an hour. I have at one time or another fired many different kinds of firearms, rifles, shotguns, large caliber pistols, etc., but while this baby packed all the kick of a BB gun, it went off with the roar of artillery.

I hurried inside and put the flare gun away before the Law was called on my dumb ass. I had another beer and played a few games of Solitaire on the computer as iTunes and Youtube would have been lost on me.

Doc

The Canoe Trip, part one

"Sometimes you just have to go home to taste the muddy water." - Doc

I have had an adventure and as much as I would like to share it with you in it's entirety to do it in one long go would be tiresome for the reader and the author as well. With that in mind, I will tell of it in small pieces much like the rain that fell on us every day and soaked us to the bone, as it also paved our way through the shallow spots at times.

The trip started on Sunday 8/16 and ended on Saturday 8/22, with five of those days in the canoe. Without exception, this was the greatist adventure I have ever had since I have undertaken fatherhood. This was a brutal test of skill, endurance, willpower, & fortitude. All in all, I feel I faired well. Almost forty miles in a canoe dosen't sound like much, but the going was tough by even the most hardy of traveler's standards.

The trip was much like a comedy of errors with several points of slapstick, and some farce thrown in. Imagine a bumbling Lewis and Clark expedition without the Indians, Thomas Jefferson, Sacagawea, and a lot more rednecks. It could almost make a mid-season TV show for the networks. "Two Boobs in a Canoe" has a nice ring to it.

Doc

I Have Seldom Been Right

I read once that, "No man is a saint is his own land and no man is ever a hero to his wife." I believe there is a grain of truth in that.

I'd love to kid you and tell you that I once saved Flannery from a ring of white slavers, or halted a war by getting the factions to sit down and drink a few beers together but that would be a lie.

I was right in front of my wife once, and that is like making Haley's comet appear out of nowhere. Gentleman, back me up here...

Flannery and I had only been married a short while at the time and I had whisked her off to my country home in Licking County, Ohio which left her far from the comforts of city life and civilization. We lived in the stone house that I had grown up in and were starting out on our uncertain married life there. We had two incomes, no kids, and life was rolling along nicely.

What she couldn't understand was my evening forays into the woods after work each evening. "What are you doing?" she would ask. "I'm going to go cut wood," I'd respond. "What for?" she asked bewilderly. "I've got to cut wood for this winter," I said with the casualness that this was as obvious as the nose on her face. "It's June!" she remarked. "No better time," I responded as I slipped two beers and a handful of Starbursts candies into my pockets.

After a week of this odd behavior, her curiosity got the better of her. She waited an hour after I had gone and then set out to find me. It wasn't hard. She hiked up the hill across the road and followed the sound of a saw cutting into wood and my swearing. In five minutes time she located me about one hundred yards from the house.

"Whatcha doing?" she queried as she hiked up the steep grade.

I wiped my brow and took a long pull at my can of Budweiser. "Cuttin' wood," was all I could say as I wipped the foam from my lips.

"Huh," she responded, as she was unimpressed by my progress. I had managed to cut through a large tree (19 to 23 inches wide) with only a bow saw as I refused to purchase a chain saw out of sheer contempt and the lack of funds. I hated the noise and even more so, I hated to unleash the fumes on an already beleaguered planet. With the bow saw, I needn't spend money on going to the gym and I could keep us warm this winter. It was win-win.

Flannery's "Huh" was an affront to my ego and my lifestyle. I felt obliged to defend myself and my way of life to my new bride. I had been mildly insulted and I felt that I needed to quell the unrest right here, so I pointed to a forked tree not twenty yards off.

"You see this here dead tree I've been sawing on for an hour?" she nodded her head and appraised the dead tree that I'd been cutting at.

"Do you see that forked tree twenty yards yonder?" she nodded her head.

"I'm going to drop this tree and let it fall to where it is going to strike this second tree in the crotch and split in half, and I can thereby drag it into the front lawn of our yard and cut it up in at my liesure."

"Sure," she nodded as if I told her a tale right straight out of Hans Christian Andersen.

I used a crow-bar that I had to run and fetch to knock over the large tree, but the result was just as I predicted. The tree fell and struck the other as I forecasted and the split of the wood was enough to drive the chipmunks and deer from our neck of the woods for a while.

I smiled a knowing smile and made to move this large boost to our winter heating bill down from the hill and to our front yard with the knowledge that I had interpreted this just as it happened.

I congratulated myself on the fact that I had foreseeen the end result, but more importantly, I had had the chance to show my new wife a thing or two. I lugged the pieces down to my front door with the reassurance that I could cut them later and my wife would respect me as if I knew what I was doing.

Gentlemen, treasure this moment while you can. You will find many occasions when she proves you wrong, but always treasure the one chance you had to prove yourself right.

Doc

The Tragic Tale Of One Ill-Gotten Bottle Of Beer

I work in the bakery of a local grocery store and on Saturday night at 7 PM, I'm headed to the lunch counter to bag and reduce the leftover bagels. I pass two teenage boys. Neither one is particularly striking, but they have a conspiratorial air about them. The tall one is blond, dressed in a long sleeve black T-shirt, black jeans, sneakers, and a winter toboggan cap despite the fact that is is pushing 87 degrees outside. The other is dark haired, with a red pock-marked face, shorts, gray T-shirt and sneakers. They speak to each other in hushed tones and the brunette is listening intently to the blond.

As I round the wine display, I see my buddy the plain-clothes security guard. I nod my hello and rush off to the bagels as I'm in a hurry so I can leave on time. I'm bagging bagels when I hear my buddy Jason from across the room yell, "There he goes!" and I see the brunette kid dash towards the door only to find it locked. He darts back into the store when Jason yells loudly again, "Hey!"

Suddenly, the steam runs out of the kid and he stops and hangs his head. He has no fight left in him. He turns to take a few steps to Jason who quickly puts his arm around his shoulders and leads him away.

I find out later from the girl who stocks the dairy case that they are 12 and 14, and they tried to steal three bottles of Corona Light. The brunette 12 year-old pushed the plain-clothes security guard (who is an off duty Sheriff's deputy) in an effort to get away and that counts as an Assault charge and he will have a felony on his record until he is nineteen when he has the opportunity to get it expunged. He will have to put this on every job application he fills out until then.

To make matters worse, the blond 14 year-old was just spending the night at his place for that evening. He called his mother from jail and she came and picked him up. The brunette called home and couldn't reach his mother. They sent a patrol car to his house and found a note from her. She had come home to find the two of them gone so she had decided to take a vacation in West Virginia and would be back later, if she feels like it.

Now our 12 year-old brunette has a felony on his record, no prospects, abandonment by his mother, has become a prisoner of the juvenile system and a ward of the overworked Children's Services, not to mention he has horrible acne to boot.

I can only pray that this kid gets his head screwed on straight early or this is simply going to be the beginning of a long line of incidents to lead from loserdom, to prisoner, to convict. No one could wish such a fate on a 12 year-old kid.

I wouldn't.

Doc

At What Price Sobriety?

***Editor's Note*** The video is provided below for those who don't want to read***

I went to Tiki Wednesday night like I always do. It was good to see everyone as everyone showed with one exception, which is understandable, as he is taking a short vacation at the county's expense.

We all hashed out our woes of the week and caught up on how everyone has been doing. Some fared well, while others not so much. The conversation meandered as it always does as we moved from politics, likes & dislikes, to philosophy. Jerry suggested that our new motto should be, "Solving the world's problems one Tiki at a time." It seemed to have some small ring of truth to it, so we are going to put it on the back of our T-shirts when we make them. As the evening wore on, each member finished their beer, called it a night and headed home toward bed, leaving only Franklin and I to douse the lights and turn the radio off.

It is usually just Franklin and I left at the end of the evening as we have the shortest distance to travel to bed and we treat our philosophical discussions with a trifle more seriousness than perhaps the other members do, so we stay up a bit later than the rest.

"Have you ever considered giving up drinking and smoking?" I asked Franklin.

"Sure, why do you ask?" he queried.

I explained that I have been giving some thought to how much money I spend on beer and smokes, especially since my consumption has increased dramatically as of late. "So?" Franklin said. I told him that I had been considering a hiatus on my vices for a short period of time, if for no other reason than to prove that I could do it, but I was hesitant to go it alone. Would he like to join me in this experiment?

"You want to bet some money?" his eyes lit up.

"Hell Frank, I don't have any money. All I have is an uncashed check for $30 from Grandma for Father's Day." I am NOT a gambling man. I never have been, as the only money that is worth betting is money that you are prepared to lose and it has always been too precious a commodity to just throw it away in my book.

"Well, I've got a $35 check from a client that I haven't cashed yet. I'll put that up. So, no beer, no cigarettes, but for how long?"

"Well, as it is already after midnight, let's start at 12:01 AM Friday and it will run until we get together Wednesday for Tiki. By my count, that's six days. That should be long enough."

"I'll start now," he said as he stubbed out his cigarette and with a grand flourish of his hand poured out the rest of his almost full bottle of beer on the flowers. Then he took my pen and the envelope that I had been taking notes on and jotted down his cell phone number. "Be sure to call me when you crack," he said with a mischievous smile. I finished my smoke, bid him goodnight, and went home with a lot to think about.

All Thursday this ran through my mind. I was a fool to have made the bet as my will power is as tough as warm Jello and I don't really have the thirty bucks to lose. For one small moment I contemplated smoking cigars again and chasing them with whiskey or vodka, as neither one would violate the rules of our bet and I could keep my money without climbing the walls like a patient in Nurse Ratchet's ward, but I knew in my heart of hearts that this would be cheating and I just couldn't bring myself to do that to Franklin regardless the amount of money.

On Thursday night at 11:54 PM, I lit my last cigarette and watched the clock so as not to violate our agreement, and my supply of beer was long since gone. I crushed it out at 11:59 and went to bed wondering what Friday would bring.

That night my back ached and my sunburn from too much time spent in the pool topless grated against me. To top it off, my heartburn could not be quenched with stomach remedies or milk. I thrashed and rolled around until 4:36 AM until sleep overcame me.

I almost didn't make coffee Friday morning from the fear that it would weaken my resolve to not have a cigarette, but my tiredness won out and I drank an entire pot to coax myself to life. I was a lump of pain, discomfort, and grouchitude for most of the day. I envisioned myself praying for strength and resolve for the next five days as I sweated bullets and snarled at anyone who crossed my path. I pictured myself eating nine course meals, six a day, just so I wouldn't run mad down the street to buy Marlboro's and Budweiser's.

I worked my shift and headed home with all the joy of a miner trapped in the shaft and the water was rising. At 9 o'clock I called Franklin, just to see how he was doing. He answered his cell phone and after a few words handed it to his girlfriend Patrice.

She explained that they were at a very noisy birthday party in a swanky bar and Franklin had lasted until 4 o'clock.

All bets were off, and I lit a smoke before I finished the call.

To some degree I was satisfied with my performance although I didn't really shine under pressure as it were. I learned what a slave I am to my vices and that is a tough pill to swallow no matter how much beer I have to wash it down.

I haven't decided whether to take my winnings or not, as Franklin is as hard pressed for cash as I am and it would be rude to press a man for something he said under the influence of alcohol and nicotine. Should he pony up the money or not, I'm going to buy steaks and beer for Tiki anyway and count this as a lesson learned.

Doc

The Night We Ran From Pan

Have you ever been scared shitless? Just flatout scared to the point that you could die from the fright alone?

I have. I have felt the chilly, lead-like drops of sweat stand out on my face as my heart skipped a beat in the uncertainty of whether or not it was going to continue to have a job in the next thirty-seconds. My feet filled with helium and my stomach turned into a fist. My eyes unbidden bulged, and I could almost hear my pupils snap all the way open in order to better perceive the threat, and worst of all, my bunghole clamps shut with the force of the will to live and 10,000 years of survival instinct. My thoughts were limited to two: fight or flight and devil take the hindmost. I have been scared shitless.

At the time, I had just arrived at the tender age when the state had deemed me old enough to obtain a driver's permit, but as cold, hard cash was not coming my way in more than five dollar amounts at a time, it just didn't seem that important. It was August and the heat and the humidity hovered at one hundred and the air was thick with haze. But no self respecting teen aged kid is going to let the discomfort of the heat to keep him from his regular round of shenanigans regardless of the cool of the indoors and the absence of mosquitoes.

I ventured out after dinner to meet my buddies, Matt and Carl, who were my partners in crime and my boon companions. These two miscreants were to introduce me to many adventures that I am mildly ashamed to have taken part in, but I wouldn't trade the times we had for a million dollars. We met at the fort to plan the evenings festivities. Now the fort was not a fort per se, but a comfortable shack we had constructed from left over lumber from my barn. It was a comfy 8x8 with paneling, a loft, a trapdoor that lead to the secret exit underneath. The furniture and stereo were "liberated" from the local junkyard and never really lost their wet goat smell.

The three of us would get together every evening after dinner to have a pinch of snuff (as that is when snuff tastes best- on a full belly) and shoot the bull while we played Rummy. This particular evening the topic of conversation could not seem to stray far from the heat. We had removed our T-shirts so we could use them to staunch the steady flow of sweat. Carl suggested that some cold beer would be just the ticket to our relief and he mentioned casually that he knew where some was. "We'll just go to Norm's" he said with a smile.

Norm was our neighbor and was a generally disliked cuss and possessed a foul temper. Norm also owned a keg in a fridge and a poorly locked garage door. Now I am heartily against stealing and always have been. I voiced my objections to Matt and Carl that evening, but was soundly outvoted by the majority. It was decided that Matt and Carl would purloin the beer as that was where their talent was, and I would serve as lookout in honor of my stance on stealing. As I grew older I learned what the word "culpable" and "accomplice" meant, but at the time this was enough to satisfy my loose code of ethics and we set out. "Besides," I reasoned, "Norm is enough of a dickhead that he deserves to contribute some cold beer to the common good." They jimmied the garage door up enough to slip inside and I watched the house with a nervous stare, thinking that at any moment, Norm was going to come busting out of the house with his rusty shotgun and give me something to think about other than my thirst or the humidity. After a few tense moments they scampered out with a milk jug full of cold, cheap beer. We headed for the fort in haste to enjoy our swag.

First off, beer should never be drank from plastic. It's just wrong, don't ask why. Beer from a plastic milk jug with a little bit of sour milk in the bottom should never be drank. Blatz beer shouldn't be drank at all, but there we were, passing the jug and giggling at the jokes from an old Playboy we had found by candle light while we began to scar our tender young livers. It was a hoot.

Now a young beer drinker is triply damned. First, he doesn't know what good beer tastes like and drinks swill, not knowing that good beer is much better, and it is always better when you pay for it rather than steal it. Second, He has no idea how much is too much or what to do once he has arrived at too much. Thirdly, his young bladder is not conditioned to hold a twelve pack at a time and quickly finds himself in dire need to make water.

By the time we consumed 2/3's of the gallon of beer, the air in the fort was thick with the smoke of our home rolled cigarettes (we used my dad's pipe tobacco) and our beers had hit bottom. It was time for some fresh air, a whiz, and a stroll. We stepped out into the cool night air and the fog had settled into the valley. The moon was bright blur behind the haze of clouds that promised no rain. In the gaps in the sky, I tried to pick through the handful of stars to spot Orion's Belt while I pissed loud enough to compete with the bubbling of the crick twenty yards away. The chorus of crickets and frogs croaked and chirped in time with the lightening bugs that were peppering the darkness. Every bug and animal seemed in full voice that night. The bats swooped in and out of the fog and stuffed themselves with mosquitoes without making a dent in the population. The grass was wet with dew and the air was hot, thick, still, and hard to breathe. Everything was awake, roasting, and restless, just like us.

It's is tough to describe the feeling of being young, thrilling to the off-kilter hormones and being mildly drunk to sauced, and seeing/hearing/feeling the world differently for the first time, while holding my dick in my hand and cutting loose with a racehorse-sized piss.

I finished and returned to my comrades as the moon faded completely from view. "Let's go for a walk" suggested Matt. "Let's go finish the beer!" Carl countered. "Naw, I think I'd rather have a little fresh air first. We can finish it later. Maybe if we stir around a little bit we can catch a breeze. Let's take a walk," I said. Carl looked more than a little sad that we weren't going to return to the jug any time soon, but majority ruled so we took a hike. We were drunken redneck country boys will a belly full of stolen beer, but we were a democratic lot and held to it.

"Where you wanta go?" Matt asked. I turned to Carl as I felt the dissenter should have some say. "Let's walk through the corn field" Carl said. While I didn't see much point in entering the cornfield in search of a breeze, Carl made the suggestion in such a way that he had something in mind. I figured that he was thinking of heading to the swimming hole for a late night dip and that didn't sound too bad to me. "Okay," I agreed, "but you lead."

Have you ever walked through a cornfield in late August? By this time the corn is full grown to seven or eight feet, yellowing, and the drooping leaves hang lower and have a sandpaper feel to bare skin that create papercut-like scratches, not to mention the amount of chaff that falls on you from the tassels on the top that tends to get caught in hair and sticks to sweaty bodies. There was a reason I asked Carl to lead and I followed Matt behind him. It makes a big difference if you follow someone as they hold back the leaves and all of the chaff falls on them; unless you are running.

Carl entered the cornfield at the usual point behind the fort but at the turn for the swimming hole, Carl went straight. Now walking a corn row at night, you get tunnel vision. There is only the back of the guy ahead of you and corn everywhere else. There just isn't anything else to see. Even the sky was blacked out by the corn. So you follow the guy ahead of you and try to not let the passing leaves slash you by staying close.

In midstride, Carl stops and Matt walks into him. As I'm crouching behind Matt, I hit him. "What's up Carl?" Matt says in a whisper. "There is a dude up there," Carl says in an ominous whisper back. "Let me see," Matt reaches over Carl's shoulder and parts a few leaves and looks down the row as the moon comes out from behind a cloud. "That's a goat," Matt said softly, "look at the feet. It's got hooves..." We held very still and tried not to breathe.

My first thought was that I had been the rube to a joke and that they were trying to pull a fast one on me. I can't see past them and the moonlight is only coming in a trickle anyway and all I see is corn, but I can feel Matt's back. I'm certain you have felt a cold shiver of fear run down your own spine, but have you ever felt it run down the spine of another? I have. It started at his shoulders and settled into his lower back like a coil spring sprung. Only twice in the thirty years I've known the man have I ever seen him frightened. This time and the time he had a heart attack. I'm not saying Matt is fearless, but it takes an awful lot to spook him.

I am not a witness to what they saw, but when Carl screamed like a little girl that "He's comin' at us!!!" I rethought his suggestion about relaxing on the comfy furniture that smelled like wet goat and finishing the rest of our beer. I mentioned this briefly as I turned tail and ran but I think it may have been articulated like "AHHHHHHH" amongst the sound of my pounding footsteps in the opposite direction. I have never been much of a fast runner as I built for endurance, not speed. This point was driven home when Matt decided that since he couldn't pass me, he would jump on my back and ride me like a rented mule, slapping me and screaming "Faster! Faster!". The extra one hundred and twenty pounds was not really much of a burden as the adrenaline dump was mixing with the alcohol in my system, but to complicate matters, Carl took a page from Matt's book and hopped on his back.

Now picture a running, screaming totem pole of mildly drunken kids bursting forth from a field of corn under the hazy summer moon. My feet only came to a halt when I threw them on the sofa of the fort and latched the door behind me. There was some discussion as to who should have the first pull at the jug now that we had returned, but since I was the one to haul their sorry asses from the maw of death by a vengeful faun, I felt I had every right to demand first pull.

Perhaps we deserved to be scared shitless by a mythical goat-man after swiping someone else's beer, but the slashes from the corn were to remind me of my transgression for days as I looked like I had been attacked by a cheese grater.

Doc

A Po' Boy Don't Have To Look Shabby

"Clothes make the man. Naked people have little or no influence on society." - Mark Twain.*

I did something today that I haven't done in ten years. No, I didn't sober up. I went clothes shopping. The last time I went clothes shopping was for a funeral. I'd like to tell you I remember the funeral and the person well, but that would be a lie. I do remember the really cool sunglasses and the sport coat I bought. The coat was a nice checked number, and the glasses looked like the ones Clint Eastwood wore in Dirty Harry. God rest his or her soul, whoever they were.

I don't shop for my own clothes for two reasons. Flannery has excellent taste, and it provides her easy gifts to shop for when a holiday arrives. She knows my sizes, colors, tastes, and needs. She always picks just the right thing and it always has a certain Flannery flair about it. I enjoy wearing what she picks.

The clothes I generally wear fall along the lines of utility. Carharts, Army surplus, T-shirts, jeans; earth tones with lots of pockets that will take a fair amount of wear and tear. I want to purchase an article of clothing that I can get six to ten years worth of wear out of, if for no other reason than I don't want to have to go out and shop for it again anytime soon. I hate shopping, unless it is for something unique to my interests e.g. new house, new car, new canoe, new hat, new beer, new gun, etc. Mostly I just want to know should the occasion arrive that I need certain duds, I have them.

Hence this morning's foray into the world of clothes shopping.

Now far be it for me to give Men's Fashion Tips as my only qualification in the field is that I have read two issues of GQ. Rural, central Ohio is not a hotbed of style gurus, so my formal training is somewhat lacking, but I do know from life experience that some situations call for certain clothes. Let's face it Gentlemen, at some time in your life you will have to attend a wedding, a funeral, a baptism, and a court date. You have to have a few simple things you can throw together so you don't look like some derelict who wandered in off the street to scrounge the ashtrays for butts. Sometimes you just have to look the part.

First off is a white shirt with a collar. At least one, and a tie. Opinions on ties vary according to taste, occasion, and the whim of fashion, but a good rule of thumb is ties with cartoons on them are only cool in situations where you don't need a tie, and take the five minutes it takes to learn how to tie one. There are only three knots and if you can tie your shoes, you can tie your tie. The only exception is the bow tie and I have spent ten years trying to figure out how to make it come out right and not look like a hangman's noose and have never mastered it. Screw it, they make clip on bow ties and no one faults you for not knowing how to tie one.

Two, you need one sport coat or one suit. Nothing fancy, nothing flashy, but it has to fit well. Most dry cleaners offer alterations for about ten bucks and you can pick up a used suit at the thrift store for about the same price. Shoot for grays, dark blues, blacks. Pinstripes never go out of fashion. Just try not to look like a banker in today's economy. In a sport coat, go with a simple tweed. Always remember that you are looking for a suit or sport coat that will be good to wear three seasons out of the year and that doesn't include winter. In winter you would wear a coat over it anyway. A wool suit or coat might look nice, but try wearing it to an out-of-doors funeral in August and you will wish very hard that you could climb into the air-conditioned limo that the widow rode in.

Three, own a turtleneck sweater. If you have to show up somewhere and look respectable (even if you aren't) a turtle-neck sweater beats wearing a tie any day. It is "dressy" enough without all the stuffiness of a tie. It couples good with your sport coat and makes you look like a Bohemian academic and that isn't a bad thing, especially for a date night.

These are time-honored classics that you just need to have. Sure, drag out your Members Only jacket for 80's night, but don't wear it to Grandma's funeral or your sister's third wedding.

That brings me full circle to the story of this morning. I had dropped the kids off at school and had some time to kill. Flannery had told me that she had cashed in some frequent flyer miles, and while they weren't enough to purchase a ticket to anywhere, but they were enough to get us $100 worth of twenty-five dollar gift certificates to our favorite local restaurant. "You've got the night off, right?" she asked. "Sure," I said, and wondered what to wear out on a date with my wife. It isn't often that we spend an evening away from home and if I want to stay in her good graces, I have to look like someone you would want to take out.

I go through my mental checklist. We will not be attending a "cheap" restaurant even if we are doing it on the "cheap". I need a turtle-neck sweater and my checked sport coat. The coat I have, as I got it for So-and-So's funeral. The sweater, I don't have.

My first thought is Macy's but they don't open until noon. Where do I get one at 9:33 AM? Target I decided. They would have cheap men's clothing, so I headed there.

On the way I contemplated how I had clothes to donate to the Salvation Army and I wished that I had had the foresight to bring them with me as it was on the way. Then I had a revelation.

Why not go shopping at the Salvation Army? What I'm looking for is really common and it is going to be cheap. Long story short; I got a dozen sweaters and shirts for $20.

Mind you, I look like I robbed Perry Como's wardrobe as it's all turtlenecks and cardigan sweaters, but a po' boy don't have to look shabby.

I'll tell you about date night later,
Doc

* -Best birthday card I ever got had this Mark Twain quote on it. Inside the card he was naked except for a fig leaf. I have it hanging in the Lodge.

The Night I Took Up Flying

The year I graduated from high school, much like most of the people I knew, I didn't know what I wanted to do with my life. I had looked into the military, but they wouldn't accept me, what with a bad heart and all. Mostly I was just looking for some good way to pay for college, and since Uncle Sam didn't seem to need my help, I took a job. I took the first one that came along and saved my nickels and dimes.

I was eighteen, had a girlfriend, and I was very much in love. She had been the apple of my eye for a couple of years and we had always been friends, but she had only just recently agreed to go out with me. I was working for next to nothing, living at home with mom and dad, and spending as many nights as I could staying with her. My 1976 Chevy Impala cost me five bucks to drive to town and five to get home, and this is when gas was $0.99 a gallon.

She had a little girl that was the product of a high school romance with a man by the name of John Dum. I am not making this up. Most guys her age weren't looking for a ready-made family, but I loved her and her little girl too, and I tried very hard to be everything she needed.

One night in 1991, I went to see her. I drove from home to her house which was usually fifteen minutes, but I stopped at a gas station to fill the tank, all of two minutes from her apartment.

I poured as much as I could afford into the tank and set off to see my girl. All the way to town, I wore my seat belt and kept it under thirty-five as I went from winding country roads to city streets. After I gassed up, I climbed in and reached for the seat belt, but then I thought better of it. The thing had a buckle the size of a dinner plate with no shoulder strap and was grossly uncomfortable.

"Screw it," I thought, "I'm only two blocks away from where I'm going. I don't need no seat belt!" and I left it lay. I turned off the main drag and onto her residential side street with a smile on my face. Between me and her was one stop sign at the only cross street between here and there. I pulled up to the stop sign at a slow crawl, as it took a lot of brake to slow down this much steel. The only problem was I couldn't see down the side street, as there was a building in the way and my car seemed to have a twelve-foot hood.

I inched forward until I could see, and sure enough, there was a car coming. He was two blocks away. As most of my car was already half way into the intersection, I gunned it to cover the eight feet necessary to not be in his way.

I didn't make it.

While the posted speed limit was twenty-five miles per hour, he was headed home with his buddy from the bar and they were moving at sixty-five in his tiny Honda.

He connected with my passenger-side front tire and proceeded to try to drive on, despite his injuries.

At this point, I took flight. Have you ever had dreams where you were flying and felt your body lose it's weightiness, and gravity means nothing to you now? Perhaps you are floating over a familiar scene or just looping through the clouds, but you are flying, or at least floating above the Earth. I've had those dreams, but now they always include a severe smash to the head as I strike the top of the passenger side windshield and busted out that corner.

The split seconds I spent airborne are the worst, and are drawn out like a life-long disease, as I see my car careen off a parked car, through a chain link fence, and into a two-hundred year old walnut tree that must have measured eight feet around. I slowly pick myself up off the floor boards and survey the damage as I try to unkink a series of vertebrae that will cause me to consult the chiropractor for the rest of my life.

The other driver is hurt, and hurt bad. He is doubled over the steering wheel of his tiny Honda and complaining of sever back pain. We can't move him and my first-aid kit is of no use. His buddy, who came through without a scratch, keeps bitching at me about the horrible wrong I have done. Even though they are drunk and were speeding in the middle of the road, and are clearly in the wrong here, I just don't have the heart to point this out to them. I lean against the trunk of my car until the ambulance arrives, followed by the cops. I have a chew of tobacco and the EMT on the scene advises me not to.

From there, the blur sets in and I remember very little, other than informing the cop that there were cigarettes strewn about the back of his cruiser. I wouldn't have mentioned it, but I knew how valuable they were in jail. "Smoke up," he offered. "No, thanks."

I kept calling my girlfriend from the house where I had struck their tree, but a constant busy signal was my only answer. The cop offered to get me a cab to where I was going but I declined. It was only a fifteen minute hike to get to where I was going and every cent I had was in the tank of the car that the tow truck had just hauled off. The cop reminded me that I could pick it up at my convenience from the impound lot but I would have to pay the lot fees first.

My redheaded girlfriend opened the door to my knock and had the phone receiver wedged between her chin and shoulder and kept chatting away to her friend with intermittent bursts of laughter. I slumped into a chair and just stared off in a daze. She talked for twenty more minutes and then hung up. No sooner did the phone hit it's cradle then she turned to me and said, "Where the F*CK have you been? You were supposed to be here two hours ago? You bastard! Can't you F*CKING tell F*CKING time? And don't give me some lame-ass excuse. You were hanging out with your buddies weren't you?" she sighed disgustedly.

"I was in an accident..." I mumbled. "Where?" she insisted. I was at this point she noticed the blood slowly oozing from my hairline and making it's way down my forehead. "I tried to call but the line was always busy...,"I trailed off. Her pale face turned even whiter and she spent the next hour picking glass shards from my scalp and dabbing me with an alcohol soaked cotton ball. At no point did she ask how I was, but she did bring me a glass of cheap California table wine and that seemed to help a little.

I know what it's like to be the victim of a drunk driver but not on the grand scale that some people have. I still have my life, even if I did lose the car and my back will forever remain a little tweaked. I have learned my lesson, for sure.

I'd like to say the story had a happy ending, but that would be a lie. The car was junked after my brother pulled the engine out of it to put in his truck and I got nothing out of the deal. I paid sixty dollars to get my car out of impound even though it had sat there for about twelve hours and it cost me fifty for the tow truck that drug it home. My girlfriend left me for a man who would later become my boss. They married, had two more children, and they fight all the time. They can't stand each other except in the bedroom department.

The final insult of the the whole ordeal is that I had to pay a Failure To Yield ticket for sixty-five dollars and all my dreams of flying now end in a sickening crash.

Be careful out there and wear your seat belt,
Doc

I Have Stared Into The Maw Of Death And Have Been Afraid.

I spent Friday night in the hospital. That sucked.

There are few things scarier than being connected to at least thirty-six tubes and wires and contemplating your mortality, with nothing to look at but your worried wife and the florescent lights. To answer the same questions over and over again while trying not to keep wincing in pain, and to steady your breathing so you can mutter the same answers again. And the worst of it is thinking about that lovely wife and two beautiful little girls having face the fact that Daddy isn't coming home anymore, and you grit your teeth and hope the meds are going to kick in soon.

Friday night sucked.

The short of it is, I took some over-the-counter cold medicine and it made my heart flip out. I took much less than the recommended dose for three consecutive days, and on the fourth day I had none, and my heart jumped out of rhythm. For the long of it, continue reading.

I can't think of any better way to recount the story than by some kind of a time line as the whole experience seemed to be governed by the clock, but before jumping in, let me give you some backstory.

I've had a bum ticker, but I had it fixed. In high school I went through a short bout of fainting spells and I went to the doctor about it. They figured out I had Wolfe-Parkinson's-White syndrome. I had a very minor birth defect that amounted to a very small, extra piece of flesh on my heart that would let my natural pace-maker shock itself and flip out. I had surgery that I watched them perform on the monitor, as they were doing it, that burnt this off of my heart using sound waves. I would like to think they used the first few bars of Black Sabbath's Iron Man, but I'm not sure if medical science was that advanced in 1992.

Regardless, I've had trouble with it before, but not since 1992.

Jump to Friday morning 6:38 am. I rise, pee, and get a glass of milk and notice on my return trip to bed my chest feels "off", but not enough that I can't blame it on indigestion. Return to sleep.

7:58, rise again and ready the kids for school. I don't feel "off" anymore. I feel as if I'm being gently strangled. My heart that always goes Bump-Bump, Bump-Bump is now going Bump-Biddy Bump Bump Squish. It is hard, but I get the oldest off to school and the youngest and I come home to snuggle on the couch and watch television while I doze in and out of sleep.

Anyone with an ounce of sense would have consulted a physician at this point. I did not. I kept thinking that with the next beat, it would right itself and I could get on with the laundry I had to do. I just needed a short nap and I would awake refreshed, energised, and my heart would give up it's love of the Latin rhythms.

When 2:33 rolled around, I decided that I needed to consult a physician, as it didn't seem to want to right itself, but I was hindered. I had the youngest and I had to pick up the oldest from school in an hour, who would watch them while I went to the emergency room? In my oxygen starved brain, I couldn't think of anyone. So I decided to pick the oldest up from school, stop at the gas station and purchase candy ring suckers for the girls and a sub sandwich and wait until Flannery got home. She would know what to do. As grandly stupid as this sounds, it all seemed to make sense at the time.

Flannery comes in at 5:32, and knows what to do. She made a call.

Faster than a delivery pizza, Cap'n Ergo and Spooky show up as impromtu babysitters. Spooky comes in and looks at me as if she is trying to read fine print on the far wall and says, "You look like Hell!" I take her at her word as I'm sure it's true.

At 6ish, we arrive at the ER and go to the front of the line. BS, vitals, and a disgruntled male nurse named Chad later, I'm in a bed with ten sticky pads on me and corresponding wires. The nurse laughs when I hold my backless gown over my breasts in a gesture of modesty. She snickers so long the next nurse coming in asks her what she is laughing about.

7:00-8:00 I take turns cracking jokes with the nurses and trying to put on a brave face for Flannery. I keep asking her to read me more of this book about a middle-aged French barber who changes careers and becomes a matchmaker in his backwater town of 33 people. It is a pleasant distraction and I can whisk my way there, instead of the cold lights of the ER, the sound of alarms and cries of pain from other rooms. Between the life of a French matchmaker, I listened to a Spanish speaking family lose there grandfather. My Spanish isn't that good but I know the word for dead. The nurse asks me if I would like to change into the bottoms that go with my backless gown and I told her no, as I just remembered that I was going "commando" and there was a reason why I really needed to finish the laundry at home.

8:20 the Doctor accesses me and perscribes some medicine through the IV that they have crippled my left hand with. He is short, and very tan against his green scrubs, and has a smile that could win votes. I try to sway him into just shocking me and sending me home, but he sticks to his guns and his meds, and promises to check back with me soon.

8:30 to 10-something, I contemplate the fact that I might be done for, while the story of the French barber turned matchmaker gets good. At first my fear is palpable and tastes like aluminum foil on my fillings. I will have been and then cease to be, much like the $1 American coin. I will be in circulation for a while and then be the oddity you find in your change from the bank. Is this as much as I've achieved? No park will have my statue for birds to crap on? I will never be a minor footnote in some eggheaded historty book? All of the novels I was going to write to line the discount racks of the world's bookstores would end with me? My friends and family will never again have any of the help I could provide? My grandchildren will never know me? Who will look after the cat? My one and only fuse is sputtering to it's end and I will never ever know the taste of a popsicle, hot coffee, or cold beer ever again. I will never know the feel of Flannery's, Riley's, and Lucy's hugs again? My God, what a faboulous life I've squandered!?!

At 10:11, I made peace with my Maker, while Flannery reads to me about the French barber and his best friend going fishing. I try not to grit my teeth against the pain as I don't want to worry Flannery or interupt the story.

10:30 the medicine starts working and I'm not going to die, it just feels like it. I explain to Flannery that the show is over and there is nothing more to see. With a lot of persuation, I convince her to go home. I will only be suffering the indignity of being admited from here on out and I remind her that the kids are going to be up early. My appeal to her motherly instinct works, but only after many promises that I will call when I know something. The nurse who laughed at my breasts tells her I will be on the nineth floor when she comes looking for me.

12:00 am My heart beats like it is supposed to and I want to leave, but my room is ready now and there isn't a good oppurtunity to make a break for it. I'm here for the night. I kid the tiny woman who guides my 800 pounds of guerney and me to my room about how Friday night in the hospital must be the worst. "No," she confides, "Monday is always the worst!" I suggest that maybe it is because everyone doesn't want to go back to work and she chuckles.

12:34 and I'm in my room. I can breathe now and the nighmare of my impending doom has become the Governer's reprieve. I don't know if I should fight, f*ck, or wind my watch. I meet my night nurses as they come to check my vitals and confirm every question I've been asked for the past five hours. "You have an accent," the older nurse purrs, "I could listen to you talk all night!" I learned what a "Cougar" is from Vikkitickitavi's blog and I think I met my first. She liked me and with my new-found lease on life I was more than a little taken aback, and a bit flattered, as it is always nice to know that "you still got it". What do you say to a woman who comes on to you after you have envisioned your own demise? I said, "Can I get a sandwich?" She straightened her scrubs and promised to have one sent right up and left slowly, trailing her blood pressure cuff.

1:05 my box luch arrives. Turkey sandwich with mayo, baked potato chips, and a Snickerdoodle cookie. The label assures me that they won't throw this out until the 18th of this month. I enjoy my feast and tune my television to the history channel as my roommate is watching this and I can't compete with his volume. It is a series of shows devoted to meteors and aliens distroying the earth and I find it somewhat comforting as I try to fall into a turkey/medicated haze. The trouble is, down the hall a few doors, there is an alarm going off. Every eight seconds there is an earsplitting BLEEP.

It is 2:30ish and I am trying my damdest to fall asleep, but every eight seconds this alarm goes off. I am ashamed to admit that every seven seconds I prayed that a nurse would shut it off or put a pillow over the face of whatever poor soul was suffering the indignity of having to listen to this until their death, if for no other reason than the other 98 people on this ward could sleep. He lived through the night. I could not understand the simple controls that ran the bed, T.V., and lights. The T.V. was easy and I quickly understood how to make the bed roll me into a burrito, but the lights remained a mystery. The reading lamp was obvious but no amount of button pushing could rid me of the horrible overhead lights. Undaunted by the challenges of my new life, I pulled my ballcap over my eyes and tried very hard to sleep through spotlights and an eight second BLEEP with the soft doom of killer comets in the background.

6:02 The morning vampire shows up and wants a quart. She has all of the warmth of a public service announcement as she pulls my liquid life from me. She leaves with the sound of bat wings fluttering. I try and return to sleep.

7:01 The morning nurses come on shift and wake me to the news that they had to talk to me as the night nurses thought I was cute. They giggle that I'm sleeping in my hat. "Oh he IS cute" they gush. My only retort is, "Not at this hour!" They coo and leave. I cannot explain it at all, but nurses love me. I have been told it is because I have big veins. I try and return to sleep while the history channel informs me about the rampant gang violence in Salt Lake City.

7:59 I am awoken and hustled to the stress test that awaits me. This involves twenty minutes of being ignored while I have to take my morning pee and being connected to enough wires and tubes to make NASA envious, while being denied a six month old magizine or a urine bottle with very sharp edges. I spend another twenty minutes in the X-ray tube trying to think about the desert while my arms are held uncomfortably above my head so they get a good picture of my gut while the nuclear charged particals they have injected me with are coursing through my veins and that only make me want to piss more.

8:42 and I could make Niagra Falls look like the drips from the exaust of your car on a damp day and the doctor has been paged twice but still hasn't shown up.

9:02 he phones from the parking lot to say he is on his way up. I spook the nurse when she asks if the metal clip in my waistband is a pager and I tell her no and remove my pocketknife and set it on the bed with my keys and wallet.

9:04 and he drops in to question me about my accent while I run a small marathon for him. The treadmill keeps going faster and faster while the angle keeps rising. He explains that he will never lose his Lebannese accent and the BMW dealer kids him about it, but his children are doing well in their Ivy League colleges. I try not to think about how bad I have to whiz or how my missing a day of work is going to affect the bills. He tells me that cold and flu season is a busy time for him as many people get the same thing I've had from over-the-counter medicine and it flips their hearts out too. This would have been useful to know three days ago.

At 9:26 I find that of little reassurance and quit the stress test, not because I'm tired, but I've reached my target heart rate and I can't stand running with a full bladder anymore. It is too much stress. He makes me return to the treadmill so they can inject me with more nuclear waste. It's cold and it stings in my veins.

9:47 my reward is a pint of milk and a broken straw, but I can't whiz yet. The milk helps define my gut from my heart in the next fifteen minutes of X-rays with my arms above my head. I am trying to be perfectly still while laying down on a bed the width of a 2x4, because I know if I move, I'll have to do it again.

10:04 really stands out in my mind as I've made it to my room and have wheeled my stupid IV stand with it's three bags of meds and two pumps that have dead batteries and the alarms scream at me and the sharp edges of the urine bottle catch me in a sensitive spot, but I could care less. I am two liters lighter and I know the true meaning of a zen-like relief and it seems to set the tone for my new lease on life.

10:12 a nurse's aid who looks sixteen wanders in and asks if I need anything. He is obviously in the wrong room but wants to cover it up with his offer to help. I ask for a cup of coffee and he leaves in haste with the assurance that he will look into that. He is never seen again.

10:15-12:00 Try and nap unsuccessfully while the History channel tells me more about the alien invasion.

12:04 the Nun shows up. She isn't in her habit but at this point I'm missing a few of my bad habits. She turns out to be a good ol' broad and asks me if I'm a poet. "No," I confess, "but I do write a blog." I didn't tell her it was about beer and dirty jokes. We prayed together and she seemed to skip as she left the room as if she felt she had done some good and perhaps she had.

At 1:12 my belly reminds me what it's for. At no point has anyone offered me food. A different nurse comes in and brings me a pill in a plastic shot glass. I ask what this is and her responce is "Exomitrraphedrineamalgumoxide" like I would know what this is. "But don't eat it yet, let me get you some water," and she fled.

1:22 she returns with ice water and I ask what this medicine is for. "It's Exomitrraphedrineamalgumoxide. Here's your water." I decided that further pursuit of inquiry with her was useless and swallowed the match-head sized tablet. "If you are hungry, call room service." She was never seen again.

2:02 My Lebannese cardiologist has sent his over-eager nurse to iterview me and ask me the same thirty questions that I have had to answer since I got here at 6ish last night but she writes it out longhand with arrows to footnotes instead of just checking off boxes. This is a woman who loves her job and her boss, as she jiggles her breasts every time she mentions his name like Pavlov's dog with the bell. I ask her when I might be released as I'm eager to get home. "Oh two o'clock or so."

2:22 I order a large lunch with a grin that I won't have to wash these dishes. I am pleasantly surprised that lunch is good but a bit bland. There are a couple of packets of pepper but regardless of what it says on the front, Mrs. Dash is NOT a salt substitute, merely a placebo. Flannery and the girls come to visit and the whole world seems to shine. The girls show me the cool toys they got in their Happy Meals and Flannery looks worn out but relieved. We talk for a bit but the girls quickly get bored. She takes them home and I promise again that I will call when I've got my walking papers.

3:07 and television can't distract me anymore. I think I've been forgoten but my new nurse comes in with a fistful of papers and offers to help me off with my backless gown. "Get me out of this f*cking thing! Excuse me," I apologized, "I'm just eager to get home." "I understand honey," she said with a smile.

3:09 and I'm dressed and have called Flannery. I pace and wait for my wheelchair.

3:19 and my chair shows up and I fold down the footpedals down so we can leave faster. I tell my pimple-pocked transport that I'm in a hurry and he takes me seriously and pushes me ahead of the rest of the slow moving hospital foot traffic with cries of warning. If I had a twenty dollar bill, I would have tipped him two of them. We moved like a Nascar.

4:10 and I'm home and just need a few minutes with the computer to read your blog before I head to bed for some much needed rest. I'm sitting here for four minutes and I hear the pained call of Markus's wife calling for their little girl who has disappeared. She is in a panic and I join the search party. Moments later she is found in Franklinton's bathroom answering the call of nature. Everyone rejoices at this relief and I find myself at Tiki and have to retell this story. No one wants to hear it but they all extend their well-wishes that I'm not dead and I find that to be a comfort. I hang out at Tiki long enough to eat some of Franklinton's eggrolls and some home-made pizza that beats anything I've ever purchased. I head home early, as I almost died and I'm really tired but I spend the rest of the evening playing games with the two kids, Cap'n Ergo, Spooky, and Flannery only to colapse into bed later.

The next day I worked in the bakery all day and deeply regreted not getting a doctor's note that said I needed that day off. I felt like something you would scrape off the bottom of your shoe, but I toughed it out. I came home and kissed the family and read your blog for a while, but my left hand was still gimped up to the point I couldn't type my comments. I went to bed early and awoke Monday morning to Flannery's kiss and to see both the girls and the cat snuggled up next to me and faded back into dreams of a better life and how to spend it. Seize the Day ocurred to me, but I just needed to make plans on how to snare it and drifted back to sleep. To welcome me home, Flannery bought a 30 pack of my favorite beer and that means a lot.

I have been keeping up with your latest entries, but have only this evening regained my left hand dexterity. Dale, I swear I've have penned a rough draft of your cartoon and it will be yours this week, but the hand wouldn't obey with an IV in it. Cap'n Ergo, your's is next.

To sum it all up, I'm very, very glad to be here with you. You enrich me more than you will ever know, and on a grossly sentimental note, I love you man, and I always will. I am taking steps to be with you for a long time. Get used to it. And if you get the chance, hug someone and have a cold beer.

Life can't get much shorter.

Love,
Doc