Boomtown Follies

Mandy, my dog, props a leg on the back pillow of the couch.No, not that. She's lying on the couch.  She looks up at me with flattened ears. "Oh, no. He's gonna do something weird."  When one is bored there's no end to weird. I cannot explain nor illustrate because my wife reads this blog.  Imagination is a good thing. 

All that's left of the 2011 garden is oregano, kale and celery.  I should dump the oregano out of the pots, shake off the dirt from their roots and hang them to dry in the summer kitchen.  I can't harvest the rest of the celery because 1). We'd have no fresh celery and 2). I'm researching the cold tolerance of celery. The kale just won't quit. After a recent slush storm it's fairly obvious that really cold weather is hiding around the corner.  When that happens, the row cover will freeze to the ground.  I have to decide. To uncover or not.  Harvest all or lose it to winter's icy grip.  There's always dry beans to shell..

I ask Mandy, "What do ya wanna do today?"  Her ears perk.  Visions of riding shotgun loom large. If we head to Dent and Bent, Mandy gets to watch their viscous miniature chihuahua barking at my car.  It's not big enough to pee on the tires.  At the Amish lumber yard, the black, brown and white mutt there is minuscule.  I back away from the yard carefully because I can't see the little rat.

To illustrate that I once had a life, I bring you an excerpt from  Clever Words Bring Forth No Buttered Turnips. There's no date on the cover. Just a picture of a stuffed rattlesnake. A clue about the time frame is that Roger Gavrillo ( pen name) is doing the writing.  Bert Bubnick is narrating.  Bert ( a fictional character) is part of the Witness Protection Program. One last note.

The photograph is second generation taken from a scanned shot.  The old Epson printer was dying, hence the yellow lines across the document.  I found it in one of my late mother's books. Back in the thirties it was apropos. It still is.  An ass and an fat thing with big ears who can only agree on a single thing- an antacid. I have no idea why it is included in Boomtown Follies. 

Since I began this tale, I have lost my desire to recreate the past.  Suffice to say that living in Arizona had one benefit.  Compared to the rest of the population in my small town, I was young.  Just a kid by comparison.  Here, I'm old.  Besides, there are no nightclubs, just farmer bars.  One either has to hire Mountain Man Johann as a bodyguard or prepare for the Elton John's song, "Saturday Night is All Right For Fightin'.

In Boomtown Follies I recount the story of a night out with my neighbors, Tuck Bartlett and his wife Windy.  We drove into town to hear a band called Grateful Fred.  Fred is the drummer for the band and lives with a woman I call Cinderella. She worked for the art gallery/co-op with me.  Cinderella eventually gets fired for theft. Fred eventually dies from alcohol related causes and cancer.  The lead guitarist is the manager for the furniture store on the main drag.  He and his wife fight nightly over his many indiscretions.  It's plenty entertaining for us'n.Here's short snort from my description of the action.

Don plays keyboards and sax. He drives in weekly from Vegas.  Paul plays sax with a wireless pick-up so that he can wander through the club.  Billy and Nancy are bumping and grinding on the dance floor. Lenny walks into the men's room and tries to pick a fight with Marty- a friend of the band who sits behind us.  

Lenny snarls at Marty, "I don't like your T-shirt."  

Marty replies, "Sorry. It's all I had to wear tonight." 

Lenny says to Marty, "Let's step outside. You bumped into me and didn't say 'scuse  me."

Marty isn't drunk enough to rise to the bait.  Lenny waits until Marty goes outside for some "snoose", whatever that is. I know it isn't snuff.   Lenny grabs Marty around the throat. I watch the action through the front window. With all the hair and beards, it appears that two bear cubs are wrestling in the parking lot.  Lenny and Marty room together along with a guy named Shmitty.  In their absence Shmitty slides next to Durla. She's married to the bass player in the band.  She used to be married to someone else but he was killed in a drug bust.  Durla used to be friends with Debbie who tends bar at the Laughing Coyote.   66 year old Shmitty wants Durla to put in a good word for him with Debbie. He doesn't know that Durla is furious with Debbie for a one night stand with her husband.  It's not pretty.