The Surly Writer

Blogoversary After Party

2009-11-13T09:52:00.001-05:00

So someone threw up on my carpet last night after my blogoversary celebration. When I find out who did it, I’m sending you the cleaning bill.

Thank you, everyone, for taking the time to stop by and give your continued love and support for this humble (time-sucking) social media platform. You readers are great, all of you from my old followers to my new ones. Here are those who stopped by yesterday to congratulate me. Please take the time to stop by and visit them.

Anne-Lyken Garner from Blogger’s Books

Jim Sullivan from Suldog

Hilary from The Smitten Image

Judith Mercado from Pilgrim Soul

Angie from Notes From the Writing Chair

Eric from Working My Muse

Kathryn Magendie from Virginia Kate Series

Teena in Toronto from It's All about Me

Angie Ledbetter from Gumbo Writer

Knucklehead from Knucklehead!

I’m a little under the weather today but decided to make this short post to thank everyone, give a little blog love to those special people who dropped comments, and accept (another) recent award.

The wonderful Theresa from An Officer and a Garbage Can gave me A Lovely Blog Award.

No strings attached to this one except to pass it on to worthy people. So I’m passing it to all those individuals listed above. It only seems appropriate for the time they spent to stop by and read my posts.

THANK YOU!

*Many of you might have noticed my award slideshow is missing. Currently, it’s at the bottom of my blog for maintenance. I’m having problems getting it to upload the pictures. Once it’s working again, I’ll be moving it below my post settings*

Terrible Twos

2009-11-12T06:59:00.008-05:00

Is it actually November 12 already? Wow! Look how time flies. One minute this blog was a cutesy-wutsy little space newly born in the blogosphere. And now, it’s a disobedient, ornery thing I want to slap upside the head.

Happy Two-Year Blogoversary!

I would come up with something worthwhile to post. However, I sent my blog into the corner for a time-out after it gorged on a multitude of writing time I could have spent on other projects and then it had the nerve to upchuck on my brand-new WIP. BAD BLOG! BAD! Go to your room.

Oh, never mind. It is your two-year anniversary. You can celebrate today.

By the way, why is it an anniversary? Shouldn’t it be a birthday? I’m not married to this thing. We didn’t exchange any wedding vows. We didn’t go on any honeymoon together. In fact, this is the most lopsided relationship I’ve ever been in! He gets all the attention and I have to clean up after his fat ass by answering all his comments for him!

I want a divorce!

Er, yeah, I suppose he has given me the opportunity to expand on my writing skills. And yes, he has introduced me to a number of wonderful people I wouldn’t have met otherwise. We gave birth to my second blog that I neglect often (but don’t let Child Protective Services know this). Also, I can’t forget the fact he lets me do whatever I want no matter how nice or naughty it is. He doesn’t complain one bit if I feel like posting pictures like this . . .

you're such a dirty boy, aren't you? You can fix my ride anytime...

or this . . .

well, at least that side is clean...

or this . . .

have to keep the menfolk happy too!

(Personlly, I think they're fake.

I've never seen leather look like that before.)

And I get to rant and rave about sports on occasion - like hockey. My beloved Pittsburgh Penguins were at the top of the Eastern Division. Hopefully, they’ll get back into the winning pace. Unfortunately, I still have fears because . . .

Well, that’s not important. What’s important is that, today, my blog has reached two years. I wonder how many more years we will have in our relationship . . . BLOG! GET YOUR DAMN DIRTY FEET OFF MY MANUSCRIPT!

GO TO YOUR ROOM!

photo courtesy of: http://www.staghen.com/

photo courtesy of: http://www.thepirata.com/
photo courtesy of: http://www.melbournevictory.net/

Self-inflicted Meme

2009-11-09T06:42:00.004-05:00

I’ve been trying to decide what to post today. It’s a filler day for a special occasion happening on Thursday. Since I don’t have any type of story set up, I’m going to torture myself and do a meme because, gosh darn it, those are just oodles of time-consuming fun!

So here it is for your enjoyment.
****
FIVE YEARS AGO, I WAS . . .
1 - 29-years-old, which would make it 2004.
2 - a nanny to three autistic children.
3 - almost getting into a fist fight with my brother’s bipolar neighbor
4 - attending my first county fair
5 - writing my second fantasy novel

FIVE SNACKS I ENJOY
1 - water crackers and cheese
2 - mini sausages
3 - Doritos
4 - chocolate-covered raisins
5 - cheese sandwiches

IF I WERE A BILLIONAIRE, I WOULD . . .
1 - Buy a small cottage near the ocean
2 - foster animals from a local shelter so they can go to good homes without having to be euthanized
3 - Donate to asthma research and several other charities
4 - buy a publishing house and give a break to those excellent writers who are passed by
5 - go on my first real vacation ever

SOME JOBS I HAVE HAD
1 - telemarketer
2 - clerical assistant
3 - sales associate
4 - nanny
5 - donations collector

WHAT WERE YOU DOING 10 YEARS AGO (5 things)
1. I would have been 24, which would make it 1999. I was working as a sales associate.
2. Fulfilled my 6-year promise to my brother by giving him the money to buy a new snowboard
3. Dealing with my sales manager trying to hook me up with her available 35-year-old son.
4. Listening to a prostitute make a deal with her john in the alcove outside my apartment building
5. Feeding my manx cat, Rabbit

FIVE SONGS THAT YOU KNOW THE LYRICS TO:
1. Pushit by Tool
2. Buffalo Soldier by Bob Marley and the Wailers
3. Dead Memories by Slipknot
4. Dull Boy by Mudvane
5. Orestes by A Perfect Circle

(Aside: If I hear any song at least 3 times, I can memorize the words even if it’s not a tune I like. So this list could have gone on forever)

FIVE STORIES I HAVE READ:
1: The Pearl by John Steinbeck
2: Animal Farm by George Orwell
3: The Fall of the House of Usher by Edgar Allan Poe
4: Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler
5: The Stainless Steel Rat by Harry Harrison

FIVE BAD HABITS:
1. Chewing on my fingernails
2. Forgetting to clip my toenails
3. Sucking air in an annoying whistle through the tiny space in my teeth
4. Plucking the hairs on my chin obsessively
5. Not being able to tell people no

FIVE THINGS YOU LIKE TO DO:
1. Writing
2. Reading
3. Listening to the hockey games on the radio
4. Emailing
5. Listening to music

FIVE THINGS YOU WOULD NEVER WEAR AGAIN
1. High heel shoes
2. Bras of any kind
3. Hats of any kind
4. Eyeglasses, but I must
5. pajamas

FIVE FAVORITE MEALS
1. Anything parmigiana with spaghetti: chicken, veal, turkey, breaded eggplant
2. Straight meat lasagna without diced vegetables: just noodles, meat, ricotta cheese, and plain tomato sauce
3. Meatloaf with mash potatoes and corn (my favorite meal of all time)
4. Shrimp scampi with angel hair pasta in a white sauce and cheese
5. Barbeque ribs with whole buttered potatoes and caramelized carrots

FIVE THINGS IN THE WORLD YOU WANT TO SEE BEFORE YOU DIE:
1. A cure to a few diseases or at least a viable health plan for the lower class
2. The ocean
3. The view from a train window
4. Japan
5. Several of my Internet friends

So ends my meme list. If you want to torture yourself and do one of your own, then please seek medical attention.
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Reminder: We are only accepting donations to Valour-It and Soldiers Angels, a nonprofit organization to help wounded veterans with their mental and physical rehabilitation, until Veteran’s Day, Wednesday 11. If you wish to donate, visit the links directly or click on the donation widget at the top of my sidebar. Every little bit helps and is appreciated.
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Oh, before I forget. Cat Lady Larew from How to Become A Cat Lady... Without the Cats gave me “One Lovely Blog” award. There were no other strings attached with the acceptance of it except to choose people to receive the award (so ignore the self-inflicted meme above).

I would like to give this to my blogging friend, Kathryn Magendie at Virginia Kate Series, author of Tender Graces (BelleBooks). Recently her family was blessed with the new arrival of baby Norah Kathryn, and Kat is one happy grandmother. Stop by her blog, see the adorable baby pictures, and give her your congratulations!
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I’ll be back with my next post on Thursday. If you need something to sustain yourself in the meantime, or you are a writer taking a brief break from Nano, visit my second blog. I made a post about adding peculiar quirks to your characters in your stories to give more depth.

Hansel and Gretel: A Mother’s Intervention Journal

2009-11-05T06:09:00.002-05:00

I tried, dammit. I tried to get my little muffins back. I remembered that day so well, the day their lives changed forever.
******
10/01: I went to work. It was like any other day. I left the children at home, thinking they would just watch some television. I warned them not to go off running into those blasted woods! Oh, sure, I could just hear other mother’s pooh-poohing me for not hiring a babysitter. But they don’t realize my situation. That louse of a man ran off with his latest hottie, leaving me to work two jobs just to make ends met. Every time I threatened to take him to court for child support, he came crawling back to me with his, “Yah, I always love yun, me poppy.”

Let him shove his “Yah, me poppy” up a damp, dark place - sideways! I would take him to court this time. But I had to raise enough money for the lawyer. One more paycheck and I would have it. I told Hansel, “Yah, Hansel. Yun listen to yun muoter and watch after yun sustor, Gretel. And stay outten them woods!”

“guten Tag,” Hansel shouted.

I hated that. It was all he said now whenever I talked to him: ‘guten Tag’ this and ‘guten Tag’ that. “Taken outz the trash, Hansel - guten Tag.” He was just saying it to be cool in front of his friends. I now understood how American mothers became so ticked off with their kids whenever they got the answer, “whatever.” So annoying.
******
10/02: I didn’t mean to work the double shift, but Olga called in sick and they offered me overtime pay. How could I pass this up? I called home and Hansel answered the phone. He seemed distracted by something. I told him to heat up two frozen entrees for dinner, the diet one for Gretel.

She had become very self-conscious about her weight. Where some girls would diet constantly trying to be the ‘perfect anorexic model,’ Gretel was eating too much. She had given up and sought food for comfort. Everywhere she walked, crumbs fell off her clothes.

Tomorrow, I would talk with her about the overeating. Maybe we could figure it out.
**
Got home late. I collapsed right on the couch, hearing Hansel’s television in his room. He fell asleep with it on, saying his sister snores too loud. I wanted to give them kisses. But I was so tired that I didn’t even think I could crawl up the steps to hop into the shower.

I started to fall asleep to the sound of a commercial - something about friendly neighborhood watch and asking the viewer if they know where their children are.

Mine were in bed, sleeping. I curled up on the couch to visit the sandman myself.
******
10/03: Oh, GOD . . .

They weren’t there! I woke up expecting to find Hansel eating his Lucky Charms cereal and Gretel finishing off her fourth Pop Tart. But the kitchen was empty. I ran upstairs and saw their beds neat. They never made their beds. I did them yesterday. I knew I did them yesterday.

Where were my Hansel and Gretel?

The basket was gone from the cupboard and their wooden shoes were missing by the front door. The woods. They went in AGAIN! Gretel would always take along bread to snack on during their exploration trips. She would leave crumbs everywhere. I would follow the crumb trail. They were in serious trouble this time.

No. That didn’t matter. So long as they were all right. That was the only thing important now.

I was frightened. They never stayed out there all night . . .
**
I couldn’t find any crumbs. I crawled around on my knees, looking. Animals must have eaten them first. I started along a trail anyway, hoping to spot something.

Wait! Was that bread there? I rushed over to check, but a damn crow flew down. It glared at me when eating then flew up on the branch. I was about to pick up a rock and hit it but noticed the bird had pooped while eating. And more bird droppings led off further into the brush. I knew it seemed weird, but I had this mother’s instinct and it was telling me to follow the bird poop to find my children.

What had I to lose?

I ran around the trees calling out my kids’ names. In the deepest parts of the woods, a strange smell blew over me. I felt as if I had walked into a bakery. Yet the odor was overpowering, as if the food had been left to spoil for a week. The overabundant sweetness caused my teeth to ache. I pushed through the thicket and came across a strange sight.

A house? I found a house at the center of the woods. I never saw anything built like this before. It had gingerbread shingles and candy cane beams. The fireplace stack consisted of red licorice. I walked up to the sugar-frosted window and peeked inside.

Children. Many children sat on couches eating sweets. Their eyes were sunken in and skin looked unhealthy and bloated. Several staggered when walking across the room. Were they strung-out on sugar? Doped up on gumdrops? I heard of this before, reading it in a school pamphlet. I had tossed the papers out not believing something like this could ever happen to my own kids.

I saw Hansel and Gretel laying on the floor, their mouths lifted in sickly grins, their lips coated in white frosting.

Despite the danger I broke in the door. The dealer sat at the kitchen table, rolling out dough while pocketing the cash. I pushed the hag away when she tried to stop me. She tripped when falling backward and landed into her own oven. Served her right. Let her experience her own evil ways - the horrible witch!

I draped Hansel over my shoulder and grabbed Gretel’s hand. I got her to lean against me as we staggered home.
******
10/04: Hansel rested on the couch. He hadn’t gone “all the way” while being in that horrible candy house. I had to lock Gretel in her room. When she came down off her “high,” she tried to run back out into the woods. I tackled her to the ground. My own daughter! I tackled her like an American football player. She screamed and cried and cussed me out. “Muoter! Letten me go!”

It broke my heart to see her like this.

Hansel told me everything. They came across the candy house about a month ago. The dealer seemed so nice, offering free samples. Hansel and Gretel had learned in school to, ‘just say no.’ But the peer pressure was there, and they saw a few of their friends hanging out. So what was the big deal? It started innocently, popping a Pez candy pill here and there. Then it migrated to smoking on the bubble gum cigars. Hansel and Gretel thought they could handle themselves. Yet even while at home, they couldn’t stop doing it. At night, they snuck out for more. They sold illegal music downloads on Craigslist to buy treat “baggies.”

This was the real reason for Gretel’s weight gain. Unlike Hansel, who had paced himself between highs, Gretel became swallowed into her addiction. She had moved up to snorting down the sugary Pixy Stix, making the lines on the mirror and using the straw to huff it up. Then, when she didn’t receive any fulfillment from this anymore, she started pulling taffy.

I sat on the front step crying and listening to Gretel banging on her bedroom door. After I got over the sadness, I realized I had to keep strong for my children’s sakes. We would get through this together.
******
11/1: I finally had a chance to write in my journal. Things have gotten better for all of us.

Hansel has returned his normal self, doing more around the house without being asked. He won’t even look at any sweets and switched over to eating bagels for breakfast instead of the sugary cereal.

I’ve made progress with Gretel. She still had the shakes now and again from the cravings. Yet she substituted chewing on carrots instead of on licorice. She lost a good 40 pounds too, and felt better about herself with each passing day. The real test came at Halloween. Hansel and Gretel passed out snacks to the trick-or-treaters without eating any themselves.

I was so proud of them. I gave each a big hug. “Yah, me Hansel and Gretel. Yun done made yun muoter so happy!”

Gretel giggled and Hansel nodded as he said, “guten Tag!” I didn’t mind those words this time. It was a good day.

*Note: By the way... if anyone has any other fairy tales or rhymes they want "Surly-fied," drop them in the comments or email me about it (michhickman@gmail.com). I have a cool thing with "The Pied Piper" featuring a "Lord of the Flies" spiel mixed in with "Guitar Hero." But I need others...*

The Accidental Violinist - romantic suspense

2009-11-03T08:18:00.000-05:00

Black leather felt so comforting under my fingertips. The hourglass-shaped case popped open with barely a flick across the lock. The instrument appeared fine, but the violin bow had received damage. Broken horsehair curled on the velvet lining, a reddish tint staining the strings. The blood wasn’t mine. It belonged to Harry.

The wind picked up outside the bus stand. I drew my coat in closer and snatched the note fluttering underneath the violin’s fingerboard. I had but a moment to read it before the gust of air blew the paper from my hand.

Anna, meet me at Ashmont Circle bus stop. 10p.m. - Michael

Squealing wheels approached the lighted street corner. The bus pulled up, driver grabbing the handle, the door folding open at his push. He stared at me and I shook my head. I saw the rolling grunt from his belly to his chest, making him hop once in his seat. The bus pulled away before the door even closed. My wrist flipped over and I glanced at my watch.

10:15. What’s keeping Michael?

I had fulfilled my end of the bargain. Humph! More like a blackmail deal between us: Harry for the doctored diploma. I had done my part. He lay on the mortuary floor, a scalpel in the neck, a bottle of white Chardonnay shattered on the tile floor, his cooling hand groping the two-day stiff of Tara Ronsen: Harry’s unwanted secret lover.

No, I didn’t kill Harry. I just bought the wine.
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You’re probably wondering what this post is about. Well, Angie Ledbetter over at Gumbo Writer is holding a photo/book title contest until Sunday. There’s still time for you to enter to win cool prizes, if you wish. Just choose a book title in theme with one of the four photos she posted. Drop it in the comments section with the genre and your email address.

I entered with the title of this post as my entry. I wasn’t going to do anything else. I had other writing projects to work on.

But . . .

I have this, er, writing curse. It happens when people send me emails or make offhand comments on my blog. A little writing worm will burrow into my mind, and I’ll come up with a story on the spot.

The first part of this post is the beginning of a story for the title contest entry I posted.

What is the story about? Heck if I know. As with all my writing, I only know the beginning and the end. The middle is kept secret deep in my subconsciousness. Only my typing fingers know what words will appear on the wordprocessor page.

I like surprises! I have little complaints about being kept in the dark concerning the overall plot. My mind will let me know the rest . . . at the appropriate time.

(btw - the picture is just something I drew maybe 4 years ago. I needed something to go along with this post.)

NaNoWrimo? Sorry... not for me

2009-11-02T07:00:00.003-05:00

Yesterday, the writing world came to a lull with the start of NaNoWriMo on November 1st. Blogs across the world experienced a drop in their readership. Several writers’ and authors’ blogs have grown quiet with no new posts.

What is NanoWriMo?

Well, it’s National Novel Writing Month. It's a . . . um . . . sort of writing challenge. The basic gist is to write 50,000 words in one month - the equivalent of writing a novella.

No preparation is required. A writer sits his/her butt down in the chair and starts typing as they throw plot outlines, editing, and revising out the window. Writers sign up under their real names (or whatnot) and people can check in on their progress. There are no actual prizes except the knowledge of pushing oneself into focusing and completing the story. A writer will come to realize their limits and overall desire (or not) for the task.

Hm? No, I have never participated in NaNoWriMo. I find it too limiting. I checked the word count for everything I had written in the past four months. I came up with the estimate of 186,000 words - an average of 46,500 words a month. This includes editing and revisions.

So, yeah, I’m short 3500 words, or a whole chapter. But I’m not going to beat myself up over it. I maintained my writing to 46,500 words for four months straight. I believe writing for the long haul is as good as an accomplishment as is writing 50,000 in one spurt during one month.

I’m happy with my writing limits. I’m happy with my overall desire for the task. Being one chapter short just means that it was 3500 unnecessary words to the plot of my writing life.

Asking for a little help

2009-10-29T09:18:00.001-04:00

I have trouble doing this. I’m not a person who asks for help from other people. Yet there are times when I have to do something for a worthwhile cause, and this cause is one I am willing to support.

Before I go into the details, I want everyone to understand something about me. I donate to a charity or someone in need at least once a year. I don’t do it to make myself feel good about it or to toot my own horn. In fact, I don’t really have any feelings about it except the knowledge that I had helped someone in need. That is enough for me.

I had already donated at the beginning of this year. I’m glad I had done so then, because I’m not in any stable financial situation right now. I’m beyond strapped for cash due to unexpected circumstances dating from my blog hiatus in July.

Still, don’t misunderstand the nature of this post. I donated again, back on Wednesday Oct. 28, despite my personal situation. I would never make a post asking for people’s help if I myself did not believe in the cause AND donated first. I gave what I could to help those less fortunate. As the saying goes, ‘even a little bit helps.’

The charity is called Valour-IT, overseen by the Soldier’s Angels Foundation. One of my dear fellow bloggers Suldog made an excellent post about it. I believe he captured the essence of the Foundation’s goals better than I could ever write it, in a way I had never expected.

Suldog talked about one of his fears concerning amputation and amputees. The lost of a limb can be emotionally traumatic not only for the person it happened to, but by those people around them. I shiver when thinking what would happen if I lost a part of myself and could no longer write. Here is a snippet from his post.
******
Every day, in military hospitals and physical therapy centers across this land, there are people facing my greatest fear. They’re doing so because they saw it as their duty to put their lives on the line for you and me. They didn’t lose their lives, though. Instead, they lost their ability to function as independently as they did before being wounded grievously.

In fighting for our freedom, they have lost much of their own.

Let me state something important before we go on. Many of you are well aware of how I feel regarding some of the United States’ military adventures. If it were up to me, I’d have most of our troops home before you could wink an eye. I categorically do NOT support my country’s actions in some instances. Some of you may feel the same way. That’s not what’s important in this case, though. Whatever our feelings concerning the actions in Iraq and Afghanistan, the men and women in harm’s way in those conflicts are making the sacrifices they make with selfless intent. And I would be some kind of miserable human being if I used my political beliefs as a crutch to absolve me from helping them during their time of greatest need.

They didn’t ask me my feelings before putting their lives on the line. They just did it. And now I’m doing what I feel is right and necessary. I’m trying to help them heal. That’s the right thing to do, under all circumstances and with no exception.

How am I trying to help, in the small way that I’m able? Via something called Valour-IT.

Valour-IT is a wonderful program (run independent of the armed forces, the Department of Defense, or any other governmental agency) supplying wounded veterans with some good tools to aid in their rehabilitation, both mentally and physically. For instance, those veterans who have suffered major injuries to their hands will be supplied with voice-activated laptop computers.

Most of us are writers of one sort or another, whether professionally or just for pleasure. Imagine yourself suddenly deprived of that ability to write, the ability to use a computer keyboard or otherwise communicate via the written word. What would it be worth to you to regain that ability? You know the answer. It would be worth the world.

Valour-IT performs that miracle. They give back the world to someone who lost it.

I’m donating to this version of an angel’s work. I’m asking you to look into your heart and find it there to do so, also.

(I’m not just using a figure of speech when I say "angel’s work", by the way. This charity was started, and is overseen by, Soldier’s Angels, a 501(c)(3) non-profit charity. All donations are tax-deductible. And, as stated previously, they are not affiliated with the government, and any government employees involved in the organization, or in the fund-raising, are doing so as private citizens.)
******
You can read his full post here, or visit the Valour-IT and Soldier’s Angels websites directly.

Short post and a blog award

2009-10-28T06:00:00.004-04:00

Busy . . . typing . . . busy . . . writing . . . busy

Yes, I'm busy write, er, right now. This makes it the perfect day to post about an award I received.

Angie from "Notes from the Writing Chair" gave me this Heartfelt award. Thank you so much, Angie! Please go visit her and give much blog love. Since there were no rules about this award, I'm allowing anyone who wants it to take it.

Okay! I'm off.

typing . . . writing . . . busy . . . typing . . . writing . . . busy . . .

Oh, all right. I guess I could come up with something!
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Jack versus Jill: The crime rhyme of the century

Jack and Jill
went up the hill
to fetch a pail of water.
Jack fell down
and broke his crown,
and Jill came tumbling after . . .

Was it an attempted rape or murder/suicide? This is what the jury must decide.

The small suburb of Goosentooth was shaken up by the dismal events that had transpired a mere week ago. Jack Thimble was found at the bottom of Sutter’s Hill bleeding profusely from his crown. Jill Moore was found unconscious near his body.

Paramedics rushed both to Mercy Hospital where the doctors discovered Jack had multiple skull fractures. After undergoing four straight hours of intensive surgery, the doctors finally had him in stable condition. Jill suffered minor bruises and was released.

When questioned, Jill Moore seemed tense with her responses.

Jill: Well, me and Jack went out back. We ate our fries and Big Mac. We got thirsty and saw the pail. That’s when Jack said, “What the hell, why don’t we go up to Sutter’s well? We’ll get a drink from the Hill, and then maybe you and I can have a little thrill? You have a fine-looking ass. We can roll around on that grass.”

Once we got up there, Jack started getting rough - acting all macho and tough. I told him I didn’t want any more. He called me a dirty little whore. We pushed each other and tumbled down. That’s when Jack broke his crown.
***
Unfortunately, when Jack Thimble regained consciousness, he had a different story to tell and it didn’t cast Jill Moore in the best of lights . . .

Jack: I received a text message on my cell. Jill said to meet her at Sutter’s well. I hadn’t seen that chick in ages. I dropped her off my address book pages. I already had a girl I plan on marrying. How could I have known Jill had a torch for me she was still carrying?

I went up that hill as she snuck around back. That girl was doped up on some serious crack. She threw herself down at my feet, saying my love makes her heart do mighty beats. I started walking away. She went insane and tackled me on that day. Next thing I knew, I woke up in this hospital bed. The doctors wrapped all these bandages around my head. Look at this long stitch! I plan to sue that crazy BITCH!
***
When questioning Jill Moore’s parents, they had a somber tale concerning their daughter.

Jill’s father: Her Ma and I tried doing everything for that girl, but her mind was in some depressed whirl. Back in high school, Jill and Jack had dated. But a life together was never fated. They broke up and Jill took off after that. We had no idea where she was at. How could we have known her heart was so forlorn . . . she would start stripping in movies for porn?

When she got too many rejections from the talent scout, she began tricking her body out. For every John driving her way, she spread her legs for their cheap pay. Yet she still loved the boy Jack, which is why to Goosentooth she headed on back. Unfortunately, she saw Jack walking around with his new tart, and this was like a knife stab in my daughter’s heart. She got into some heavy drinking, and started doing some serious thinking. Later she left her room, mumbling about seeking someone’s doom. The last words we heard from Jill on that terrible day. “I’ll make Jack mine or in death we will both lay.”
***
Although these dismal circumstances would convince most people that Jack Thimble’s rendition of the events was true, we received a disturbing account from Jack’s fiance, Miss Amy Muffet.

Amy: Jack hasn’t been all right. It began during these past couple of nights. He had heard of an old girlfriend returning here. And Jack’s face had this awful leer. I found movies hidden in the cupboard where I kept my dishes. I didn’t know my future husband had such strange sex fetishes. Women performed those nasty things, hanging from rafters while wrapped in bondage rings. What I found disturbing when watching the girl doing her lustful spiel, was that all the movies featured the bimbo named Jill.

When I confronted Jack about this, he became majorly pissed. He warned, “I’ll do anything I damn well please, even if it’s going to look at this girl doing her striptease. She satisfies me in ways you can’t. So I don’t want to hear any of your bitchy rants. She’s my thrill - my lusty hoe named Jill.”

Then Jack got into his car. I figured he was going out to the bar. Then I heard the news story about an accident on Sutter’s Hill. I knew it had to involve my Jack and that poor girl Jill.
***
So the trial will commence featuring Jack Thimble and Jill Moore. Who is telling the truth? Was it a deranged man wanting to experience a naughty sex scene in a movie? Or was it a depressed woman’s attempt to rekindle a love not there as she sought to be forever with him in death?

An attempted rape or a murder/suicide? This is what my readers must decide . . .

Autumn leaf

2009-10-26T06:37:00.001-04:00

Autumn or Fall. I didn’t care which name a person used for this season. It was the one season I loved most during my childhood.

It was the season where I didn’t have any chores.

Or at least I didn’t have as many. By this time, we had planted all of the vegetables and harvested them from the fields. We no longer had to mow the grass since the ground was too soft to support the large, heavy tractor tires. I had weaned those young calves from their milk buckets and they could now eat grass and hay like the rest of the cows.

Still, we had a few things that always needed done: feeding the pets and livestock as well as gathering the chicken eggs. But during the colder months, it felt like a vacation from some of the more strenuous chores.

I am about to gloat here, people! I never had two chores to do, although I’ve seen many people in the suburbs and city do them. I didn’t have to do the winter chore of shoveling snow. Why should I shovel around all that snow when we had a farm tractor to do it? With the plow hooked on the front, my father performed this task in fear we would get the tractor stuck in a snow drift. As for the second chore, I didn’t have to rake leaves in the Fall.

Can you imagine trying to rake leaves on 5.6 acres of property? It would take so much time that I would still be raking during spring thaw. Besides, leaves are good mulch for the lawn.

So . . . why am I writing this story? Because I still raked leaves . . .

First though, I tried to catch them. To get me outside to play, my mother once told me if a person caught the falling Autumn leaves, they could make a wish come true. This thinking was a little like blowing out a candle on a birthday cake but it didn’t involve open flame and the possible third-degree burns.

So, of course, I went traipsing outside while running my little legs ragged. In early Fall, I found the task challenging since so few branches would shed their colorful canopies. By the middle of the season, the novelty of leaf-catching waned when showers of the dead castoffs covered my head. This became the time when I broke out the rake.

I didn’t do the whole 5.6 acres. I didn’t even do just the backyard by the house. I did this little side section where I collected just enough to make a big pile.

Then I jumped into it.

Leaf jumping. It is such a whimsical, Autumn thing for a kid to do. I listened to the crackles of red, yellow, and brown leaves around my body. I made leaf angels on the cool grass. I burrowed like a gopher underneath and stayed quiet as a cat would trot through the hedgerow headed for the shed. Then I jumped out, roaring, scaring the crap out of it as the cat dashed off with heart thumping.

Of course, the cats always got even with me for pulling this prank.

I only risked leaf-jumping in the same pile for two days. After that, the leaves belonged to the cats since all this available cover made a fine place to do a little cat business. When I saw the shiny stickiness and smelled the ripe odor of bodily functions, I left their litter box alone.

I placed the rake back into the shed. Then I headed inside the house for a cup of hot chocolate, ready for winter.

A Tale of Two Balloons

2009-10-23T07:00:00.001-04:00

It’s not so strange to see balloons floating around. It just all depends on what sizes they are and from where did they come from to be where they are now.

I’m going to tell you two different balloon stories. One tale will be a large balloon traveling a short distance. The other will talk about a small balloon that traveled a long distance.
************************
It was not an everyday occurrence when you are sitting on your porch stoop playing with your twenty cats who chased after a springy weed pulled from the overgrown hedgerow. Yet it was one for me during my childhood. I had fun watching the cats tumble over each other, claws ripping apart the leaves along the stem, their mouths shaking the bits of captured plant making sure what they gnawed on was dead before going back for more. This was my play time. Meanwhile, this was the cats’ practice session for the field mice and rabbits they would stalk down to create a balanced diet to go along with the cheap dry cat food we fed them.

Having twenty cats surrounding me wasn’t a strange sight. The strange sight came from beyond the hill.

A bright orange and yellow, upside down, raindrop floated in the air. At the bottom of this raindrop stretched ropes connected to a large wicker basket. Inside this basket sat a man tugging on a chain as flames shot upward from a metal box trying to keep the canvas bag inflated.

A hot-air balloon.

Delight and wonder filled me. I had an idea where it came from: Hannastown Fort. About fifteen miles from the valley sat an old colonial fort. The fort itself was on the small side, more of an outpost, having its huge barricade fence and a small building no bigger than a one-room schoolhouse. I remember taking an elementary school trip there to see the colonial actors make corncob dolls and horseshoes in the convention center across the road. Many different types of festivals rented space in the field beyond the fort: Swap meets, gun-trade shows, fireworks displays.

Every year, the fort also was a host to a hot-air balloon competition.

While driving past headed toward the mall, I stared out the passenger side window watching the workers unfurl the balloons and fill the fabric bags with the gas that would take them off the ground.

I knew where the hot-air balloon had come from, yet something looked wrong. No matter how much he tugged on the chain, the balloon sank. It wasn’t dropping out of the sky like a stone. Featherlike, it drifted down with the pilot (I guess this would be a correct term for him) in complete control. He obviously wanted to make an emergency landing. He decided it would be in our fields.

But there were several problems. We had three fields. Two of them were the cow pastures separated by a barbed wire fence. The third field we used to plant crops in was separated from the others with a row of pine trees.

The first field sloped too much to make a good landing. The third one, although not sowed with plants yet, was near the roadway and there was the possibility the fabric balloon could collapse there on a moving vehicle. Th second field in the middle had a telephone pole with high-voltage wires stretching back into part of the third field toward the neighbor’s property to provide electricity to them.

The pilot picked the second field.

He navigated it down, the basket skimming over the barbed wire and settled right there while he kept an eye on the direction of the wind to see where the deflating balloon would settle. It came down, missing the wires and pole, short of hitting the pine trees.

The man was a master of his craft.

By this time my parents had seen something weird coming from the sky. The pilot asked to use our phone, he called some people he knew, and they came by in their large vans to roll up the deflated balloon. They stowed everything inside and drove away.

What an incredible thing to have seen!

Unfortunately, the wondrous sight did not impress the twenty cats. They went back to snacking on their caught weed.
******************************
On a windy March day in 1990, I found a regular balloon on the ground.

Either purple or red (I can’t remember which), the balloon had lost enough helium where it could no longer sail majestically through the air. The string lay on the ground, and the card attached at the end was heavy enough to keep the balloon there.

I picked up the card and read it.

I wish I could remember the name of the elementary school. As a classroom project, they had released the balloon. They wanted to see how far it would travel. I’m sure many students had wanted the balloon to go across the ocean to different countries. A few might have even had dreams of people rushing from their grass huts to point at it, jabbering in their foreign tongue about the strange floating object.

Although the balloon never left the United States, a trip from the state of Wisconsin to Pennsylvania was still an impressive feat for a regular plastic balloon. The card asked the founder of the classroom project to mail it back to the provided address with any pictures and information on where the balloon landed.

I’m not sure I sent any photos. I want to saw yes, but this was also the time when I didn’t own a camera. I could have sent old photos though. I wrote about whom I was and where the balloon had landed. Then I mailed everything back.

About two weeks later, I received a mailed reply. They thanked me for finding their balloon and telling them about myself. On a piece of drawing paper, the students had written their names.

I am forever grateful to have been the person to find this balloon. The possibilities of it wrapping around a telephone line or landing in the creek and swept underwater could have happened. Or someone could have just shrugged their shoulders and thrown the card away. I’m also happy the students enjoyed the photos and letter.

Even Pennsylvania can be considered a foreign place in the mind of a child from another state.

I hope many schools still do this today.

So ends my tale of two balloons . . .

This Isn’t The Wonder Years - a memoir

2009-10-21T07:00:00.006-04:00

There are coming of age stories, and then there are memories . . .

Growing up happens in a heartbeat. One day you’re in diapers, the next day you’re gone. But the memories of childhood stay with you for the long haul. I remember a place, a town, a house, like a lot of houses. A yard like a lot of yards. On a street like a lot of other streets. And the thing is, after all these years, I still look back . . . with wonder.

–concluding narration to the final episode of the show “The Wonder Years,” spoken by Daniel Stern.

Many people look back at their lives with wonder, with smiles, with frowns, with sadness and with joy. Many people will see their childhood reflected within the television shows they watch, as they sit upon the couch and relate their family history to the younger generation.

They would say, “My life was like ‘Leave it to Beaver’ with a peaceful neighborhood and two doting parents.” Or they could start with, “My life was like ‘Toddlers with Tiaras’ where my mother tried to relive her dreams of stardom through her children by dressing me up like a miniature Barbie Doll to compete in beauty pageants.”

“My life was like ‘The Cosby Show’ full of laughter and wit and never a dull moment.”

“My life was like ‘Married with Children’ where my father worked as a struggling salesman and my sister was a floozy who slept with everyone.”

“My life was like . . .”

Well, my life was not like “Married with Children.” It was not like “The Cosby Show.” And it was definitely not like “Leave it to Beaver” or “Toddlers with Tiaras.” I cannot compare my life with anything seen on television because of one simple fact: all those shows emulated normal everyday life. This was the reason they gained popularity. Everyone could see a bit of their childhood in those shows. Everyone could smile, frown, feel sadness and joy. Everyone could understand where the plot led.

Normality bred familiarity.

Normal? My childhood? No. My father popped this dream bubble with a certain phrase told to his steelworker buddies during phone conversations loud enough for me to overhear. “This isn’t The Wonder Years.”

For those unfamiliar with the sitcom, “The Wonder Years” was an American Dramedy (comedy/drama) that ran for six seasons in the late 1980s to the early 1990s. It featured Fred Savage as the typical junior high school kid getting into trouble and exploring relationships with the female students while engaged in family drama. The show broke the mold of storytelling by relying on a narrator portraying the main actor in his older years as he retells his misspent youth.

The show was a memoir made for television.

This isn’t “The Wonder Years”; my father did not have to remind me of this fact. I could look at our surroundings and know the truth. I could look into the mirror and see it in my wincing eyes. My place dwelled in an isolated valley out in the countryside. My town existed, but could not be found on a map. My neighbors looked different from me, a difference seen in the shade of skins while shouted from strangers’ cars whenever people passed by our driveway.

“There are niggers living out here.”

My place was a rural valley in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. My town was called New Alexandria, the closest borough willing to take our taxes without providing the basic needs of municipality water and sewage, consisting of a racial makeup of 99.50% White, 0.17% Asian, and 0.34% from two or more races.

My house was a three-bedroom ranch-style dwelling for a family of five, infested with rats for part of the year and bugs for the other six months. My yard consisted of 5.6 acres of farmland with two fields, three pastures, two barns, a separate garage, a shed, and enough grass that took two days on the riding tractor to mow as the cows swished tails while chewing their cuds. My street had no sidewalks, no lights, no curbside, and no guardrail while smelling of tar and chipped stone as it wound around hills to cross over a small bridge.

I stood in the middle of our field, staring at the surrounding hills absent of echoes from children playing hopscotch on the sidewalk, of car horns honking at malfunctioning traffic lights, of jingling bells hanging inside store doors as cash registers rang up purchases of penny candy and cherry bombs. Instead, I heard incessant birdsongs occasionally drowned out by the police helicopter flying low in search of illegal marijuana plots hidden on properties.

I was part of a hillbilly family living on the outskirts of a rural town pretending to be farmers. I was part of the only black family living in a country valley surrounded by white people who held differing viewpoints of those people whose skin color was different from theirs.

Obviously, this was NOT “The Wonder Years.”

Yet, my father’s comment held a deeper meaning than this. It hadn’t meant to describe the area where we lived, but the life we led. On that television show, a family engaged in an average family life doing those things considered instinctual as to what a family was supposed to do. The laughter. The sadness. The arguments. The understanding. The kindness. The love.

A fictional life with fictional ideals, or so my father believed. Love belonged strictly in a sitcom show with their make-believe antics and make-believe hugs and make-believe love not found in the real world. In the real world, there was always pain. In the real world, there was always scorn. In the real world, adults had children for fraudulent purposes with no other obligation except to cash the money until the child was of no further use to them.

I was a black hillbilly girl not knowing how she came to be there in the valley or why she was born on this world. When I looked back at my memories of childhood, I felt wonder . . . on how I even survived.

Aerial photo of old New Alexandria

All photos courtesy of http://www.newalexpa.com/

Mental Images

2009-10-19T07:22:00.000-04:00

There are those times when a person doesn’t have any particular memory to associate with the mental images they see.

They know the event happened. Yet it might have happened many times, and many things may interweave with it to create the special memory. Sights, tastes, and smells linger within the past as they happen in brief flashes of mental clarity within the present.

I close my eyes and see a hill of white, tasting and smelling the metallic iron within the cold on the windward side of the slope. Steam clouds around my nose and mouth, a brief flash of heated existence showing life within the folds of my gray tufted coat. My boots crunch through the top crust, sinking, greeting the soft billowy snow hidden under the ice.

I sit on the three hard slats of the wooden sled, my body almost level with the tips of the towering pine trees, well over 30ft tall. Their swaying branches show flashes of the road and the yellow rotating light on top of the plow truck while it sprinkles salt on the icy asphalt.

I lift snow boots and place them on the sled rudder in front. My mitten-covered hands grip the length of twine tight.

The wind whistles past my head as I ride my sled down the hill. My rudder shifts to the left, avoiding one tree while my head ducks under the branches of another. My eyes squeeze tight at the stinging wind and the sight of the upcoming snow drift.

My hands release the twine cord and lift high. I toss back my head and holler in delight at the anticipation for the sudden stop when the rudder meets snow.

Thump!

The sled has stopped, yet my body keeps moving forward. A spray of snow erupts as my body smacks into the large, cold mound. Giggles sound among the groans. I climb out, shivering at those flakes sneaking past the coat zipper to brush up against my neck. I grab the twine and start my climb back to the hill’s top.

I get ready to do it again.

I open my eyes yet the memory lingers, swirling at the front of my mind as warm breath mist. It was winter with no specific time frame - many winters of yesteryear combined as one memory. A flash of my childhood, crisp in its realness and belonging only to my viewpoint.

Such interesting stories we can create from these mental images . . .

Ruby Red

2009-10-16T07:26:00.002-04:00

She wasn’t taking it anymore.

For Ruby Red, living in the city projects wasn’t a happy skip down the trail. Murders, rapes, and gang violence plagued her neighborhood. Then the day came when the gang, “The Lupines,” broke into her relative’s house.

They ransacked the place. Yet before they could do any physical harm on her grandmother, Ruby entered through the front door with her current boyfriend, Woody Pineisco, who confronted the men.

The gang split, but not before their boss accidentally tripped on the grandmother’s sewing basket. He slammed into the wall, dislodging the antique silver axe that Ruby’s grandfather had used during his days as a lumberjack. The axe tumbled from its display pegs and lodged into the gang member’s skull, killing him instantly.

Ruby believed The Lupines would not trouble her family again. She was dead wrong.

Up through the gang hierarchy emerged a troubled soul out for revenge. The younger brother to their dead boss, he had the street name of “Big Bad” and the credo to match. Big Bad planned to let Ruby Red know just how bad a Lupine he could be. With several of his posse staking the house, he broke in while Ruby was out grocery shopping. Big Bad killed Woody Pineisco and dragged the grandmother away into the night.

When Ruby returned home, she found her dead boyfriend on the kitchen floor. Gang signs in blood covered the walls. Ruby discovered a spray-painted message on her grandmother’s nightgown.

‘Give us all the loot or Granny gets whacked!’

Ruby Red had other ideas as she held back her grief for the boyfriend she had wanted to marry. From off the wall she picked up her grandfather's axe. Then she jumped into her red Firebird and sped toward the gang’s hideout at the heart of the projects to confront The Lupines’ Big Bad boss.

“Little Red Rides into the Hood” - only this time, she plans to end the tragic story.

Coming to a fairytale near you.

Ruralfication 3

2009-10-14T07:00:00.005-04:00

If you have come late for my childhood memory hoedown, then you can read Parts 1 & 2 here. Everyone else, grab your partner dos-i-do. Spin her around, to and fro . . . or at least into this final part.

Y’all come on back to read my youngling’s tale? Oh, y’all wanted some more’n that muskrat. Well, sit on down and pull up a plate. I got me some chicken-fried muskrat steaks a-cooking in bacon grease inside that cast iron skillet there. Make y’all self comfortable. I’ll finish my tale. Y’all can listen if y’all want, or just flip-on through the newspaper ‘til the steaks are ready.

So where’n was I? Oh, there I was . . . fully clothed while a-swimming in dirty creek water doing my doggie-paddle with my eyes closed. Sure’n I was almost nearing that high creek wall, thinking I had more’n ‘nuff air in my lil’ ol’ lungs to make it, when I felt something gone brushing up against my face. Y’all probably be thinking, “Why’s, Michelle! That ain’t nothing but some lil’ froggy toad sharing the watery fun with y’all.”

Yah, it could’ve been . . . if y’all was living in one of those Am-a-zon places where’n y’all can find all types of ex-o-tic critters in strange shapes and toads could-a been long and slithering, like what this here critter felt like. But this here story of mine didn’t happen in no tro-pi-cal woods. This here happened in the valley in ‘slvania. And this here critter weren’t no stretchy long toad.

In my mind, this felt like a snake.

Why’s my mouth gone popped all open in surprise as I scrambled back. Hard to do when y’all underwater with eyes closed. But when y’all swam with a snake, y’all pretty much could go all out to sprout gills and dig up through those creek walls to get away if y’all could. The air all trapped in my mouth blew out and the dirty water took its place. Yet I was close ‘nuff to the water’s surface and the creek wall where’n I burst up coughing and clawing my way out.

Everyone saw how all frantic fuss I be making trying to get to flat dry ground. I fell back-flat on the grass, staring up into those tree leaves seeing the sun moving on ‘cross the blue sky. When finally my sputtering stopped, I looked at all them staring. “I felt something slither across my nose.”

I’d never seen so many people go scrambling back from that creek. Billy and Mike climbed all up. Don’t know why since they be on the other side of the dam. They a-gathered ‘round, getting themselves into a fuss ‘bout my words.

“There’s no way it could’ve been a snake.”

“But I’ve heard of water snakes.”

“Are you sure it wasn’t just a leaf?”

“She said it was long and slithering. Could it have been a twig?”

“I’m not jumping back in!”

Well, I sure’n was the person who said that last statement. And it all sort-of convinced them that there was something a-lurking underneath that creek water. I’ll admit to y’all now, what I felt underneath there could-a been a twig, maybe stirred up from the muddy bottom by our KER-SPLOOSHING. But I still come ‘round thinking that I’ve never met myself any twig floating sideways ‘cross the bridge of my nose drifting that fast. It slithered, no doubt about it.

No one felt like going back down into the creek today. The sun was moving fast through the sky anyway. While my sibs go a-heading on home, dry though Mike’s hands covered with mud that he planned on using the garden hose to squirt on off, I had myself a big ol’ problem. My clothes dripped all wet through, even down to my de-lic-ate things I’m not all going to mention here. I was a sure’n to get a good ol’ scolding from my Mama and my butt whooped on by my Pa’s belt.

I went with Cher on back to her house, standing in the tub while talking a shower. Still had my clothes on. Naw, I ain’t being daffy. My clothes were wet and MUDDY. Had to get the mud off. After that, Cher used her Mama’s hair dryer along my clothes. They ain’t own no regular dryer. When all toasty warm, I took to my heels a-heading on back home. Walked from her house and straight down that corn path humming to myself.

Yah, y’all heard me right. I trotted through those corn fields without nary a fraidy-shake thinking those leaves going to do me some evil. Heck, I just went all creek swimming with snakes. Ain’t nothing left to be all scaredy-cat that could be a-lurking in this corn field.

I passed by that corn, that bunker with its slingy-shot machine, and that ratty couch ready for those burping men. Ducked my body through the hedgerow and stood in my backyard, peeking eyes ‘round at them hills surrounding this place.

This here, it was true valley life.

And now, if y’all can put the newspaper away, y’all chicken-fried muskrat steak be ready.
*********************************************************
Note: Dear Angie over at Gumbo Writer has very special news to the bloggy community. Since I'm all for supporting people in this community, I wanted to share.

You are cordially invited to attend an "open house" beginning Wednesday, October 14, in honor of the newly renovated Rose &Thorn Journal: http://www.roseandthornjournal.com/

Drop by, sign up for the newsletter, check out the new digs (and blog!), follow us on Twitter and Facebook, leave us your comments/thoughts, and wish us well!

Rose &Thorn is a quarterly literary journal featuring the voices of emerging and established authors, poets and artists.

Now...go enjoy the open bar and appetizer spread!

Angie Ledbetter &Kathryn Magendie
Co-Editor/Publishers
Rose & Thorn Journal

Ruralfication 2

2009-10-12T10:17:00.000-04:00

If y’all knows anything about this fancy pants in-ter-net thing called blogging, then sure ‘nuff y’all understands what it means when seeing the pretty blue color on this here word. If y’all don’t know, why’s it means this ain’t the first ol’ tale of mine y’all should be a-reading. Get’s-u-gone over at that other place and reads up.

(If this is your first time here, I assure you that I don’t speak . . . er . . . type like this all the time. Of course, it would be interesting if I did - annoying to me, yet interesting to you. You won’t believe how long it took to shake off the hick accent . . . okay, I’ll get to the second part of this post. Ahem!)

Eh, governor? Would you believe them drunk Yanks piled into the motorcade escorting the Queen? The bullocks on them Americans! Them bloody wankers even asked if she stowed Earl Grey in the trunk and if he drank tea.

Oops! Sorry. Wrong accent.

I know y’all be squirming in pants a-waiting to see what be going on with the rest of my youngling’s memory. Well, shake them ants out ‘cause here be the next part of the tale.

The sun was beaming, the wind was blowing, and I was a-getting all hot. Yet, my body, it had a mind of its own ‘bout not trotting down that scary path with the waving corn leaves in the neighbor’s field.

I could hear me some yelling in the woods yonder. Cher and Billy went all a-hollering with two other peoples. Why’s it took me lickety-split time to rec-o-gnize them voices were to my older sibs: Jeannette and Michael.

Well, I stood there all a-missing out in the fun. Took a deep breath, glared at those weaving green hands of the corn acting like they’d try to drag my body under the dirt for fertilizer, and I built up my waning courage. My sneakers scuffed that ground, getting ready. Then my shoulders just gone give a shrug. I strolled away from that path and headed on down to the driveway.

Now, don’t y’all be saying I was a scaredy-cat for not taking that blasted path. Everyone knows there’s always more’n two choices in any sit-u-ation. Y’all just got to think of it and pick the one y’all most comfortable with that don’t cause no one else any trouble. I picked it. I walked ‘round them fields of corn. I didn’t force myself to go all in, getting the fraidy-shakes halfway and hollering for help. I didn’t interrupt anyone’s play in the woods. I didn’t make my nerves turn into wiggly Jell-O. No harm done.

Sure’n I trotted along that driveway, but I got even hotter before reaching them shade trees.

Y’all got to understand. Us gals, we don’t go sweating like them guys do. It’s not fem-in-ine to have salty water staining our shirts in embarrassing places. We keep it inside and only sweat in private, like in the shower. This why we’s take so long in the bathroom.

Why’s y’all snickering? It’s true. Why’s I swear on my pet muskrat that it be true. Oh, Mama gone done and cooked it? Well, I go and swear on the muskrat burger during suppertime then.

Anyhow, I scampered into that shady cover of trees. Felt ten times cooler as I hiked the trail. I came ‘round to the part where it split, made a type of baseball diamond with two dog houses where first base and third base would be. There ain’t no dogs. Cher and her lil’ brother Billy never had any. Them things just looked like doghouses pretending to be kid’s playhouses.

Stretching along them tree branches in the middle were a twine string. At the end of that string were two large tomato sauce cans. Cher’s pa claimed it was a working tele-o-phone, like how them ancient peoples used in the 1970's to talk on ‘fore the menfolk go all outside with clubs to hunt down them dinosaurs for food.

I don’t think that man’s head was screwed on tight when talking ‘bout dinosaurs in the ‘70s. I knew me from some reading that dinosaurs roamed the land in the 1950's and became ex-tinct by the 1960's when womenfolk started their movement for equal rights so they could vote to go a-hunting ‘cause them big ol’ reptiles made nice fancy-schmancy leather for shoes.

Anyway, why’s I ducked my head under the twine. I headed down the path toward second base where the trail branched off to go back toward the creek. My ears heard them voices getting louder. Then I stopped where the ground went all straight down.

See here. This creek was a good fourteen feet lower from all the reg-u-lar ground. Y’all could either step down on bricks and cross on stepping stones to get to the other side where you climbed up the dirt wall. Or y’all could swing to the other side using a large rope. And this creek, it used to be real shallow - ankle-high to cool y’all toes while watching for swimming toadies. But that ‘fore Billy and my brother got it into their fool heads to build a big ol’ dam farther down the way. They might’en just gone and called it the Hoover Dam ‘cause of how big it was. It was made of twigs and mud with them all working like two big beavers ‘cept neither had bucked teeth.

But I plumb-thought I once saw Billy gnawing on a tree trunk.

So this here creek ain’t no longer ankle-high. With nowhere for the water to go ‘cept for this little chute opening Billy and Mike used to release the pressure when it got too high, it could cover over two tall mens’ heads if one stood on the other’s shoulders. And it was no longer all clear where y’all could watch them toadies. The ongoing dam work made the water all dirty-looking brown.

‘Course, this here didn’t all go stop Cher from jumping on in. She took this running start and grabbed knees to go KER-SPLOOSH as the water all shot up likes a geyser. Then she climbed back out, biggest grin there on her lips with hair changed from sandy blond to dirty blond and leaves a-tangled in it. She dared my sister to do it. Yet our Mama, she had forbidden us from getting all wet in this creek, ‘specially with our clothes still on.

Why’s I walked up and Cher asked if I wanted to go all a-jumping. My finger tapped my chin while I was thinking on how hot I still was with keeping that sweat locked up in my body. And sure ‘nuff that creek water looked nice and cool. I also was thinking on how I had chickened out on taking that path through the corn field.

Now, my older sister and brother, they ain’t daring on going a-swimming. And it looked to both Cher and Billy that they were scaredy-cats. If I went and jumped all in that water, I’d be cool in both my body and their minds. Even if later I got the fraidy-shakes when taking the corn path and hollered for help, none of them could go teasing me ‘cause I had been brave ‘nuff to dive into that creek water despite my Mama’s words.

Yessir! With Jeannette and Mike’s mouths all hanging open, I took a mighty leap, still clothed, into that creek. Grabbed my knees and felt the air whistling past my ears until my KER-SPLOOSH. I had my eyes closed when going under. I didn’t like having them open to the water even in the shower. It was at that moment when I remembered something.

I don’t swim, ‘least I don’t swim well. Could do me a lil’ doggie-paddle, though. So while underneath that dirty water I pumped my hands and legs under my body hoping to reach the creek wall ‘fore I used up all my good air in lungs. I knew in my mind I neared it so I had no worries.

That when I felt something slithering along the bridge of my nose.
***********************
Enough! I’s needs me, er, I need a break. Come ‘round for the ending . . . return for the final part on Wednesday.

Y’all hears?

Please?

Ruralfication

2009-10-09T07:00:00.003-04:00

It is a word (now). “Rural” means countryside and “-fication” means production: making.

Ruralfication - country production, which is what I’m doing for this post. It is my little writing challenge for today. I plan to regale you with a childhood memory but writing it country-style.

What? Why’s not? I got me some writers visiting who might’en like to see if I can do this without screwing it up fast’ah than cooking a bowl of muskrat stew. And for them y’all just coming ‘round for a story, why sure’n I can still en-ter-tain y’all with my youngling’s tale.

Let’s see what I can do, shall we?
*********************************
Valley life, ain’t nothing fine-ah. Y’all stepped out the door and stood in the backyard, peeking eyes in every direction. Hills surrounded y’all like Mama’s tender embrace holding tight when younglings had the shiver-shakes from the flu.

Sure’n I heard of those folks out in the west claiming they lived in their big ol’ valley while sipping their “mo-ca chin-os” and jibber-jabbering up on their cell-u-lar phones while waiting for their trolley rides. Them San Francisco city slickers in their high-rise condos as they pretended they be the real valley people.

Pshaw! That ain’t no valley life. This here was valley life when y’all caught a whiff of overripe cow pies from the pasture. Valley life was when y’all took those hen eggs, rotten two weeks past, and played hot potato to see who dropped one first on spanking new sneakers. Valley life was when y’all fell back-flat on the shin-high grass and listened to nothing but birds’ songs and bugs’ buzzes and nary a puttering engine ‘cept for the farmer’s ol’ tiller machine cutting up the field soil to start his oat planting.

Yessir! This be the true valley life. Wait! What y’all means that ain’t no valley? Well then, what y’all calls it?
.
.
.
Gulch?
.
.
.
There ain’t to be no cussing up here in this tale of mine, y’all understand?

Now, I was like any other youngling living in the valley: sure’n ‘nuff bored out of my mind. This time was ‘fore we had those playing boxes for the tv where y’all pushed the buttons on the controller and it made the froggy jumping ‘round on logs on the screen. Atari video games, they’d be called though I heard of some newfangled thing causing folks to go all a-raving.

A strange name. I was thinking it came from 'nother place not like folks here in the valley. Foreign people, sort of when I watched those Bugs Bunny cartoons and Sylvester the Cat dug straight through the ground and end up upside down in another land where he met Tweety Bird speaking funny with the squinty eyes and the triangle hat.

Nintendo 8-bit games.

Why gosh if that ain’t all a fancy name from those foreign places! Nintendo. I liked saying it, having the word roll off my lips and make the other kids think I was all smart about the world. I might’ve been a tad smarter, but we all were the same. Our parents went a-frowning at the wasted time spent on such things when younglings had farm chores to do. It was years ‘fore any of us got to have those gray boxes to while away our childhoods.

But all this talk of mine ain’t getting to the real story. When the sun shone hot on my head, I sought a shady place to have me some fun. I ducked through the hedgerow seeing what my friend Cher and her lil’ brother Billy be doing.

My eyes peered 'round their field, not seeing strange adult folk sitting on the ratty couch burping in time to the absent gunshots. Cher’s pa, he did him some trap shooting, would cry out “Pull” and one of those burping men on the ratty couch hit the switch on the wire. That wire went 'cross the hill and down into a little bunker where a machine did a little slingy-shot with clay pigeons.

Those ceramic disks took to the sky and her pa’s rifle made all those BLAM noises. Y’all could tell how many drinks he’s had depending on how many pellets it took to shatter them disks. One shot meant he'd just started with his aiming and his drinking. Five shots meant he was working on his second case of beer, and birds should seek cover or else he was mistaking them for the clay pigeons.

All quiet in the field as I took to my heels. I neared the part where they did their sowing, corn, rows of green stalks not yet showing upright pouches sheltering sweet nugget goodness. Lots of stalks stood tall, casting patches of shadows and light good thirty feet on either side. I stared at the dirt path that snuck in ‘tween the rows, all wavy and quiet and cramped in by the whisks of corn leaves caught in the breeze.

Those leaves stretched out like green hands reaching for me.

Why’s I didn’t like trotting down that path by myself. My mind . . . it has this ima-gin-ation where it sees things and hears things that were not all right and not all there. Right now, it brought ‘round to my thoughts that those whisking leaves sounded like lil’ ol’ whisperings from peoples I didn’t know. Them shade patches along the tall stalks looked like shadows cast by those folks who wouldn’t all go and hesitate to drag some poor younglings in there and do bad stuff like in those horror flicks my pa snuck me into at the picture show. And the dirt didn’t look like it was all packed down where’n someone couldn’t make a body into fresh fertilizer to feed those corn plants’ hungry roots.

Sure’n I didn’t want to go walking along there . . .
***************************
Hm, I think I will stop here for now. The story is a bit too long to type out in one setting, and this will allow everyone a break. The last thing I want is for someone to have a meeting with their boss and start talking like some hick from southwestern Pennsylvania. I will continue my childhood memory on Monday.

So reckon y’all needs to come on back then, y’all hears?

Thankgiving Comes First!

2009-10-07T07:00:00.007-04:00

Holidays.

I don’t celebrate them.

I understand the concept of such special days. Whether it is to commemorate the date due to its significance in history, a special person in one’s life, or the festive gathering of people to celebrate family values, I have no emotional attachment to any holiday - not even birthdays. The last time I celebrated my birthday was in 1987. I was twelve.

My family life when growing up was . . . not exactly on the normal side. No, this doesn’t explain my quirky nature now. It took me YEARS to be this annoying. Let me just say that when it comes to family values, finding such in the Hickman household was lacking. There was a particular phrase spoken often by the adults:

“This isn’t The Wonder Years.”

For those of you who are unfamiliar with the sitcom, The Wonder Years was an American Dramedy (comedy/drama) that ran for six seasons in the late 1980s to the early 1990s. It featured Fred Savage as the typical junior high school kid getting into trouble and exploring conflicted relationships with the female students while engaged in family drama. Or so I summarized from the wikipedia page.

Honestly, I knew of the show but never watched it while young. My parents, or rather my father, watched it on occasion since it featured a character whose background involved being in the US Marine Corps (as my father had been).

Anyway, to move along with this post, the above phrase “This isn’t The Wonder Years” simply meant that family core values of love, togetherness, and understanding had no basis in real life. In the Hickman household, the adults taught the children that such notions were the fictional creations of a Hollywood scriptwriter’s overabundant use of an illegal recreational narcotic.

Yeah . . .

So celebrating holidays that adopt the philosophy of family values became frowned upon. Inside the adults’ minds, the only thing holidays seemed good for was wasting money. This became the final savage blow since the Almighty Dollar had a vaulted place in the echelons of holy worship in the Hickman household and should never be squandered on the goofy ideals from a doped-up Hollywood writer.

Thus, the death of holiday celebrations.

Okay. Before I get a slew of comments, let me state that I have never believed in this nonsense. I’ve come to have a happier and healthier mindset by going out of my way in doing the exact opposite of the taught concepts practiced on me. If I had actually listened to the adults . . .

. . . shudder . . .

Well, I’ll just say things would be VERY different with my posts at this blog. The lack of humor would send most of my readers screaming in absolute terror and disgust.

Moving right along . . .

The point of this post is to tell you that although I have no personal emotional attachment to holidays due to my messed-up childhood, I understand other people’s feelings and beliefs about them. I celebrate people’s desires to celebrate these festive events. Also, when someone is asking for help from his blog readers to support a special cause in celebrating not only holidays, but the core values involving love, togetherness, and understanding, I show my full support.

Jim (Suldog) has started his movement once again in keeping holidays within their allotted time frames. It irks him, and seems absolutely silly to me, whenever stores shove a holiday down people’s throats and into their wallets MONTHS before we actually celebrate it all because of corporate greed from avaricious merchants.

Money overriding family values? Hm, this seems familiar . . . like I mentioned it before in this post . . . concerning the warped values taught to me when young . . . and it causes me to do the exact opposite . . .

Christmas has come early, like NOW. When you can walk into a store and already see the cutout Santas at the display shelves, this cheapens the religious aspects of the occasion and completely steamrolls over another holiday that has a sole purpose in bringing families together in celebrations of love and thankfulness.

Thus the movement of “Thanksgiving Comes First” is being spread throughout the blogosphere. Here is an excerpt from Jim’s post.
*****
When I was a kid, Christmas was magical. The lights were colorful and amazing, making the night a warm, bright, wonderful place to be, even if it was 20 degrees outside and the snow was up to your waist in drifts. If you're old enough, you'll recall that Christmas carols gave you the same sorts of butterflies in your stomach that would be associated with love at a later time in your life. Cities and towns put up decorations on the main streets, with the larger municipalities erecting lovely Christmas trees in central spots.

All of the above worked, on a spectacular level, because it happened at an appropriate time. No retailer (or city or homeowner) dared breach the unofficial line of demarcation – Thanksgiving. It was an unwritten rule that one holiday would play out completely before another was allowed to be spoken of.

Now? Nobody cares. Whatever you can peddle, whenever you can peddle it, is the mantra. It matters not a whit how many people’s memories are trampled, nor how irreligious your displays and advertisements. The only thing that counts is that you get into the black. Restraint and taste are passé. The more outrageous the spectacle you make, the better for your bottom line.

Make no mistake about it: I’m a capitalist. I believe in a system wherein the market regulates itself. I’m all for everybody making as much money as they can, as fast as they can, in whatever way they can, so long as nobody is physically hurt in the process. I’m not looking to enact laws against early Christmas advertising, nor am I in favor of jail terms for such nebulous concepts as greed. What I am in favor of is standing up and being counted. If you decry this incursion upon our holiday ground, I hope you'll join me in raising a slight ruckus. My hope is that we'll make enough noise to affect the situation. If we can’t, then I suppose we deserve this despicable state of affairs.

I’m going to give it a try. I hope you'll help.

If you believe, as I do, that Thanksgiving should play out before Christmas; that Christmas carols should not be heard on the radio before at least Thanksgiving evening; that advertisers who dare to encroach upon Thanksgiving - or, God help us, Halloween - with their hideous advertisements should be told in no uncertain terms that you will not shop at their establishments; that malls who put Santa Claus on display before Veterans Day should be made ashamed of themselves; then please consider doing what I'm going to ask of you.

Should you be as incensed as I am concerning Christmas schlock, please post a "Thanksgiving Comes First" entry on your blog. Write from the heart. Everybody who visits your blog will know how you feel. Perhaps they'll also write about it, and so will their friends, and so on. I hope that, if enough of us do this, we might make some small impact.
******
Here are his personal reasons for this:

I'm a Christian, so I have more than an annoyance factor at work here. I think that cheapening the holiday, by expanding it beyond reasonable bounds, does a world of disservice to my religion. It gives people a false view of it, by making it a greed-fest. However, if you aren’t a Christian, your take on matters may be even more so than mine. If you're Jewish, for instance, it might make you mad to see some of your own festive holy days being given short shrift because of this overkill. If you're an atheist? I imagine it doesn't make you happy to be bombarded by this stuff. Whatever your reasons, please consider telling the world that you've had enough.

I firmly believe – and I’m sure you do, too – that the great majority of people are sick to death of the way Christmas has been commercialized. I’d be willing to bet that whenever you talk to anyone about this stuff, they almost always say, "Yeah, me, too!"

You may already know that I consider Fred Rogers to have been an actual living saint. He really was a nice man as I detailed in a previous post. Anyway, on one of his shows that aired recently, he was explaining the concepts of noisy and quiet. In order to illustrate the difference, he took his television audience to see a musician friend of his.

Fred had the musician, a percussionist, play his many instruments. Some were very loud, while others were soft and gentle. Afterwards, Mister Rogers looked into the camera and spoke. I have to paraphrase, but it will be close enough. He said, “In music, the silences are just as important as the loud parts.”

That’s a very profound statement. The silences are just as important as the loud parts. It’s true, isn’t it? Without the silences, it’s just noise. The silences – the pauses, the gaps, the unfilled spaces – are what give the notes their power and meaning. And when it comes to a holiday, the silences – the quiet times preceding (or even within) the holiday – are extremely important. They give the celebration its power and meaning. That’s why I care so deeply about this. We all need some silences. They’re just as important as the loud parts.
******
You can read Suldog’s entire post to get a deeper understanding. Come join the cause!

I’m there, in heart and spirit.

The verdict

2009-10-05T07:00:00.006-04:00

All rise! Please read jury seat, opening arguments, witness stand, and closing arguments. Here comes the (real) honorable conclusion to this series.

I shouldn’t have to do a big recap anymore. I’m sure a few readers might be cussing me out for drilling this court case into their noggins and giving them nightmares. So I’ll stick to a basic one-liner.

Injured Cast Lady with questionable past was suing Garage Man for $10,000 for medical bills and mental anguish when tripping over a pile of debris mostly on a house owner’s property with only a handful overflowing on Garage Man’s side.

That’s it in a nutshell.

It took three days of lawyers’ antics and a disgruntled character witness to reach our judgement. We had eight pages of questions we needed to answer in the deliberation room to figure out which counts we could hold against Garage Man and how much of a dollar amount to grant Cast Lady. There was also a part (strangely) on whether we held the house owner accountable for this situation.

Well . . . DUH! It was his debris.

The twelve jurors sat in the cramped deliberation room with our papers. Our foreman (who actually napped halfway through the trial) decided it would be for the best if we went around the table and allowed everyone their two-cents’ worth.

We mostly shared the same sentiments. “Why couldn’t one freaking person take a normal photograph of this DEBRIS? We have twenty photographs at this angle and that angle and standing on the other side of the street.”

Other people said, “I’m not convinced. The circumstances are too convenient. Cast Lady said she knew the debris was there weeks before the injury. It’s not an unexpected accident. Her knowledge of it excuses Garage Man from any wrongdoing.”

A few more concurred, “How can anyone step out of a vehicle while not seeing a mound of debris three-feet long and shin-high sitting right beside the car?”

(Heck, it’s 10 years later and I’m still trying to figure out how she even opened the car door without hitting it against the debris.)

More speculation: "Why didn’t the driver see the debris when pulling up to the sidewalk? If Cast Lady were so drunk, why didn’t she get dropped off at her apartment?"

Yet the biggest thing on everyone’s mind was this: Did Cast Lady really break her arm on the debris? Or did she see it as an easy way to cash in on an opportunity?

As for my humble decision, I just couldn’t agree with Cast Lady suing Garage Man for the handful of stone that had shifted on his property. It would have been a different matter if this case involved the house owner. But going after Garage Man for $10,000 over an anthill of pebbles just seemed trifling. Also, her past thievery from a job for this same amount didn’t help her case.

Our decision: Garage Man was innocent of every count. The house owner was responsible for the hazard. Cast Lady would get nothing from Garage Man, yet could use the decision from this case in seeking damages from the house owner.

If he still lived . . . nobody established this and might be the reason Cast Lady had to sue Garage Man.

Of course, this is merely conjecture on my part.

We filed into the room. Our awake foreman handed in our decision and a clerk read it to the court. NOBODY was surprised. Cast Lady and her lawyer sat there with even expressions on their faces (although I did see Hardy shake Laurel’s hand for the good case as they chatted happily in the hallway afterward, and out of sight of Cast Lady and Mr. Wit - OUCH).

The cute judge stood, thanked the jurors, and said he would be available to talk with the jurors about this case if anybody was interested. Most of the jurors were interested in cashing in their little pay for this trial as they filed into the elevator and headed downstairs to the accounting offices.

A week later, I picked up my mail. I found a letter from the cute judge asking for a date.

Ha! No, he merely wrote to thank everyone for attending and if we had any additional questions to give him a call in his private study.

Hm . . . yanno, now that I think back, his eyes were glued on me for the whole entire trial. I know mine were on him. And he did give an occasional smile.

DAMN! I should have called . . .

Closing arguments

2009-10-02T07:10:00.007-04:00

Hear yea! Hear yea! First read the jury seat, opening arguments, and the witness stand. Now, please rise for the honorable conclusion to this unexpected series. You may now be seated.

Lawyers Laurel and Hardy had bumbled their way through the trial and seriously needed the judge to find both in contempt for wasting everyone’s time on such a trivial case that should have never come through the court system. When the end of this trial came, it left both clients with an important lesson: rational thinking with rational communication in seeking mutual compromises leads to having fatter wallets for yourselves. Irrational thinking with irrational litigation based solely on greed leads to the lawyers having the fatter wallets.

Closing arguments commenced.

Hardy (Cast Lady’s lawyer) reemphasized his client’s mental, emotional, and physical anguish. He said the jury needed to take in account all evidence and rule in her favor since it was as obvious as a baboon’s naked backside that enough of the debris trespassed on Garage Man’s property for him to be held accountable for Cast Lady’s injuries. Thank you.

Laurel (Garage Man’s lawyer) reemphasized Cast Lady’s questionable past and that this was just another way to fleece an inordinate amount of money from someone else’s bank account. He asked the jurors to consider the facts carefully and whether the other lawyer had proven beyond a reasonable doubt that the piffling section of debris was on Garage Man’s property before Cast Lady’s accident or caused by her fall and those people who lifted the woman from the ground. Thank you.

By the time closing arguments ended, it was approaching lunchtime. On this rare occasion, they sequestered us in the deliberation room. So instead of partaking in a meal somewhere in the city (I had gone Chick-Fil-A and Chinese takeout crazy during this), the court clerks ordered simple box meals for us. It consisted of a regular sandwich of choice (ham or turkey), a bag of plain potato chips, a fruit cup, and a soda. All twelve people sat in the cramped room looking at the evidence. It took us less than ten minutes to decide.

But first, let me ask a serious question of my readers. What would YOU have decided?

You already know the facts. Yet perhaps I have given a biased opinion in my recounting. I will now give an unbiased account of all the hard evidence, extenuating circumstances, and city laws.

These were the facts:

A safety hazard was on a public sidewalk.
The house owner created the hazard.
The hazard was found on both his and an adjoining property.
A person became injured.
***
These were the laws involving this case:

City law allowed the injured to sue for medical and lost wages.
City law allowed the injured to sue whoever owned the property where the debris was found - who created the debris was not a consideration.
***
These were the extenuating circumstances:

The injured had waited more than four hours before seeking medical aid.
The injured had been fined and fired from a previous job for theft in the same amount as was being asked for in this case.
***
Based on the above information, form your own ruling. Do you have it in your minds? Okay, let me throw something else at you now.
***
Nobody knew if the debris was on the other property before the injured fell or shifted there afterward when the injured lifted off the debris.

This was the stickler. It was pure conjecture tossed out to send that itty-bitty worm of doubt into the jurors’ minds. The lawyer representing the garage owner had to say it although the other lawyer had protested his question and the argument was sustained by the judge. It was the only thing that could possibly save his client from losing the case.

Yet should it be considered part of the trial? A juror’s task is to decide based on the hard evidence, the laws, and any extenuating circumstances proven to be true. The lawyer’s task was to present their cases and lead our minds to rule in their favor.

Did the lawyers do their jobs right? Did they prove their sides with honesty?

Lawyer Hardy openly misrepresented parts of the testimony involving the photographs - something he even conceded to without any duress from the judge.

Lawyer Laurel deliberately threw out a conjecture question while having no evidence to support it.

So, take out your notes and go back through them. Then drop your answer in the comments.

I’ll give the jurors’ verdict on Monday.

The witness stand

2009-09-30T07:03:00.003-04:00

It seems I’ve unintentionally dragged myself into writing another series. How the crap did this happen? Well, at least this one concerns an enjoyable topic. Jury Duty.

No, I’m not ditzy . . . today. For some reason I found my time as being part of the 12 chosen enjoyable. I had the power of the world at my fingertips. I planned to use my power wisely.

Okay, if you’re familiar with blogging you know to click on the pretty highlights to read the other two posts: the jury selection and the opening proceedings. Everybody else who paid attention, please find your designated seats so we can commence with the next part: interrogating the witnesses.

Oh, and seeing how many ways a photo can be taken.

The photos were the main, and only, evidence we had for this case. These photos were taken by both skinny Laurel lawyer (representing Garage Man) and fat Hardy lawyer (representing Cast Lady). The beginning part of the trial illustrated that one of the lawyers was crooked in presenting his facts concerning these photos.

Hardy lawyer (representing Cast Lady) was up first. He passed out pictures showing the many different camera angles on where it looked liked the debris was on Garage Man’s side. This was the only frustrating part of the trial for the jurors. There was about twenty photos and not one provided showed a straight closeup in line to the property fence. Every single freaking one showed the debris at a left or right angle or so far back we had to squint just to make out the sidewalk.

Once Hardy refreshed our memories of his opening statements the day before (reminding us of the emotional and physical anguish his client had endured), he now entertained us with a slide show of photos. Then he goofed up.

Using a laser pointer, he drew an imaginary line from the fence boundary. It wasn’t a straight line (boy, was it NOT one) as he made it appear as if half the debris were on Garage Man’s property. We saw it, the judge smirked about it, and the other lawyer cried, “OBJECTION. That’s not a straight line. Do it right.”

And so Hardy conceded without having the judge say anything. He showed only a small pile of stones had trespassed the boundary line. Needing to do some damage control, he then called up Mr. Wit.

Mr. Wit wasn’t at the scene when it happened. He was to be a character witness for Cast Lady before she took the stand. He was also the person who snapped the majority of the photos. He was gruff when answering Hardy’s questions.

The time came for cross-examination by Laurel (representing Garage Man). For you to get the full appreciation of this fiasco, I’ll write out the conversation.

Laurel Lawyer tapped photographs in hand as he addressed the court.

Laurel: “Please state you name for the record.”
Mr. Wit: “Mr. Wit.”
Laurel: “Mr. Wit, what is your relation to Cast Lady?”
Mr. Wit: “I’m her uncle.”
Laurel: “Could you please look at these pictures and tell me if you are the person who took them?”
Mr. Wit: “Why are you trying to fool me?”
Laurel: “I’m sorry? Nobody is trying to fool anyone. I just want to verify that you are indeed the person who took the photographs.”
Mr. Wit: “I’m not playing these games. Can’t you people see how much pain my niece has gone through?”
Laurel: “Mr. Wit, could you please just answer the question.”
Mr. Wit: “Naw, man. My niece has gone through hell and you lawyers are just playing games. Look at her. I SAID LOOK AT HER! She had her arm broken. She had to sit in that hospital while the doctors put bolts into her bones. It’s someone’s fault and all you want is to lie and play GAMES!”

By this time, the judge was close to laughing his ass off. The situation was more incredulously funny than threatening. But knowing we were wasting valuable taxpayers’ dollars, the judge tried to cajole the witness to behave.

Judge: “Mr. Wit, calm yourself or I’ll have to find you in contempt of court and the bailiff will remove you from the room. What the lawyer simply wants is for you to verify the evidence.”
Mr. Wit: “Fine.”
Laurel: “Are these the photos you took?”
Mr. Wit: “Yeah.”
Laurel: “Can you please tell the court when the photos were taken?”

Mr. Wit now completely dismissed the lawyer and spoke directly to the jury box.

Mr. Wit: “My niece has suffered enough. Look at her! Having to deal with all this mess because some asshole can’t pick up his garbage. She doesn’t deserve this. Put yourself in her shoes. How would you feel?”
Judge: “Mr. Wit, I will warn you again. If you keep up with these outbursts then I’ll have the bailiff escort you from the courtroom. Please do not address the jurors. Answer the lawyer’s questions so this case can proceed.”

Mr. Wit grunted and crossed arms over his chest.

Laurel: “When were these pictures taken?”
Mr. Wit: “Around three weeks after the accident.”

Totally flustered and sure that if he kept going it would come down to another shouting tirade from Mr. Wit, Laurel said he had no further questions for this witness.

By this time the judge rightly saw we could all use a break. We were told not to discuss the case and were dismissed for lunch. Upon our return, Hardy called his remaining witness: Cast Lady.

To move this story along, I’ll just summarize. Hardy asked for her account. She told the same thing as was in the lawyer’s opening argument. The only difference was that she detailed her hospital experience trying to buy sympathy votes. The cross-examination was more interesting.

Laurel fileted her.

He first brought up her sordid past involving the money theft from the business in the same amount she now sought in the lawsuit. Then he discussed the time discrepancies on when the accident took place and when she sought medical treatment - four hours after Cast Lady left the celebration she attended. Laurel talked about her alcohol consumption and how convenient it was to be dropped off at the bus stop at that exact spot so late at night instead of at her residence. For his final question, he brought out the big guns.

How did Cast Lady know if she (or one of her friends) hadn’t shifted the debris onto Garage Man’s property when scrambling to get her off the ground after she fell?

This question called for Hardy to cry out, “OBJECTION. He is leading my witness.” The judge sustained, since Laurel had to present hard evidence and not conjecture. Laurel ended his cross examination. Hardy had no other witnesses and closed his case.

It was time for Laurel to present his side. After another refresher course for the jurors, he called his client Garage Man to the witness stand.

Garage Man was a quiet person with a foreign accent. He admitted he knew about the debris and had asked the property owner on numerous occasions to clean it up. During cross-examination, he claimed he didn’t know any of it was on his side because he had closed his garage for the season to go on vacation. He said he was sorry to hear someone had been hurt and would have cleaned up the entire pile of debris himself. Then Garage Man was dismissed from the stand.

Laurel had only one other witness. House owner’s signed affidavit. He somberly presented it (in slide show format) showing the house owner’s admittance that it was his debris on the sidewalk. Then Laurel closed his case.

Next installment: Closing arguments and the verdict.

The opening arguments

2009-09-28T07:58:00.006-04:00

So there I was with my gang raisin’ the courthouse roof with our holla and fightin’ the establishment.

Um, what I meant to say is that there I was with the other 11 jurors picked for a trial.

*If you missed the first part, then just scroll down one. If you happened across this post when doing a web search, then don’t you have a court case to research for right now? Er, I mean that you can click on this link to read the previous story and I plead The Fifth if you use any of it as evidence against your own conviction*

So there the lucky 12 filed into the elevator with an officer as he led us toward the courtroom that would be our new home for the next three days (it would have only taken two days if one witness . . . well, I’ll get to that part later). They told nothing about the case to the jurors before we entered. We sat in our padded leather chairs (I had to get the squeaky one - bad karma struck again), then bounced back up when the cute judge entered.

Wow, he was a looker! Our judge had short-cropped hair, maybe in his 30's, and had a quick smile that made everyone relaxed in his presence. He introduced himself and explained how much of the court process would proceed concerning opening arguments, deliberation, evidence, and the ilk. Then he introduced the lawyers (who looked to be the epitome of Laurel and Hardy) and their puppets . . .

Clients! Yeah, this was what they were called. Clients.

Really, the suing people weren’t at the heart of this case. Their lawyers’ bumbling methods on presenting their sides became showcased to us. Boy, did they stink up the joint. In fact, I think I’ll refer to the lawyers as Laurel and Hardy, because both looked like them (without the black bowler hats and moustaches) and they converted a simple, everyday court case into a disastrous tangle of stupidity.

The skinny lawyer (Laurel) represented his client, which I shall call Garage Man. He owned a small car repair garage next to where the main incident took place.

The fat lawyer (Hardy) represented his client, who will have the name Cast Lady. She was the suer in this for pain and suffering due to a slip-n-fall accident that placed her arm in a cast.

Anyway, the trial commenced. Both lawyers had their say in the opening arguments. There wasn’t any buildup to this case. It was as plain as day and everyone agreed to the circumstances, which only made things more confusing on why this even came to trial. Hardy stood up, approached the juror box, and began.

Cast Lady lived at an apartment complex at the top of the hill. Every day she walked down and crossed the street to stand at the bus stop right by the car repair shop so she could head to work. Next to the garage was a house with a large wooden fence between the two properties. There had been some work done and a pile of debris sat on the sidewalk right at the property line. Most of this debris (the lawyers were adamant in calling it DEBRIS) consisted of small stones and a few large chunks of cement in about a three-foot long area and about shin-high.

The debris had sat there for months and was still sitting there when this trial started. Cast Lady saw it was there. So did Garage Man, but he didn’t care because it wasn’t his debris. It belonged to the owner of the property and was his responsibility to clean it up, or so this was the normal impression everyone should have.

(I should also mention now that the house owner never appeared in court. His testimony consisted of a signed affidavit shown to us with the use of a slide show. I’m not sure what the circumstances were for him not to be there since the whole case involved him. Perhaps a medical situation prevented the man from coming. Perhaps he died before the trial date. Everybody appeared somber on both sides when it came to presenting his written testimony.)

Anyway, Cast Lady knew the pile of debris was there for as long as Garage Man did. One night, after attending a celebration that involved consuming large amounts of alcohol, Cast Lady was the backseat passenger in her friend’s car. At 2am, the car pulled up to the bus stop to let out Cast Lady so she could walk the rest of the way home. She opened the door, placed her foot onto the pile of debris, and promptly fell on her side. Her friends helped her up where they discovered she had broken her right forearm in multiple fractures. They took her to the hospital. A week later, she contacted a lawyer to sue Garage Man.

This was Hardy’s entire case. Cast Lady broke arm due to house owner’s DEBRIS on sidewalk and was suing Garage Man for medical bills, lost wages, and pain and suffering in the amount of $10,000 dollars (including lawyer’s fees). Yeah . . . makes you want to dope slap every single person in the court case, including both lawyers.

But wait, it got even better.

The reason Garage Man was being sued was because a little of the house owner’s DEBRIS had shifted due to wind, rain, and acts of God to trespass on his part of the sidewalk. How much debris was it? Lift both of your hands and cup them together. Now imagine your hands filled with pebbles. THAT’S how much went onto Garage Man’s property.

Here’s an interesting fact everybody might not be aware of concerning Pittsburgh city law: if any type of hazard that might cause bodily injury to an individual is on your property, even if that hazard does not belong to you or was originally placed on your property, YOU can be sued for damages. So, in essence, if the neighbor’s boy takes out a stick of gum and tosses the wrapper on his property where later the wind blows it onto your property and someone comes along and slips on it, breaking their leg, that person can now sue you for their pain and suffering.

This was the reason Garage Man was in court. It was his responsibility to clean up the bit of shifted debris that would only fill up to the halfway point inside a bowler hat.

Now that Hardy had his say in the matter, trying to get the jury to have a tearjerker moment for his poor client, he sat as lawyer Laurel rose. By this time, we were still getting over the shock of the city law concerning safety hazards. A few of the people had even grunted in their surprise (I’m sure a few had called their spouses during our lunch break to yell at their neighbors to clean up the crap from yards so they don’t get sued). Laurel began his convoluted defense of his client by smack-talking on Cast Lady.

He first brought up Cast Lady’s questionable past, including a job where she had been fined and later fired for stealing money from the account books. The amount, not surprisingly, was $10,000 - the same being sought in this trial. Then he brought up her drunkenness on that night and the discrepancies from Hardy’s retelling versus the time the hospital forms indicated when she arrived there for treatment. Laurel’s last argument dealt with saying he would establish during the proceedings that NONE of the debris sat on Garage Man’s property so his client shouldn’t be held liable. In closing, he said Cast Lady was a moneygrubbing con artist. Thank you.

So closing arguments were done. The judge released us for the day to go home while bemused, befuddled, and flabbergasted. Yet we were in even more of a treat the coming day.

Laurel and Hardy would be calling up their clients and witnesses to testify. One character witness would raise the courthouse roof with his holla.

The jury seat

2009-09-25T07:49:00.006-04:00

I’ve only had jury duty once in my life. That is to say, they only called me up once . . . period. I don’t know how I got out of it for so long (well, I do - I bounced around different places to live and they could never pin me down long enough to be considered in one distinct jurisdiction).

Once I settled down, I received my notice to attend. This was when I was working at my first crappy job in Pittsburgh back in 1999. Or rather, it was a week before I quit. I went home to my apartment and picked up my mail with the little card saying, It is now your civic duty to report to the fiery depths of Hell and give your completely biased opinion in litigation matters to condemn the guilty in becoming Lucifer’s prison bitch for all eternity.

I jumped for joy.

Psst! Tell you a little secret that will totally blow away your mind and pretty much cement the ideal that I am a deranged individual. See, I LIKED jury duty.

I did, dammit! I liked it, and I’m proud to admit it!

Anyway, at this time I didn’t know if I really had to be there. I had to call the courthouse at the specific date and time to find out. Well, the day arrived. I dialed the phone number and heard the recorded message.

Anyone with their last name beginning with the letters “A” through “H” must attend . . .

Well, that was a simple process . . . or was it? I took the bus down to the county courthouse and sat in a room with close to hundred other people. It quickly became standing room only.

(I’m relying on my memory of events that happened more than 10 years ago, figuring I’m safe from any incoming lawsuits from those individuals involved directly in these proceedings. If someone else attended this courthouse recently and has a fresher experience on how the court process happens, just snicker behind your palm at my faulty memory and let me tell my story my way.)

The setting: a gigantic courtroom with one judge, several bailiffs, and a few court clerks. From the gathered victims, er, lucky lotto winners, they would pool those to fill the jury box for several different trials - both civil and criminal.

The clerks started the process of elimination, i.e. - those people who believed they could weasel their way out of being assigned on a jury by saying their sick grandmother Judy was having multiple bypass surgery in three hours and it would be against their religion to miss the operation. Oh, and they also hated everyone: babies, women, men. Hated the whole freaking human population.

Once those people who had “legitimate” excuses (and I do use this word loosely) were free to leave and commit mass crime waves along the streets, the next round of seating commenced. Yes, this was just the first go-around. These courthouse people planned to drag out the process for as long as possible.

So now we went on to the final judging (I don’t even think beauty pageant contestants went through this much of a hassle). There were four rows of ten seats. All of them filled with people. I sat at the back top row in the first seat. This meant I would be either the first one called or the last depending on where they started. At a small table on the ground floor sat the two lawyers and a friendly court clerk.

First, the clerk asked the basic questions: Does anyone work in the same field as the defendant? Are we related to either party or their lawyers? Blah-blah-blah . . .

A few people raised their hands. The clerk asked each person to take a seat by the table as she bombarded them with additional questions. With their answers given, these people left the courtroom. Then the clerk called up the remaining individuals separately.

Here was what happened when my turn came:

Clerk: “Hello, please state your name.”
Michelle: “Lizzie Borden.”
Clerk: “Where do you currently work?”
Michelle: “I was a spinister until my father and my stepmom were killed with forty whacks of an axe, with one extra for my dad.”
Clerk: “I’m so sorry to hear such tragic news. How did it happen?”
Michelle: “I can’t tell you. It might taint my ‘not guilty’ plea for the upcoming trial and then I’d have to poison you with prussic acid.”

Okay, we all know this didn’t happen. Here was what really took place:

Clerk: “Please state your full name.”
Michelle: “Michelle Lee Hickman”
Clerk: “Where do you currently work?”
Michelle: “I’m a clerical assistant at a subsidy book publisher, which means I work at a proctologist office.”

(Both lawyers looked at each other and raised eyebrows. They smiled. One of them nodded. I could almost hear their thoughts in my head. JACKPOT!)

Clerk: “Do you know the area where the incident occurred?”
Michelle: “No.”
Clerk: “Do you know the people . . . ”
Michelle: “No.”
Clerk: “Do you know anything about this . . . ”
Michelle: “No.”

(It was at this point where we all knew I was getting picked. The lawyers knew it. The clerk knew it. I knew it. We were all smiling now at the humorous circumstances since the clerk still had to fulfil her duty by asking each and every question on her paper.)

Clerk: “Would there be a problem with you attending...”
Michelle: “No.”
Clerk: “Would you have any undue bias...”
Michelle: “No.”
Clerk: “Do you have any particular standing in ruling...”
Lawyers: silently mouthed, “No,” while writing on their notepads.

(We went on autopilot by this time. The clerk was just opening her mouth and I was plugging in the same answer before she spoke. I could almost feel every other possible juror behind me pumping their fists and silently cheering over their increased odds of not getting chosen.)

The clerk thanked me for my truthful answers. I nodded my head in one of those - yeah, we’ll be seeing each other again REAL soon - motions. I sat back in my chair at the top row. The clerk informed all those seated that they would now go over their papers. They would soon decide who the lucky group of panelists would be to vote the person off the island, or win a brand-new car, or choose the door for a grand prize: a trip to watch Lucifer ready his pitchfork while his bunkmate bends over to pick up the prison soap.

Well, this wouldn’t be much of a story if I didn’t get picked. My first time called in. My first time seated for a trial. And what a crazy trial it was! I’ll tell you about it next week.
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FYI: There's a new blog in town (well, he's been around before but had to change his format for privacy reasons). Check him out . . . he's a real knucklehead!

250

2009-09-23T07:45:00.005-04:00

I feel old.

I can’t believe I finally reached such an awkward age. But I have. The numbers can’t lie.

This is my 250th post.

I still remember those yesterdays when I was struggling to reach 100. Now, I’m 250. Break out the walker and the horse pills, Granny. I’ve officially hit the downslope to what is called, Blogger Addiction.

Really, if you can’t get away from this social network at your 25th mark, then you are doomed to a life of shaky hands and aching eyes and the smell of stale Doritos crumbs wafting from between the computer keys. If you’re one of the smart people, you learned to pace your stories so that you’ll still have something fresh to spout out on a regular basis.

When thinking back, I never knew how this Blogger thing would work for me. During my first year, I only posted four times a month (or less). Now, I’m up to three times a week. Am I prolific enough to post more? Do I have the creative juices to slap in something fresh and original?

I know there is one regular reader of my blog who is nodding his head empathetically. Truthfully, I could post a story twice a day - between 1200 and 2300 words long. That’s how prolific I’ve become.

Of course, I’m not crazy enough to actually DO THIS!

So enjoy my three-times-a-week posts and the fact I have such a weak willpower to not fight off the devil called Blogger as I have fought off all those other social networking evils. I’ve succumbed to the addiction and reached my 250th post.

I don’t know whether to cheer or weep.

Age progression transgression

2009-09-21T07:07:00.002-04:00

Lately, I’ve been thinking of my younger years. Whenever I’m in the pondering mood, I search for photos to further jog my lagging memory. I don’t have many photos. Yet the ones I do have sometimes create entertaining moments.

I was looking at four different photos. Instead of wondering when they took place and what I was doing at the time, I began analyzing my own thoughts - or rather the first thoughts that popped into my head. Then I began wondering what other people’s first thoughts would be.

Someone’s first thoughts: Awwww, look how cutesy-wutsey-putsey she was with those chubby cheeks! Ubba-wubba-lubba . . .

My first thoughts: I am so doing the Sugar Ray Leonard pose with those curled fists. And look how my tongue is out like that. Who has the bad breath because I’m ready to punch out the person for spewing their garlic funk while talking all nonsense on me? Also, will someone please pass me a comb! That hair style isn’t working for me.

Someone’s first thoughts: Oh look! She’s playing with a cute little baby doll while sitting all nice in the chair. How precious!

My first thoughts: Huh, I wonder where that handstitched puppet is now? I remember placing my hand through the slot in the back where I could make the head and the arms shift around to fool people into believing it was a real baby. I would imagine them leaning over for a better look and then smacking them in the head with the plastic rattle before stealing their wallet.

Someone’s first thoughts: This picture must have been during the early ‘90s. There are the famous teenage puffy bangs. At least she still has those chubby cheeks. By why on earth is she wearing those large eyeglasses?

My first thoughts: What is with those large bugeyed glasses? Egad, and what was I thinking on wearing those puffy bangs? And am I squirreling nuts inside those cheeks? I can’t believe this was my graduation picture. Someone please shoot me.

Someone’s first thoughts: Look how much she has matured from those earlier pictures. She seems more relaxed with herself. The chubby cheeks are still there.

My first thoughts: I am so about to work the Sugar Ray Leonard pose because someone’s breath is reeking up the joint. Wow. I have a big forehead. Maybe I should do some nice puffy bangs.

Wait! Did someone just drop their wallet on the floor? I wish this camera would flash so I can grab the money. Crap, someone else picked it up. Someone please shoot me. Never mind. I want to finish eating the nuts in my bulging cheeks. Have to go now.

And the time has come

2009-09-17T07:00:00.003-04:00

It’s here . . .
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We have been patiently awaiting this news . . . or at least I have been . . .
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The hard work, the perseverance, the blood and sweat and tears . . .
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Tuesday it happened and I was quite surprised . . .
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The time has come . . . my time . . . has come . . .
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It’s hockey season once again!

This will be the last year the Stanley Cup Champions Pittsburgh Penguins play in the Mellon arena before moving to their new home, Consol Energy Center. The preseason game between the Pittsburgh Penguins and the Columbus Blue Jackets took place. Who won? Who cares! It’s hockey season. It’s here. Let’s enjoy it while we can!

By the way, the Penguins won in overtime: 5-4. Yay! GO PENS!