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Helicopters, $50.00 apiece...
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- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Conversations
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We're sitting down before the shift and eating dinner. It's a ritual in the old-school Italian restaurants....
The owner's son is there, chatting, he's very lively. Good looking, 26 years old, he's trying to sell us helicopters he's found in the back of his roommates "Soldier of Fortune" magazine. Helicopters, $50.00, Jeeps, $25.00, the US government is selling them off cheap....
Now I know he's talking about the Army Surplus, and since I've got that Helicopter Pilot's helmet (which I grossly overpaid for, but I'm a safety-first kinda guy) I think "Why not" and I offer to buy 2 helicopters. $100.00. He promises to bring me in the magazine, but I don't want it. I just want the helicopters. I offer him a hundred and fifty, so he can buy one for himself, let him deal with the paperwork and ordering, and now he's backpedaling.... His father just ignores us.
The next night, dinner again, we're talking about the gun control laws, the 1 billion wasted on the gun registry, the owner is telling us how anyone can get a gun, heck, he can get me any gun I want in 2 days, with silencer and everything, brought across from the border....
And I'm thinking to myself, "Great, throw in a couple of Glocks with silencers with the helicopters and I'll pay $200...".
But I don't say anything. I'm new, and I haven't tested his sense of humor yet. He seems pretty dry.
You remind me of Alfred Hitchcock...
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- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Conversations
- Hits: 1491
He's introduced himself, and by way of conversation tells me that "I remind him of Alfred Hitchcock".
My curiosity is piqued, I haven't yet been warned by the other staff; and so I ask him what it is about me that could possibly remind him of Alfred Hitchcock - my pointy nose? My somewhat portly carriage? My balding head?
"No, no, no, it's just something about your demeanor...." he tells me.
"So you're a film buff I presume?" I parry.
"No" he replies.
Later I overhear him on the phone with his mother. His father owns the restaurant, he works here as a sort of errand boy, dishwasher, prep-cook, whatever.
"I want to ask him Mom but you know how Dad is about giving raises....And I haven't worked here a year yet...."
96 is the Fix
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- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Conversations
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"Get me a bill" he says, and I'm a little embarrassed, because really I don't want to be showing my bills to anyone.
"96 is the Fix" he says, and he's quite insistent, and I ask him to explain, is it some sort of radio contest that pays your bills? But he's acting all enigmatic, there's no fobbing him off, so I pick up one of the many unopened bills that litter my desk and hand it to him. It's a gas bill, overdue 3 months, final notice, but I know they can't cut me off 'cause it's the middle of winter and so this is a bill that can wait...
"See? 96 is the Fix" He points to the lower right part of the bill, and sure enough there's a number 96 there.
"Now all you have to do is circle this and write above it to charge it to your Social Insurance Number, then send it back to them. There was an account created in your name when you were born. The government borrowed millions of dollars with only your birth certificate for collateral. Once they have it they'll stop sending you bills...."
"How do you know this?" I interrupt, not to be skeptical but I am somehow.
"Been doing some research on the internet. There might be something else you have to write in addition to your Social Insurance Number, I'm not sure what it is...But as soon as I saw it I thought of you, with all your bills and all...."
"Have you tried it?" I ask.
"Not yet."
Now in ordinary times this would be a great idea. Not because I'm thinking it'll work, but I'd like to see the Utility company's reply. A David Thorne style correspondence ensues, in which I enlighten the utility agents as to my rights as a free citizen, the history of Freemasonry and the Conspiracies of Rome.
"Why 96?" I ask.
"I don't know..... I'm pretty sure it's Latin for something...."
E Type Jaguar
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- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Dreams
- Hits: 2187
We're getting along famously, Rob, Margaret and I. These are the people I work for.
And in the dream I'm working for them, cleaning a fieldstone fireplace. Margaret has an old E-Type Jaguar that she drives everywhere, it needs some work, some TLC, and I'm trying to persuade her to sell it.
Rob, he has an old Jaguar too, but he's staying out of the conversation, we're cleaning the fireplace together. There are children playing behind us, Margaret's looking after them, it's what she does. Greg has an old car too, something like what Fozzy Bear drove in "The Muppet Movie", only in better condition, new paint job, better interior, although what that has to do with anything is a mystery. Everyone seems to have an old car.
I'm trying to buy Margaret's, she doesn't really want it, but has suddenly contrived an attachment to it now that I'm interested in it. She wants to know what it's worth, I'm trying to lowball her, a few hundred dollars I tell her, depends on the year, it needs a paint job, some body work...
I wake up and my big toe is throbbing.
**Odd dream. Cheery, hopeful in tone. Apart from the characters, however, there's no grounding whatsoever in reality. None. Not a bit. Not in the fireplace, the children, the possibility that I'll be buying an E-Type Jaguar even for $2.00. Absolutely none.**
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