Category: Texas

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Ask A Texan: Lost In London And Homesick


Downhome Advice For Folks That Don’t Have A Home…

The Texan

This Texan received an exceptionally long telegram from a fellow Texan, a Mr. Forest H. Crouch, from somewhere in London, England. It seems his wife got herself in trouble, and now he’s stuck and can’t get home.

Mr. Crouch: Mr. Texan, I’m in dire need of help here. I saw your ad in the back of a Penny Shopper paper at the train station. I’m stuck in London and can’t get back to Texas. I just want to go home to my Armadillo ranch. The wife, The Lovely Juanita, that’s what she insists I call her, even though she’s not Mexican, but has a dark complexion and thinks she’s really cute. Well, The Lovely Juniata and I took this trip for our 30th wedding anniversary. We had never been out of the US, so it was a cultural shock to us since we’ve lived just outside Luckenbach, Texas, all our lives and are the proprietors of the Luckenbach Armadillo, Watusi Cow, and Llama Ranch. We were eating at a nice Pub by Marble Arch Station, here in London, and I tell you, I was freezing my balls off because no one will turn the heat on in this city. My toes were like frozen Vienna sausages, and The Lovely Juanita was turning blue, even with her dark complexion and all. Even my Justin boots (manly footwear)couldn’t keep those frozen toes warm. Well, The Lovely Juanita orders some fish and chips, and I order a steak with gravy, since the menu said it was chicken fried like in Texas. The barmaid thought she was really cute and made some smartass remarks about us being from Texas. The Lovely Juanita takes a taste of her fish and spits it out and yells, “This crap tastes like bait, I want some Bass, or at least some Catfish nuggets, and then, thanks to four big glasses of warm beer, the missus jumps up and slugs her. Well, that started the fight, and two big old Limey boys get me down and are working on me pretty good. I couldn’t get up because there was this big Sheep Dog in the Pub, and he started chewing on my leg. Somewhere in the fray, I lost my Sony Walkman, which had all my favorite country music from Amarillo and Abilene on that cassette. The Lovely Juanita grabs a cheap acoustic guitar from the stage and starts beating them about their limey heads, yelling at me to “run, Forest run,”(which is my first name, folks back home call me Hondo), which I did. I run out of the pub just as the limey police come and arrest The Lovely Juniata for assault with a musical instrument, which I guess is a crime here in London. Hell, back in Luckenbach, we use guitars to bust folks’ heads all the time if they can’t play for shit. Just a month ago, I smacked some little Austin hippie dippy man bun wearing boy for butchering Jerry Jeff’s Mr. Bojangles. The bartender bought me a beer for that one. Well, The Lovely Juanita is locked up in a limey jail somewhere in London, and she has all the money in her Pioneer Woman purse, and the hotel key. Somewhere in the fight, I lost my billfold and my lower false teeth, I think the dog may have eaten them, and now I can’t get in my room, and can’t chew nothing. The Lovely Juniata is in the jailhouse now, and all I want to do is go home, be in a Texas bar, and tend to my Armadillos and Llamas back in Luckenbach. Can you help a pal out?

The Texan: Well, Hell, Hondo, I hope I can call you that, it sounds better than Forest. I’ve never been to England, but I have been to Oklahoma, and folks tell me it’s nice there. I’m leery of overseas travel, especially for Texans; it just ain’t safe these days. My cousin from Buda went to Paris, France, and was walking down the sidewalk when he tripped on a prayer rug and the moron kneeling on it, and broke his collarbone. Best to stay in the Hill Country. I contacted the London Police, and Prince Charles and they won’t release The Lovely Juanita until she pays for the cheap guitar, or replaces it. I’m sending the cops a new Fender guitar to take care of the fine, and you and The Lovely Juanita some cash to get home, and of course, a box of Cherry Bombs so you can throw a few into that crappy Pub. Let me know how it all turns out. I’ll be down your way in a few weeks and will stop by to say howdy.

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Ask A Texan: The Wild West Days Of Gunsmoke And Cherry Bombs


Illuminating Southern Advice For Folks That Seek The Meaning Of Life As We Live It In The Great State Of Texas…

The Texan

A few days back, I received a letter from a Mrs. Hagan of Gunsmoke, Montana. It seems her husband, Festus, and his pals have gone plum Prairie Dog crazy since a family from Minnesota moved into town.

Mrs. Hagan: Mr. Texan, I saw your column in the back of The Farmers Almanac, and I’m hoping you can help me and my husband, Festus. The entire town has gone Prairie Dog crazy. About a month back, a family from Minnesota moved into the KOA campground outside of town. At first, they seemed friendly in a weird sort of way, but it was clear they needed some help. They didn’t wear much clothing, and their children were scraggly and reeked of an old can of Tuna Fish, so Sheriff Dillion, my husband’s employer, and his wife, Miss Kitty, took them under their wing. Gunsmoke is known as the safest town in the USA, probably because everyone in town packs a gun, either on their hip, in their purse, or their pickup. Even the service dogs with the little red vest have a pistol attached to their vest. I will admit that when the townsfolk celebrate, they tend to shoot into the air or the ground. After all, this is the last town of the old wild west. Sheriff Dillion is as guilty as he rest of us; he carries two pistols and likes to shoot out street lights and street signs after a few cold beers. Well, the scroungy kids of the Minnesota family started blowing up people’s mailboxes with Cherry Bombs, which is against the law ’round here. Then, the little pecker-heads began throwing them into folks’ business. Our local grocer, Little Bob’s Sure Good Market, had his entire produce section blown up by the kids with Cherry Bombs. Sheriff Dillion and my husband, Festus, can’t catch them in the act. The whole town is on edge and at each other’s throats. Festus and I are constantly arguing. Well, our big summer celebration is Wild West Days, featuring a big rodeo and a Carnival. We still have the original Miss Kitty’s Saloon in the old west part of town, so that’s where most of the action takes place. Festus and Doc Adams coordinate the whole shindig. After the rodeo, around dark, everybody was in the old saloon drinking hooch and having a good old time. Our local country band, “Little Junior One Arm And His Blasting Caps,” was laying down some great dance tunes. Festus, even with his limp and all, was dancing his best in years, and Sheriff Dillion and Miss Kitty were having a little too much fun. I guess the sheriff got too excited about a song the band played, and he pulled out his 44 and fired a few shots into the ceiling, which is already full of bullet holes from the old wild west days. One of the shots threw a spark into Miss Kitty’s lacquered-up hair, and it caught fire. Festus, quick on his good right leg, threw a beer on her head to extinguish the blaze. She looked real bad, half her red hair was gone, and her mascara was running like a river. I guess that was her last nerve, and she pulled out a derringer from under her skirt and shot Sheriff Dillion in the foot, making a considerable hole in his Justin boot. The Sheriff, drunk and now enraged from the cheap hooch, pulled out his other 44 and shot off Miss Kitty’s pinky toe, which was bad because it was the toe she wore her dead mother’s wedding ring on. The toe and the ring fell through the cracks in the old wooden floor and down to who knows where. During all this confusion, the mean little Minnesota kids sneaked in and dropped a bunch of Cherry Bombs down the knotholes in the wooden floor. The explosions rocked the saloon like a bomb, and the floor started to collapse. No one knew there was an old tunnel underneath the saloon that had been there for over 150 years. Some idiots back in the gold rush days dug it to catch the falling gold dust from miners and cowboys paying for their drinks with gold. The saloon floor fell into the open tunnel, taking half the dancers and all the band with it. The fire department rescued everybody, and Miss Kitty and Sheriff Dillon were taken to the hospital. A fireman found her toe with the ring still attached, and a foot surgeon sewed it back on. The local hoodlums packed up the Minnesota family in their old station wagon and ran them out of town, good riddance. The Fire Department boys found an old sign in the tunnel that said “Wandering Star Gold Mine,” of which the town paper has no record. Miss Kitty played the Tammy Wynette “D-I-V-O-R-C-E” song for the sheriff, who was fired, and Festus is now out of work and sweeping the sidewalks for tips, and his limp is getting worse. I’m looking for advice on how to get the town and my marriage back to its glory days.

The Texan: Well, well, Mrs. Hagan. This is going down as the wildest west tale I’ve had the honor of reading. It’s a riveting read, and I will likely frame it to hang in my tool shed. It seems your troubles began with the folks from Minnesota and a town that is lost in time. I will admit, I am familiar with that family. The father of the daughter wrote me for advice some months back, and he was a jiggered as you. I assume that since they ended up in your quaint town, he heeded my advice. The old west days, cheap hooch, guns, cowboys, bad tempers, and Cherry Bombs are a sour mixture in a bad cocktail, of which, after reading your letter, is what I need. My advice is to take Festus and move about a hundred miles away to a little town called Rawhide, Montana. I’ll make a call to their sheriff, a nice fella by the name of Rowdy Yates, who would likely hire Festus, even with his limp and all. I’m enclosing a U-Haul gift card, a bottle of Excedrin PM, A VHS copy of the great movie, Paint Your Wagon, and, of course, my usual gift of a box of Cherry Bombs. Let me know how this saga of the old west turns out, and when you see Sheriff Yates, tell him to head ’em up and move ’em out. He’ll get it.

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Ask A Texan: A Life Without Fireworks? Not In My Lifetime


Unfiltered and Unfettered Advice From A Texan For Folks That For Some Reason Just Can’t Seem To Make It Here. Bless Their Hearts.

The Texan

The Texan: Recently, I’ve received numerous inquiries regarding my infatuation with Pyrotechnics, Fireworks, and things that explode. I won’t beat around the Prickly Cactus; the letters are talking about my love for that classic American invention: Cherry Bombs, the firework of my childhood. Inexpensive, well-made in the USA, it packed a powerful punch and was too dangerous for children. Sure, my cousins and I had Black Cats, Lady Fingers, Doodle Bugs, and other puny munitions that could barely destroy an Ant hill or a Dixie Cup, but nothing could top the vaporizing, nuclear power of a well-placed Cherry Bomb. My sister and her cousins and friends played with Sparklers: a stick of iron wire coated with magnesium nitrate and potassium chlorate that reaches 3000 degrees. What fun, and what could go wrong letting small children wave around a welding torch? This was well before parents found out that those things could disfigure or kill their child, and cigarettes gave you lung cancer. I’ve told many of my readers that dangerous fireworks and the 1950s go together like Forest and Jenny, and peas and carrots.

My fondest and fuzziest memories of 1950s summers involve fireworks. My cousin, Jok, and I always had a supply of them thanks to his older brothers and my neighbor, Mr. Mister. Jok’s youngest-older brother, Michael, our main supplier of fireworks, purchased an MG sports car, a beautiful piece of English engineering. There it sat, parked under a large Oak tree to protect its delicate paint job from the brutal Texas sun. We had just completed blowing up my father’s Aunt’s mailbox with a Cherry Bomb, and the lure of illicit excitement overrode our common sense. Jok placed the munition on top of the left front tire. He lit it, and, giddy with excitement, we dove under their covered porch, awaiting the blast. The fender muffled the initial explosion, but a cloud of smoke told us the test was successful. Creeping closer to the injured auto, we could see the fender had an upward pooch about six inches high, and the top of the tire was shredded. We knew instantly that retribution would be swift and painful, likely lasting for days, if not weeks. It was. First, there were the multiple butt whooping’s from Aunt Berel and Uncle Orem, followed by one or two from his brother, a few from my mother, and then one each from the other Aunts, culminating in the final one from my grandmother and grandfather. They never found our stash of Cherry Bombs.

This explains my fondness for gifting a box of Cherry Bombs to almost all my readers who write in for advice. Nothing relieves anxiety and tension like blowing something up with fireworks.

God Bless Texas and Davy Crockett.

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Ask A Texan: The Magic Of The Yeti Cup


Illuminating Advice For Folks That Seek It

The Texan

Another old friend of mine, Bwana of San Saba, wrote me with a question. Like our other mutual friend, Mooch, Bwana refuses to talk on the phone because he won’t wear his high-dollar hearing aids. He’s also forgotten the art of texting and avoids computers. At this point in our lives, I attribute all unusual behavior to old age. He writes that he is losing sleep over knowing how his Yeti cups and ice chest work; the technology is foreign to him.

Bwana Of San Saba: Mr. Texan, I need help in the worst way. I can’t sleep, eat, or drink my hooch, and my wife is about to banish me to the Deer lease in San Saba because I’ve gotten her last nerve. I’ve owned and excessively used Yeti cups and ice chests for years: I use only the best when it comes to hunting gear. My man trailer on the lease is full of Yeti stuff. Did you know they make a Yeti iron skillet, pans, forks, knives, hunting clothes, and a darn good Deer rifle? Neither did I, until my wife stocked my hunting trailer with the gear, which makes me uneasy because I’m thinking she is baiting me, and wants to get rid of me. Well, I was sitting on a rock in a dry creek bed waiting for a Bambi to trot by so I could nail his little white-tail ass. This is the same creek bed where I killed the 1,000-pound wild pig with my Yeti pocket knife. I told you about that battle many times. It’s damn hot, too hot for Deer, so I reach in my Yeti backpack and pull out my Premium Ultra Yeti Tumbler for a drink of water. Mind you, that tumbler had been in my pack for half a day in 100-degree Texas heat, and when I pulled a swig, the water was so cold it gave me a brain freeze, and that’s when my sleepless nights and obsessive behavior started. I was so discombobulated that the Bambi I was waiting to shoot walked up to me to see if I was alright. I’m sitting there thinking about that damn Yeti cup and the biggest 20 pointer I’ve seen is in my face begging for a drink of water or a Granola Bar. I poured a handful of cold Ozarka water into my hand and gave the Bambi a sip or two. He turned, wagged his white tail at me, farted, and trotted off. I need some advice here. How does this Yeti thing work? I’m having a nervous breakdown here.

The Texan: Well, Bwana, I can see how not knowing how mystical, magical technology works is causing you to lose your marbles. When I was a young’un, right about the same time you were in the 1950s, my mother bought me a genuine Davy Crockett lunch box. In the tin box was a Davy Crockett Thermos Bottle. It was a dandy, with a coon-tail attached to the lid. I took that box to school every day, and my milk was always icy cold, which baffled me. Why would Yeti make a rifle? Does a gun need to remain at a specific temperature to work correctly? Now I’m confused. I used to feed the Deer in Ruidoso watermelon and Nabisco Granola. They loved it and would almost sit on my lap to get a treat, so it’s not surprising the Bambi in San Saba approached you. Even a thirsty Deer knows a quality product. I believe Yeti has used the same magical technology in its products as Davy Crockett. I’m no scientist, and am as jiggered as you on this one. The answer to your question is: ” It keeps hot things hot and cold things cold…how do it know?” I’m sending you a package of Deer Of The Month trading cards and a box of Cherry Bombs to help you unwind and relieve your anxiety. Let me know if you figure the Yeti thing out.

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Ask A Texan. Cloning For Dollars


Positive Advice For Folks That Don’t Live In Texas, But Wish They Did.

My old pal, Mooch, whom I don’t see much of anymore because he became a vegan, and now we can’t meet at Whataburger for lunch. We always ordered a Number 1, no onions, extra pickles, large fries, and a Dr Pepper. I sure miss those days of culinary camaraderie. A week ago, instead of calling me, he wrote a friendly little letter on the back of a two-year-old garage sale flyer. He forgot I also have an email and receive texts on my iPhone.

Mr. Mooch says he’s about to have marital problems because of clones.

Mooch: Mr. Texan, you know me well, and you also know that I like to tinker with science and gadgets, right? Well, Giblet, my twenty-five-year-old blind and toothless Chihuahua, is close to cashing in his kibbles, so I decided to have him cloned. I took a sample of his drool to the South Side Animal Research Center over in Fort Worth. Their ad in the Nickel Shopper paper sounded very professional, and what the hell, I’m a sucker for science fiction. The science guy’s were real nice and said they could grow me a new little doggy with no problem. I paid them half down and said, “get-er-done.” Three months passed, and they called to say that Giblet Jr. was ready for pickup. Mrs. Mooch and I were so excited that she peed in her pedal pushers. We’re standing in the lobby, drinking a free Latte, and out trots an exact puppy copy of my old Giblet. I picked him up, and he bit my nose and peed on my shirt, just like old Gib. He needed a name for the certificate, so I decided to call him Gravy. Now I have Giblet and Gravy. Mrs. Mooch is so excited that she wants to have her old cat, Here Kitty, cloned as well. She said the clone cat would be called Here Kitty Kitty. She said if she can’t clone her Here Kitty, she’s going to do a Tammy Wynette Divorce song on me, and that would mean losing my truck and bass boat. Any thoughts on this little buddy? I’ve got to go fishing.

The Texan: Mooch, I rarely have any thoughts on the bat-shit crazy things you do. Charging folks to swim with the Mexicans across the Rio Grande, The Mooch 2000 Life Meter, and burning and burying your laptop are just a few that come to mind. I’m really sort of sorry, but not much, about that mean little demon dog Giblet, is about to expire, and now you have yourself a replica of the little Hell-Hound dog from below? I will admit that carrying him in a chest papoose was cute for a little while. I’ve known you for over forty years and didn’t know Mr. Mooch had a cat named Here Kitty, which is a ridiculous name for an animal. I guess a clone named Here Kitty Kitty makes as much sense. Old Possum didn’t do too well after Tammy and that song, so you might consider letting her clone the feline so you can keep fishing. I’m sending you a gift card to Whataburger, so if you ever decide to come back from the dark-vegetable side and eat some real food. I’m also sending you a box of Cherry Bombs so you can blow up those clones if they turn into little Frankenstein monsters.

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Ode To The Mesquite Switch


Memories of your childhood can invade your life at the oddest of times. While shopping at H-E-B a short while back, I witnessed a young mom dragging a screaming toddler down the aisle by his arm while the rest of his little body slid along the floor, she used her other arm to push the cart, which also held another small child. She was nonchalant about the whole scene; obviously, this was a common occurrence for her. I thought she at least had the guts not to give in to the little demon. In my childhood days, not that anyone gives a shit about what an old man remembers, my mother, and more likely my Cherokee Indian grandmother, would have administered a healthy dose of parental punishment. Today’s mothers call in a “child whisperer” to reason with the kid on their behalf.

My two late uncles, Jay and Bill Manley, had a significant influence on my upbringing, and not always in a good way. It must have been in the mid-1950s, on the farm in Santa Anna, Texas. My cousin, Jerry, and I were out behind the smoke-house shooting tin cans with our Daisy BB guns. This was about our only form of entertainment on the farm, except for shooting at rattlesnakes and each other. My uncle Jay walked up and asked if he could shoot my gun. Of course, he could; he was my idol, my mentor, my mother’s older brother; he could do no wrong, except that most everything he did was wrong in my mother’s eyes. I handed him my Daisy. He turned and shot one of my grandmother’s five hundred chickens square in the butt. The hen jumped, squawked, and ran a few feet, then went about pecking the ground for whatever chickens peck for. I was shocked. Jay said the BBs give the chickens a little sting, but don’t hurt the birds, their feathers are too thick. Well, that’s all I needed to know. I popped a few, as did cousin Jerry, and man-oh-man, what fun that was. Jay walked away knowing that he had given his nephews a new source of entertainment.

The rest of the day was spent shooting chickens. I must have used two tubes of BBs. The chickens, one of natures stupidest birds, jumped, squawked, and then went on about their chicken lives. My cousin and I were having a grand old time, and improving our shooting skills on moving targets.

Unbeknownst to us, my grandmother was watching the shooting gallery from the back porch of the farmhouse. Her son, Jay, ratted us out after putting us up to the crime. She let us have our fun.

At supper time, she called us to the farmhouse. Standing on the back steps to the porch with her arms crossed, we knew that she knew we had been shooting her egg-laying chickens. It was no use to plead and beg for mercy; we accepted our sentence. As always, she told us to go to the barn, go around to the back of it, and cut a nice limb from a Mesquite tree that would serve as the switch to deliver our punishment. She knew the mental anguish this caused, having us deliver the weapon to the executioner. I cut the shortest limb I could reach, hoping that the smallest weapon would deliver the least pain.

I handed her the puny limb. She smiled and said, “That’s the sorriest excuse for a switch I’ve ever seen.” She then walked to the barn and came back with a whole tree limb, complete with all the thorns. Jerry and I almost pissed our blue jeans. My uncle Jay was standing on the porch, doubled over in laughter. At that moment, I realized my mother was right about her brother.

Instead of switching us with her tree limb, she asked for my BB gun. She was an old Indian gal and knew how to shoot. She instructed Jerry and me to go about fifty feet away and start running in circles, which we did. She then started shooting both of us in the butt with our own BB guns, and man, did it hurt. I don’t think she missed a shot. After that, we didn’t shoot anything except tin cans. We knew that Granny kept a 22 rifle next to the ice-box.

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Ask A Texan: Raising A Heathen Child


Somewhat Good Information For Those Unfortunate Folks That Live Up North

The Texan

A Mrs. Lee, of Rebel Yell, Virginia wrote that her son has been hanging around a bunch of contractors and has picked up their bad habits.

Mrs. Lee: Mr. Texan, there’s a convenience store being built on our block, and my six-year-old son, Robert, and his little pals have been hanging around the jobsite watching the construction. The tradesmen are friendly to the boys and have been giving them Pops and sharing their food with them at lunch break. A few days ago, Robert and four of his little pals tore down our backyard storage shed, and they are now using the lumber to build a fort in our two-hundred-year-old oak tree. My husband, Jefferson, thinks it’s okay, they are just being boys, but not only did they destroy our shed, which we bought at the Home Depot, but now they are cussing and yelling nasty things at the neighborhood girls. I’ve heard foul language in my years, but these little boys are using disgusting terms: ” **** this and **** that,” “you’re a dumb ass,” “hand me that ******* hammer, you know, the kind of foul language tradesmen use. I’m a Christian woman, and I can’t bring myself to tell you all I’ve heard from my little boy. Well, this morning, Robert told his sister to get out of his “damn way or he will kick her ass.” Well, that did it for me. I told him to go to the backyard and get me a switch so I could spank his little behind. He looks at me and says, ” Hell no! That’s the electrician’s job.” I don’t know what to do, my son is a heathen.

The Texan: Well, Ma’am, your problem is not as dire as you think. Boys love to demolish things and then build stuff with hammers and nails. Contractors often use colorful language because there are no women on the job sites. I wouldn’t be too concerned, it’s a phase and will pass. The good news is that Robert may have learned some valuable hands-on skills that can be used later in life, like carpentry and such, and some darn good curse words that will come in handy as he grows older. I was cussing like a Hun by the time I was his age. Let me know how he turns out, and I’m sending him a gift card to Home Depot and a box of Cherry Bombs.

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Prophecy Or A Coincidence? Is That A Molotov Cocktail In Your Pocket Or Are You Just Happy To See Me?


Is the world living out Biblical Prophecy, or is God testing us to see how far mankind will go to reach the end? Why would he not? He’s done it before with many empires: Roman, Greek, Mayan, Inca, and Persian. All the answers to the questions and scenarios were written thousands of years ago. Still, the main lesson woven throughout the Bible is that the land of Israel and the Jewish people are protected by God, with no exceptions. Flip the historical religious stone, and the Islamic religion and its followers’ rabid devotion to a tribalistic and often cruel deity are told to eradicate the Jewish people, with no exclusions. If the infidels, meaning Christians, stand in the way, then we are also to be taken out as part of the crusade. Twelfth-century manipulated, warped religious ideology combined with modern weapons of destruction presents a real danger to this world.

Closer to home, our United States mainland is facing a different danger. Our universities have been radicalized by left-wing socialist faculty and administrators, resulting in a curriculum that is more anti-American, socialist driven ideology than education. The most dangerous product coming out of our educational systems is the young, white, college-indoctrinated, feminist female who stands for nothing in particular but willingly and blindly embraces any radical cause. Please pay attention to the news reels of the violent protest, and what do you notice, most of the violence is coming from these women, and their man-bun, skinny jean-wearing, masked male tag-alongs. Will this be the next generation of mothers? I hope not, but it doesn’t look good.

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Summer Adventures of a 1950s Boyhood


It was the summer of my seventh year, 1957.

It was too hot to play pick-up baseball games unless my buddies and I got to the Forest Park Ball Diamonds before 8 am, and the city pool was closed because of the Polio scare; my mother kept a picture of an iron lung taped to the icebox to remind me what would happen if I disobeyed her orders. Boredom set upon us, we had too much free time on our grimy little hands, so the six of us that comprised our neighborhood coterie did what any gang of young boys would do; we went feral. It was two full months of constant butt-whoopings, loss of cartoon time, and other parental vs child warfare. My buddies and I agreed it was our best summer so far.

Mr. and Mrs. Mister, our next-door neighbors and mentors, attempted to reel us in, which worked for a short while. Mrs. Mister, a wonderful mom substitute who resembled the movie starlet Jane Mansfield, would let us sit under their backyard Mimosa tree. At the same time, she served chocolate chip cookies and Grape Kool-Aid to control our restless young spirits. Fred and Ginger, her twin white Poodles, would join us and beg for cookies. Mr. Mister, when his wife wasn’t looking, would let us have a sip or two of his ice-cold Pearl beer. We were bad assed and nation-wide.

This was the summer we declared war on our school tormenters, the older boys across the tracks known as “the hard guys.” And thanks to Mr. Mister and his military and engineering experience, we successfully implemented a detailed plan and defeated our nemesis. Sidewalk biscuits with implanted cherry bombs and a small Roman Catapult designed by Mr. Mister played a role in the defeat. Instead of feeling remorse for injuring our schoolmates, the battle made us insufferable and meaner, fueling our summer of feral behavior.

Our parents and Mrs. Mister were shocked and bewildered. Fifty or so butt-whoopings with everything from a belt, switch, and a Tupperware pan, didn’t phase me or my gang. The three girls in our neighborhood, our classmates, were all tomboys, and they said we were now “too mean” for them to associate with. Cheryl, our center fielder, the only girl we would allow to play on our team, called us “mean little shits.” Those are pretty sophisticated words from a seven-year-old gal, although we knew some of the good ones we heard from our fathers.

Skipper, or resident math wiz and duly elected gang leader, had the “Hubba-hubba’s” for Cheryl and gave her his tiny Mattel Derringer cap pistol as a sign of affection. He found it on his front porch one morning with a note from her mother that read, ” stay away from my daughter, you mean little shit.” Now we know where her scoffing comments came from. He was crushed, of course, but he was young and felt much better after he blew up Mr. Rogers’s mailbox with a cherry bomb. Firecrackers and high-powered fireworks secretly supplied by Mr. Mister played a big role in our feralivious behavior. The two neighborhood garages that caught fire were blamed on us, and Georgie, with his love of matches and lighter fluid, may have had something to do with those fires, but he wouldn’t admit to it.

My parents started taking Miltowns, an early pill similar to Xanex, and most other parents began drinking more than normal. Mr. Mister was called in to negotiate a truce, but secretly, he was on our side. He felt boys should have the right to cut loose and show their young oats, even though we didn’t have raging hormones, underarms, or pubic hair, which we anxiously awaited.

Our parents had enough of our feral behavior, and one Saturday evening, there was a hot dog party in our backyard. All my gang was there, as were their parents. Ice cream and a cake were served along with burnt wieners, and the Misters were there with Fred and Ginger. It was a downright ambush, the predecessor to the popular “intervention.” Our parents let us know that the next stop for us was “The Dope Farm,” an institution where malcontents and little hoodlums were sent to do time. We knew the stories about the place. It was out of a horror movie, and Father Flannigan wouldn’t be there to save us. It was time to clean up or be locked up doing hard labor and eating maggot-infested gruel. No more baseball, cartoons, or Mrs. Mister’s cookies and Kool-Aid. We huddled, agreed amongst ourselves, and promised our parents we would walk the righteous path of the good child. We did for the most part, but we hid our stash of cherry bombs for the next summer.

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Virgin Nuns With Guns


Let us all pause and think of those poor bastards in Iran and their buddies who think that by blowing themselves up, or sacrificing themselves for Allah and the Supreme Leader, they will be awarded with 72 virgins and whatever comes with that package. This picture above is what likely awaits them: Virgin Nuns with guns, and not real pretty gals either. Mother “Annie Oakley” Superior, far right, was a medal winner at the 1936 Olympic Games in Germany, and we can assume she has taught her Heavenly army of Nuns to shoot straight—my monies on the good Mother.