The Codfather

The Codfather is a unique man.

He is all of 5'6" but comes across as 6'6". You may snicker at that but until you have met him, I'd be quiet. He'll kick your ass and won't break a sweat doing it.

CF is built like a bull. As you look at him all that you see is head, giant shoulders and an ample gut with no legs. He looks like a walking weeble-wobble (for you 70's kids out there).

CF was a Green Beret in the Army in the early to mid 60's. That was back when 100 of the best soldiers were chosen to "try out" for elite Special Forces group and out of that 100, only 3....yes 3, made it.

He went on to be a policeman in Hampton for 23 years. He started as a part-timer for a few summers, got on to full time and eventually worked his way up to be the 1st Captain in the history of the HPD. Some of his larger accomplishments were convincing the department to acquire motorcycles so they could get through the summer crowds better, getting them to upgrade from 6-shot .357 Smith&Wesson revolvers with a reload speed of 3.5 seconds to 15-shot .40 cal Glock semi-auto pistols with a 1.2 second reload speed. Quite the difference in firepower if you ever needed it. He also brought up the subject of having a SWAT team after a few disastrous local hostage situations.

He even talked the local selectmen into having the town fund the SWAT teamwhile putting CF as the head of it.

Who better?

Nowadays, said SWAT team has evolved into having several other officers join Hampton Police Department on the team. It isn't often that someone can look at what their father may have done while still having a positive effect on the community.

He is still a fully decorated expert marksman (although I have some quarrels with that distinction) along with a bunch of other stuff that only coppers know about.

Anyways, don't fuck with CF.

But....

...he's a bumbling fool just like his youngest offspring (me).

I have seen him fall down, cut himself, never see a punch coming even though everyone else did, light himself on fire and other various calamities. Yeah yeah, I know. Obviously the wind wasn't blowing at all when this apple fell from the tree.

Some highlights in no particular order....

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He once arrested a guy who had escaped from a mental hospital. To this day, he still says that he was the most polite person that he had ever arrested. Anyways, he had just finished fingerprinting him when the guy asked for a cigarette. Of course, CF being a fellow smoker at the time, he complied. When CF reached towards his pack of butts in his front shirt pocket, the guy hit him in the face as hard as he could. He then (smartly) ran into his jail cell as fast as he could and locked himself in there. CF ended up with his nose tucked snugly under his left eye.
The Dr's had to stick a small spoon up his nose to push all of the "parts" back into place as four people held CF down at the hospital. He later had mentioned that if he could of gotten to the prisoner, he would have killed him. And I don't blame him one bit.

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One morning soon after I moved out of CF's house I had stopped by after my boat didn't go fishing that morning just to say hey. As I wandered in I realized that he had just jumped out of the shower. Now, CF likes to sleep in the buff. Don't ask me why, he just does and it can be quite traumatizing. After he wakes up or showers he throws on his $300.00 terri-cloth robe. He always has liked the finer things in life.

Anyways, he was sitting at the table chatting with me and having a butt when it happened.

The head fell off of the cigarette and fell into his lap.

Now, I don't know if you have ever experienced something with a flame coming into contact with terri-cloth, but it can be quite spectacular!

Right after CF saw the head of the butt fall off, he continued to sit there talking and calmly patting at his crotch while trying to put out the possible fire and wondering what had just happened.

It was about 2 seconds later that I heard a "whoosh" noise and watched him start jumping around the room.

Being the good son that I am, I immediately saw the flame climb up his robe towards his face but it didn't register. Well, it registered, but it didn't register that he might be burned badly. When I saw the flame I had immediately burst into hysterical laughter! I'm not kidding you. It was one the fucking funniest things that I have ever seen!

Here was a proud man (The Codfather) running around the kitchen like a chicken with it's head cut off yelling "Put it out!! Put it out!!"

After he yelled at me to help him a few more times and I got my laughter under control, I finally snapped to my senses. I jumped up, tried to pound out the flames on his back...... and then he took it off.

Now, nudity amongst family members might be quite common in this world of ours, but it certainly wasn't in our family so I tried to avert my eyes.

I had to look back as he could have been burning to death. What I saw scarred me for life...

The Codfather looked just like a naked garden troll and was running around with everything jiggling and hanging out all over the place. It wasn't pretty. And that can certainly be quite traumatic on a child. Even if said child was 19 at the time.

Either way, I got the fire on CF put out before all of the hairspray in his hair caught fire. But the memory of The Codfather running around in circles yelling "Put it out!! Put it out!!" while naked, will haunt me to the day I die.

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One more story for now....


CF was doing his usual route while patrolling Hampton late on night. As he was driving along, he almost ran over what looked like a dog in the road. Come to find out it was a 14yr old girl on her first Jack Daniels kick. She was literally crawling in the middle of the road. Good times.

Moving on....


After CF piled her into the back seat, he brought her down to the police station. After they figured out her name and called her parents in Exeter (about 20 minutes away), CF put her into the care of another female (she was a secretary at the time) at the dept. He knew that he was going to have to stick around to talk to drunkgirl's parents, so he figured that this would be a good time to hit the head (bathroom).

The cops had several of their own bathrooms at the police station. The prisoners also had their own and neither one was close to each other, but for some reason it became confused that night...

Fast forward 20 minutes.....

The Codfather was sitting there enjoying his newspaper while doing his thing on the hopper when he heard a rustling. Apparently drunkgirl needed to barf and for some reason the secretary thought that the cop bathroom would be better than the normal jail cell one would.

The Codfather's words of conformation from earlier today....

I was sitting there enjoying the newspaper when I heard a noise...

The next thing that I knew I was looking at our secretary holding drunkgirl's feet while another cop was holding her shoulders. They threw her in my stall headfirst and took off. Drunkgirl proceeded to give me three good shots of pepperoni and pepper pizza mixed with Jack Daniels into my underwear. I didn't know where to start or stop wiping after that. Cod God, ask your mother about this if you don't believe me. [Even though we are divorced now] She still questions how a young girl puked into my underwear while I was on duty. I don't blame her for asking, but I was truly innocent.


And that ends out The Codfather stuff for now. I'm sure that there will be more to follow.

Road Candy

Candy.

That's what has these animal-rights idiots up in arms.

Here is a picture of the offending material....






THE HORROR!!! THE HORROR!!!

The douchebags think that it advocates the harming of animals to children.

Yeah, Jr. is going to run right out, hop on his big-wheel and start chasing the neighborhood cat around the block.

What a bunch of morons. Are they really out of things to complain about? Isn't their a chicken without enough straw in it's coop somewhere? Maybe a sparrow somewhere felt slighted when Mr. Smith didn't put out his favorite birdseed this morning.

I hate people.

Smokey and The Cock

My friend Derek has a knack for losing his license. He managed to lose it at least 7 or 8 times the last time that I checked. It was always for dumbass stuff. He would get a $40 speeding ticket and even though he had about $40,000 in the bank, he wouldn't pay it. Invariably he would get pulled over a month later and off to jail he would go. My favorite chain of events involving Derek and his license happened one fall. He had been pulled over on Rte. 1 for speeding and when the cop saw that he was in default for not paying an earlier ticket, off to jail he went. I then got a phone call and headed down there to bail him out. No big deal, right?

Well, the very next day while I was relaxing at home with the family, I received a phone call. It's Derek and he's in jail again. Apparently he had duplicatd his actions from the day before. He had driven his truck not only on the same road, but past the very spot and at the same exact time that he had been busted the day before while the same cop was sitting there. Derek said that the cop was laughing as he walked up to his truck after pulling him over.

So, now you know a little background on my driving-license-challenged friend. That leads us up to another time that he had lost his license. This time he had to drive up Concord (about an hour away) to get it back. He asked me to drive him there while using his car since my truck got terrible gas mileage. I stupidly agreed....as I always did.

I headed on down to his house to drag his ass out of bed and while walking up to his house I noticed that the rear seat in his car was down and everything was askew. Nothing terribly out of the ordinary as he was a slob. After rousting him we headed out to the car. I wasn't really paying too much attention until I heard him yell "Fuck me!!"

Derek had been about to open up his car door when he noticed that his $500 stereo had been ripped out of his dash. Not only that, but he had a 15'' subwoofer in the back that they couldn't get out as it was too big so they hacked it up with a knife instead. He probably lost about $2000 in stereo equipment, so he wasn't very happy. He proved how unhappy (and stupid) that he was by throwing his keys at his window. As you can imagine, the window smashed into a million pieces. Now, instead of just having no radio all the way to Concord we were going to freeze our asses off as well.

Well, there wasn't much that we could do about it right then, so we took off for the DMV. After a quick stop at the Hampton Police Department to fill out a report for the stolen equipment we were headed up to Concord no worse for wear.

Not too much happened during the first half of the trip but then a NH State Trooper car pulled up behind us. I didn't pay them too much attention as we weren't doing anything wrong. They followed us for a couple of miles but then the road split into 2 lanes and they then pulled out around us to pass. While they were doing that the cop in the passenger seat glanced over, saw the smashed window and immediately waved for us to pull over.

After I pulled over I saw what looked like a State Trooper, only smaller, get out of his car. You could tell right away that he had a bad case of "small man's disease" by how he walked and the way he puffed his chest out like he was some sort of rodent trying to scare away the bigger snake. After looking at my license and Derek's registration the ensuing conversation went something like this....

MiniCop- where did you get this car?

Me- it's his, sir. (Pointing to Derek)

MiniCop- Yeah, sure it is. (Looking at Derek) Do you have any i.d.?

Derek- No, I lost my license and we are on our way to Concord to get it renewed.

MiniCop- You have nothing with your name on it? No credit cards or anything?

Derek- I think I have some mail around here somewhere...

MiniCop- What good is that going to do me?

Derek- I don't know. You're the one who asked for it.

MiniCop- Don't be a wiseass to me!

Derek- Hey, I'm just doing what you told me.

Me- (looking at Derek with a SHUT THE FUCK UP!! look)

MiniCop- (looking at Derek) You be quiet. (looking at me) Is this car stolen?

Me- No, sir. It's not.

MiniCop- If it's not stolen then where is the stereo and why is the window broken?

Me- Sir, we filed a report about the stereo at the Hampton Police Department this morning. You are more than welcome to check it out.

MiniCop- Don't tell me how to do my job!!

Me- Sorry sir, I was just trying to help.

MiniCop- Yeah, right. So where did you steal this car from?

Derek- (blurting out before I could answer) We didn't steal this fuckin' car!

MiniCop- (leaning in the car across my body) You'd better shut-the-hell-up before I take your buddy here (jerks his thumb at me) out of the car and show him what kind of a real man he is.

Me- (thinking to myself) what the fuck did I do??

Derek- Yeah, whatever....

MiniCop- That's it! Both of you, out of the car!!

So, we both get out of the car as we were told. As I do I glance around and notice that there isn't another car within sight and then think to myself ....great, I'm going to get my ass beat on the side of the road by some psychotic cop and his buddy because Derek didn't pay a fucking ticket....when will I ever learn?

MiniCop storms off to his car to run my license and do whatever it is that they do in there. His buddy, who has remained conspicuously silent while standing to the right and behind the car the whole time finally pipes up to explain how it looks with us being in a car with a broken window, stolen stereo and it not being registered. (What we didn't know at the time was that NH had just passed a law stating that if you lose your license they also yank all registrations in your name) He also added this gem about his partner, MiniCop..."He's kind of crazy. Don't worry about it though, he's just having a bad day."

Yeah, easy for you to say.

Mute-Cop tells us to get back in the car and he heads back to the cruiser to plan our demise. While we are sitting there I can see the two of them in my rearview mirror laughing it up and having a helluva time. They obviously are finalizing the plans on where to dump our battered bodies after they have their way with us. After a few more guffaws, they both get out looking all stern and make the short walk back to our car.

MiniCop leans both arms on the door, puts his face about 10 inches from mine and asks....

"What, do you got a good cock or something?"

Me- uh.....excuse me?

MiniCop- your cock, is it good?

Me- (glancing at Derek and then back at MiniCop) "............."

MiniCop- Is it big?

Me- Um.....I don't......uh, I think that.......damn

MiniCop- Do the chicks like it? Is it nice?

Me- (REALLY worried at this point) I don't know how to answer that, sir.

MiniCop- Well, it must be big because you're donating it to science.

Me- (scared now) uh......I really don't want to

MiniCop- Well, you're going to. See?

He then flips over my license and right on the space where you can donate specific organs it says in big letters "Penis."

Later on I found out that some girls who had my wallet at one point thought that it was absolutely hysterical to write that in there. I didn't think that it was too funny. I thought the cop was going to do something naughty to mini-me.

Well, one good thing that came out of this is that the two cops thought that it was just the funniest thing that they had ever heard. They kept laughing and said to Derek and I, "You should have seen your faces. Ha ha ha! Go ahead and...ha ha ha....get out of here....hahahaha!!!

So, I did.

Rats for Breakfast

I was attending a TOP SECRET high level meeting with the Patriots Militia in a fortified underground bunker one night (ok, we were drinking at the bar) when I was informed of a possible Tunnel Rats recording session the next morning. After expressing my disbelief that they would actually show up and record, I was assured that it would indeed be taking place. Not only was it going to take place but also I was invited along to witness the historic event!

How could I possibly say no? The Tunnel Rats are like cicadas...they only come out (what seems like) every 17 years and it always becomes an event of immense terror and destruction with Bible thumpers running for cover. I would be letting down all of my fellow journalists if I were to pass up such an opportunity to witness history in the making.

Ok, ok. As you all know by now, I'm not, nor was I ever a journalist...but it sounded good. Either way, I was going to be there! I then asked what time I should show up to (hopefully) witness the raping and pillaging of music world as we know it. Someone mentioned something about starting at 9am and then everything went black....

The paramedics in the ambulance told me that I had laughed so hard that I started convulsing, blacked out from the lack of oxygen and hit my head. Hey, what's one more concussion at this point, right? Right? Ok, back to the story. What was I writing about? Peaches and Herb? Blondie? With a cow?

Moving on...

After being discharged from the hospital that morning I had headed home to grab Billy and head over to the studio. To my absolute and total surprise we were the first ones to arrive. After waiting a few moments I realized that it might be wiser for me to find a non-metered parking spot for my truck so I didn't go broke over the course of the day. After some searching around I found a little side parking lot and stored the truck there for the day while relishing in the fact that the Skunk-Bitch-Meter-Maid-Nazi couldn't do shit about it!! Ha ha! Chalk one up for Dennis Casey!!

As we wandered back to the studio we noticed what looked to be a human-like form slithering towards the front door. As we got closer we realized that it was the legendary Duke Crevanator! He looked much smaller and less bloody in person. Undeterred, we got the requisite pleasantries out of the way while I tried to avoid his stale beer and cigarette breath while we headed in to the studio. A few minutes later a few other leather-jacketed lumps of suffering joined us inside. It was right about then that I heard the studio doorbell go off. Someone was trying to get in. While I was trying to figure out who it could be at this time of day a pile of hangover asked me to go outside and see who it was and (possibly) let them in. As I walked out into the hallway, I saw a vision!

Wimpy (of The Queers and Jabbers fame) was standing there with his arms full, kicking at the door and yelling "Don't just look at me, let me the fuck in you dumb sonofabitch!!"

I scurried over to the door as per my instructions and opened it up for him. I politely asked him if he needed a hand with his packages and he said "Nah, it's just breakfast."

I stood frozen in awe.

"Breakfast" was a 30-pack of Budweiser in each hand and a bag of stale bagels under his arm.

While gazing at Wimpy with the beer and bagels under his arm it suddenly became so crystal clear to me. After years of aimlessly wandering the earth I had finally found my people! I still get emotional just thinking about it.

After my epiphany, the rest of the day went as you would expect. Everyone was drunk by noon. Many, many tremendous songs were put to tape and fun was had all around.

Oh yeah, I almost forgot, I also lost my truck.

Seriously.

How I originally lost it, well it had to have been the firewater. The devil's elixir! It certainly couldn't have been my fault as I am a fine (and sometimes) upstanding member of our society.
I know that I had to grab a cab to go home but I still should have been able to remember where I had parked my truck. I did go back the next day to try and find my truck because the thing does tend to come in handy but it was nowhere to be found.


You may ask...why couldn't I find my vehicle in downtown Portsmouth? It's plain and simple...I'm retarded. Downtown Portsmouth is only about 4-6 square city blocks in size with few obvious places to park a vehicle. In my defense it does have plenty of nooks and crannies to park in around all of those rich bastards condos. While searching for it the 2nd day I miraculously happened to glance over my shoulder as I wandered by a small parking lot and there it was! There were no tickets on it or anything! I was a happy man and so was the wife. She hadn't been too impressed with my actions up to that point and we'll just leave it at that.

And so ends another thrilling adventure of booze, bagels and punk rock.

Commercial Fishing And The Weirdos That Love It

This will be a retrospective of my time commercial fishing starting with some of the stranger things that I saw at the pier.

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One morning as I was going down to the boat at 2am, I knew that something was up. Ed, the 300lb+ guy that I worked with at the time was acting a little funky. He was walking worse than his normal wobbling motion. I found out later that he had a fight with his wife and decided to take it out on some unsuspecting barstool, partially crushing it in the process.

We tried to get Ed on the boat without killing himself (especially since it was a 10 foot drop) so he could sleep it off on the ride out. Ed wasn't going to let that happen.

Have you ever tried to help someone over 300lbs walk anywhere while they fight you? It isn't easy.

After my captain and I got him safely onto the boat we thought that everything would be all set. Unfortunately, Ed had other ideas. He came charging out to (in his words) "earn his money" by untying the boat. Before we could stop him he had fallen over the side and into the river.

My captain (who shall remain nameless) started to panic. After calming him down, I threw Ed a line to (hopefully) get him back in the boat safely. It was the summer after all and we thought that all he would suffer would be some wet clothes, a bruised ego and a headache once we got to where we were going.

It didn't work out quite that easily.

With Ed being 9 billion pounds, we couldn't hoist him back into the boat all by ourselves. The hardest part was that he was too drunk to swim and/or help us out. He was just floundering around like a stranded manatee with paralysis and a heroin addiction.

Another problem we had to overcome was that the tide runs quite hard in our river. If I'm not mistaken, I believe that it is in the top 10 for tidal flow in the world. With all of that tide and the hippo-sized-object that we were trying to rescue, we couldn't muscle him out of the water.

We decided to then drag him over to one of the ladders that line the pier and hopefully get him out of the water that way. Shortly after telling him to grab ahold of one of the rungs, we saw that those would end up being too hard for him to climb. He couldn't get his arms to move correctly in concert with his feet. He would climb a rung or two, and then fall back into the water. About then, we were starting to get a little worried about him. We didn't want him to drown and none of us were strong enough to haul his ass up the ladder at low tide.

It was around that time that a captain for another boat happened to be walking down the pier and noticed what was going on. He watched bemusedly for a moment and then suggested something that quite possibly saved Ed's life....

"Winch him up at the takeout!" (the takeout is the area where we tie up to unload fish)

I laughed at first but quickly realized that it was so simple that it was brilliant!

With Ed gurgling "No!" we dragged him up the pier with ropes still attached to the takeout area. I then crawled down the ladder to make sure that he didn't drift away while we were hooking him up to the winch. After him throwing a few punches at me, I got him hooked up and yelled to my captain to start winding him up.

After he started getting winched up and cleared the surface of the water, he ended looking just like a drowned rat. He was just kind of hanging there with water pouring off of him for the whole ride up to the pier. The best part was that when he got to the top, two other guys had to pull him in and plop him down on the table that fish usually get sorted out on. Someone made a comment along the lines of "We won't get much money for him. He smells like shit."

You had to be there to appreciate it.



Unfortunately, Ed died a couple of years ago from a freak, and quick, illness. He was a good man who had his faults, as we all do.

The Good Dr

Hunter S. Thompson killed himself last night.

Not good times.

Depot Road

Depot Road is a nice little area in Hampton Falls that caters to the single man without enough money for a hotel room. The man that has it all.... the car whore.

Depot Road is a road that stretches out to the railroad tracks that line the marsh. There is about a mile or so of trails that line the tracks with plenty of hiding places along the way.

While local couples go down there and do their shit, I never did such a thing. At least as far as public records are concerned.

One night after driving around with an ex (and I can't stress the ex part enough) of mine and listening to her blather on about this and that, I found myself tiring of not only listening to her, but of driving as well. Being the nice guy and resisting the urge to kick her to the curb, I figured that Depot Road would be a nice place to park and listen to her utter nonsense and senseless babbling.

Momma Cod, skip this next part

Now, in full disclosure, I have been "observed" doing something wrong down there before. For some reason the policeman couldn't keep his flashlight off of my Tommy-Cod. Then he threatened my female Cod-of-the-week companion with statutory rape as she was a "few years older" than I was at the time. But, that is another story for another time.

So, I had a bit of history amongst the Hampton Falls Police Department to say the least.

Ok, Momma Cod, you can read again

We were innocently sitting there for some time in my truck just talking while it was running with the headlights on. Just like The Beaver would have done. Totally innocent. No funky-monkey stuff going on. Just like when we were dating. But, that explains the reason that we weren't together anymore. I digress...

Around that time I was dying inside. What is worse than listening to some ex-girlfriend complain about this and that if you don't have to? I would rather slam mini-me in a door. I personally couldn't wait until I could put it in drive again to go and drop her skinny ass off at home. Unfortunately that wasn't in the cards just yet.

After what seemed like an eternity to me (it was probably 10 minutes) I suggested that we head back towards her house. After the ex agreed, I put it into gear only to be surprised by a car turning on its high beams directly in front of me.

Oh great. Another cop.

I'm sure that he was all excited to catch "young lovers" in his neck of the woods.

(A quick aside -I don't mind being harassed if I have done something wrong, but when I haven't I tend to get a bit testy no matter who is there.)


This is about how the conversation went....

Police- (walking up to my truck) are you two having fun?

Me- yeah, tons...just look at us

Police- it sure looks like it

Me- yeah, I bet you'd like that

Police- don't be smart with me kid

Me- whatever...what did we do?

Police- you aren't allowed down here at night

Me- since when?

Police- since the sign went up

Me- there isn't any sign

Police- (looking at my driver's license) you're from around here, you should know

Me- well, I don't and I didn't see a sign

Police- yeah, right

Me- (getting pissed at this point) I didn't see a fuckin' sign!

Police- (angrily) want to see it?!?

Me- damn right!


I then get out of my truck and followed him over to a grey sign that was recessed into the brush on the side of the road right where you drive in.

Police- (smugly) see the sign?

Me- that one covered by the bushes?..yeah

Police- read it!

Me- (reading) ok, I did

Police- read it out loud!!

Me- (quite belligerently) I don't have to prove to you that I can read!

Police- READ IT OUT LOUD!!

Me- fuck you!

Police- wow, you're a real tough guy

Me- yeah, that's me

Polie- READ THE SIGN!!

Me- this is stupid, are you gonna give me a fucking ticket or not?

Police- (quite upset at this point) IS THAT WHAT YOU WANT?!!?

Me- If that will get you to shut the fuck up and leave me alone, yeah!!

Police- FINE!!

He then stormed off to his car to write my ticket.

I couldn't believe that I hadn't just been arrested. Mr Police man said that he didn't know my name or my father, but I think that he did. My Dad had just retired from Hampton's police force as captain that year.

At this point I had worked my way back to my truck and here comes Super Cop. When he got up to my window to hand me my ticket, he couldn't have been nicer. I don't know if it was because he had called me in to the dispatcher and they had said that it was Daddy-Cod's son or he finally realized that you don't need to be a total asshole all the time to the public. I'll never know.

Either way, he gave me a $60 ticket. I then politely told him that he could use it as a suppository and I would see him in court.

Fast forward to 4 months later....

I had to take a morning trip off from the party boats (which cost me $150, dammit!) to go to court to meet this asshole, but I was determined to keep my good name.

After arriving there I realized while watching a few cases that I wouldn't get "my moment" anytime soon and I would probably miss the afternoon trip as well. I then went downstairs and paid the $60 fine because I couldn't waste anymore time on this douchebag.

The Man wins again!

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A couple of months later I received an early Christmas present....a $60 check from Hampton Court stating that I had been found "not guilty"

I have my theories as to why I was found "not guilty", but I'll keep them to myself for now.


I do know that the officer who gave me a hard time lost his job for picking up transient men and raping them on a regular basis. Seriously.

He got his.

Another example of stupidity

Geez, there are so many that I don't know where to start. Let's see...

Ok, here is one that recently Bface reminded me of. I had successfully buried it in the back of my subconscious after years and years of shock-therapy, but oh well. How bad could it be to go back on Lithium, right? I suffer for my art...

I used to live right at the beach in Hampton. We were close enough so the only thing separating my house from the ocean was the boulevard. We had the whole 2nd floor of the house and the entire front of it was big windows that let you see the entire ocean. Not to mention being able to look down at certain "vaginal americans" as they went by. The house had its charms, to say the least.

Well, since it was at the beach there weren't too many people around in the winter. In fact, the houses on either side of us were empty from September-April. Without anyone around or anything to look at it got to be quite boring.

Well, as I was sitting there one day bored (yet again) I figured that I would spice things up by breaking out the old BB gun. Just for some wholesome family fun, mind you. Nothing bad was supposed to take place.

Well, after taking some pot shots at a few psychotic Starlings, I was quite bored. Then with all the clarity of thought that a 16 year old possesses, I realized that there was a much more fun (and satisfying) target to aim for.

The windows in the house next door.

I mean, afterall, they weren't home. Hell, they wouldn't be there for another few months. Anyone could have come by and shot the windows out, right?

My 16yr old logic as it was happening...

I couldn't possibly hit that small basement window from here.

Wow! What a shot!

I should stop now. This is wrong.

Oh, look! That one has a small crack in it.

I better shoot it out so they make sure to fix it. I wouldn't want it to break at the wrong time and hurt passing children or baby kittens.

These look old anyways. I'm probably doing them a favor.

Well, I can't just break a couple and leave those other ones in. They wouldn't match.

Good. I safely removed all of the broken glass out of the frames for them. I won't even charge them for this because I'm such a nice neighbor.

I wonder if those big storm windows are up to code?


And so on and so on.

This whole thing went on over the course of the winter. A few shots here, a few shots there when I was bored.

Then one day I came home and there they were....the neighbors. They didn't even wave to me or say hello. And after all of the wonderful things that I had done for them out of the goodness of my heart.

Snobs!

Of course, with all of my teenage awareness I didn't even realize what they could have been so mad about. I had lost interest in that house a while back after there were no more windows left unscathed. I had moved on to bigger and better things....like streetlights. Of course starting with the one right outside my window. But, that's another story.

Anyway, the neighbors didn't say anything to me about it and I thought that was that until one day my Dad wanted to talk to me....

Dad- Have a little fun with your BB gun?

Me- (thinking it was about the streetlight) what are you talking about? I haven't shot at any street lights

Dad- street lights?

Me-um....forget it.....are we watching the hockey game tonight?

Dad- nice try, the neighbors have several broken windows

Me-which neighbors?

Dad-the ones across the street from your window

Me- It must have been that Andy punk out back. He's a wily looking one and he's always trying to get me into trouble.

Dad- He's 5 years old

Me- maybe someone threw rocks at them

Dad- the neighbors have a cup full of BB's that they got out of their living room

Me- Someone could have done it while they were driving around. You know how it is with these working parents nowadays...never around to supervise their little hoodlums

Dad- the shots came from above the window(s) and the only thing up that high is your bedroom

Me- maybe it was a fly-by?

Dad- just pay for the damn things, ok?

It ended up costing me about $175, if I remember correctly. Not too bad for a winter's worth of entertainment, if you ask me.

Don't fuck with us, we're armed

I saw this headline today...

EARTH GETTING WARMER, HUMANS TO BLAME

Really.

What was your first clue?

-------------------

Hey this whole Tedy Bruschi thing really sucks. When I saw the headline early yesterday morning I immediately had a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach. The poor bastard wins three super bowls (in case I hadn't mentioned it before), makes his first Pro Bowl then comes home and has a stroke. Luckily, it looks like he'll be ok. I don't care if he never plays football again, just as long as he'll be there for his three kids. It's some scary shit when you see that happen to a professional athlete at the age of 31. Good luck, Tedy. (what's up with the one "D" anyways?)

-------------------

I just received a care package from Dan Secretion and it included a kickass bumper sticker. It says, "Fuck your honor roll student! My kid kicks ass and listens to The Secretions!" I'm sure that it will be a big hit with all the rich pricks when I pull into the Little League parking lot. Fuck them anyways.

-------------------

A buddy of mine (Derek) once bought a scooter from another friend of mine. It was one of those bigger Aero 80's that Honda used to sell. They actually qualify as a motorcycle here in NH. How they figure 80 cc's is a motorcycle, I'll never know.

One day, Derek was giving me a lift home (I know, I know. How gay were we? Two guys on a scooter. Hey, I was 16. Anything that moved us without involving pedaling was kickass) when it started acting funny. We had to stop in an empty lot near my house because the motor kept bogging down. The motor wouldn't stay running normally so we decided to put it up on its gay, double-kickstand thing that they have and see if that would help. Derek fired the scooter back up and was standing to the right of it while twisting the throttle back and forth trying to keep the motor running. Right about the time that he had it wide open, the scooter rocked back on its kickstand and took off like a shot with Derek firmly in tow. He disappeared in a spectacular explosion of whipping tree branches and flying pine needles.

Now, for reasons unbeknownst to me, he never let go. Apparently, his body weight had continued to keep the scooter at full throttle. I was actually quite surprised at how long the scooter stayed upright while dragging his limp body on the ground beside it.

I heard his adventure end with a scream and a loud crash. After I stopped hyperventilating with laughter, I fought my way through the bushes to see if I could find him. I came upon a large group of trees surrounded by several feet of thorn bushes and Derek in the middle of it all. He was just sitting there with this far-away, dazed look on his dirt-smeared face. His clothes were torn and covered with leaves. His hair had chunks of thorn bushes scattered throughout it. The scooter was off to the side with a broken windshield and it's rear wheel still slowly spinning.

It was funny as hell.

-----------------------

How the hell do bands like New Found Glory even procure record contracts? Do they have compromisisng photos of the record executives? I mean, have you heard these guys? Strangling a cat while running fingernails down a chalkboard would sound better than the assault on my sensibilities that they call "music"

I mean...just....damn, I'm speechless. They are just plain terrible.

It goes to show that what Bface preaches is true. Whatever pre-packaged flavor-of-the-month garbage that they play on the radio and Mtv says is cool will be bought up by some mindless drone.

---------------------

It's pronounced fuckin', not fucking. When you say it that way you sound like an uptight douchebag.

You know who I'm talking about.

----------------------

Some items that have changed hands during our "Yankee Swap" on Christmas Eve...

1000 rounds of .22 ammo
many different kinds of booze
a cheese grater
gift cards for Staples and Best Buy
a George Foreman grill
gift cards for the liquor store
multiple items from the 2004 WORLD SERIES CHAMPION BOSTON RED SOX
a pocket knife that Momma face so callously STOLE from me
girly candle crap
a wine chiller

you can draw your own conclusions...

------------------------

Things Bface and I have given each other as gifts over the years in no particular order...


I gave him a GG Allin watch that showed a picture of a bleeding, naked, dog-collared GG as the watch face and featured a syringe and a Jack Daniels bottle as the hour and minute hand...
He gave me a framed 1997 Confederacy of Scum Supershow poster with a flourescent stripper on it.

I gave him a "Keith Richards for President" t-shirt....
He gave me a Dwarves t-shirt that has a "skull and crossboners" (yes, cross-boners) configuration on the back

I gave him a framed "Bladerunner" movie poster...
He gave me a kickass framed "The Cramps and Lords of Altamount" concert poster

He gave me a giant knot on my head with a possible concussion...
I gave him a broken hand

------------------

While in the "gifty mood" here are a few other notable gifts that family members have given each other....

I received a Winchester model 1300 pump shotgun from my Dad.
I gave Dad a deer-antler handled knife. I saved up my paper-route $ for months to get that.
My brother, my uncle and I all went in together and bought Momma Face a beautiful .22 pistol.
The Cod Gal bought me a .40 caliber Glock pistol to replace the one I had to (reluctantly) sell the year before. It is quite possibly the nicest gift that I have ever received. Not because of what it was, but because how much she knew (and remembered) that it bothered me when I sold my first one. Once again, my chick rules.
Dad gave Bface and I a really cool tactical knife this year. Bface got the "killer" of the two.

Wow. Lots of implements of destruction changing hands.

The moral as always....don't fuck with our family. We're armed.

The Bronco Part II

There is no real appropriate way to segway into any of these stories so I will just tell them at random...

---------------

Billy's friend Ray had a '78 Bronco that was all jacked up with badass tires. He just thought that the thing was the absolute shit. I kept hearing about how it would drive through hell and back and also how it would go right over my truck and keep on going if we were to go muddin' together. So, one day I decided that I would see what "the boy" had. In his defense, he had never been 4-wheelin' with Billy and I so he didn't really know what to expect.

{Authors note: my truck was as stock as stock gets right down to the radial tires.... just so you know}

Anyways, we go to an area that has a nice stretch of muddy trails that lead into a swamp. Billy's girlfriend Lindsey is with me in my truck and Billy is behind me with his boyfriend Ray. As we go charging along I come upon a great muddy area. I then tell Lindsey "Watch this, we'll shut Ray's ass up." I sat there for a few minutes waiting for Ray to catch up and pretending to be stuck in the muddy bog. Ray pulls up, sticks his head out of the window and (true to form) starts telling me how much of a piece of shit that my truck is. Little did he realize that I was just waiting for him and his boyfriend Billy. As I started revving the motor, Billy wisely ducked back inside the truck but Ray kept yelling anyway. I then threw it into gear and he got fucking douched, and I mean DOUCHED!! by mud. The best part was that my truck didn't even move for about 10 seconds, it just kept sending multiple 12-foot arcs of mud onto his truck. It covered every single inch of his front end and windshield. What was even better than that was when I found out later on that while he was bitching at me, a clod of mud had hit him square in his (ever) open mouth. Apparently he was gagging and then had the dry heaves. That'll teach him!

After that little bit of fun, we moved on down the trail. We came upon something that used to be a stream, but was now a river. Ray wouldn't cross it with his "Bad-Ass-Truck" so I blew by him with my stock vehicle and had at it. It ended up being quite a bit deeper than even I had thought. Before the entire truck could even get into the river, we quickly dropped down about 3 feet...but that was short lived. The Bronco didn't die but kept chugging along and the water started to slowly get shallower. After traveling through another 15 feet of river with a gradual incline, we hit it....

The "Sippi Hole".

That motherfucker dropped the Bronco down so quick and so far that I couldn't even see the hood! The water was so deep that it rose above the bottom of the windows and was licking at the windshield. At one point we started moving sideways in the current but that didn't faze the old girl at all. We just kept on chugging right along. Once we got clear of the rapids and triumphantly climbed the bank on the other side of the river, we yelled across to Ray and Billy that "It's nothing.... no problem! Especially in that Big Badass truck of yours, Ray. Bring it on over"

After much trepidation on Ray's part, he finally took his skirt off long enough to try and conquer the river.

Well, he got about a truck length into the river before the shitbox died. We came to find out later that he didn't have an air cleaner or its case on top of his carb, so the water just poured into his motor and killed it. Apparently he knew about it beforehand. What a dumbass.

After I came driving back through the swift flowing river and rescuing Billy and Ray on the way by, both of whom were now perched on the roof of Ray's Bronco, we charged over to Ray's house to grab some tow chains and rope to get his "Bad Ass Truck" out.

Once we got back to the scene of the crime, we had to figure out a way to get Ray's truck towed out. We obviously couldn't attach a chain to the tow hook on it's frame because none of us had any SCUBA equipment with us. After some brainstorming and finagling, I decided to back up to the front of Ray's truck with Billy at the ready. We were going to have to find something under the hood to attach to.

After watching Billy fumble around under the hood for 5 minutes or so Ray got pissed, opened his door and stormed out. Ray was immediately waist deep in water, but he was determined and didn't care at all! The funny thing was that when the door opened, you could actually see the current flowing through the entire truck and out the other side. Good times.

Ray eventually tied a line to something solid and off we went. I did get him pulled up and out of the river that way but we still had to turn around and go back through the river again.

On the way back we started off well enough until we got to that damn "Sippi Hole. "

We hit that bastard and the towline immediately snapped and then came flying forwards to smash my side mirror. After that hard lesson learned, we knew that Ray wasn't capable of perfecting an adequate knot, so Billy had to do the next one. Once he did that, we proceeded to save Ray's shitbox Bronco from it's watery grave.

As I was towing Ray and his "Badass truck that would run over mine" out of the swamp with Billy's "superknot", we came upon the same mud hole that I had douched him with before.

As I slowed down I could see him yelling and waving his fists at me...but I had to do it anyways. I douched him again. Not once, but twice..and there wasn't a GODDAMN THING that he could do about it!!

Once I towed his shitbox to his house, we actually had to use a 2x4 once to scrape the inch and a half (we measured) of mud that was on the windshield. Not only that, but a rock must have hit the windshield and cracked it, but I wouldn't know anything about that.

In following, Ray ended up being pretty respectful of my truck after that.

To be continued...

The Bronco

My first vehicle was a 1984 Ford Bronco XLT.

That's right baby...XLT! Hey, I had to look good for the ladies.


Anyway, the thing was totally badass! I used to pound the ever-livin' shit out of the poor thing and it would keep coming back for more. We went through swamps, rivers, bogs, trees and the like.

They say that this is a picture of a '84 Bronco, but this one is much nicer than mine was. I'll just have to take their word for it.




Mine was oxidized/scratched blue with rust highlights.

I ended up with my fine piece of american know-how in a roundabout kind of way. My father had previously owned it but when he bought a different truck, he co-signed it over to a "friend" of his who then proceeded to skip town. He was found 10 months later in east-bumfuck Maine living in it. After some legal wrangling, The Deadbeat decided that he would give the truck back to my Dad and drop it off at a store here in Portsmouth. I was charged with the task of getting it home. That proved to be harder than you think.

She started up ok but as soon as I got on the highway, I realized that something was amiss. It was blowing steam out of not only a few hoses, but sections of the radiator as well. We would get about 3 miles, stop, and have to put more water in it. All the while diving for cover because I was too stubborn to wait for the radiator to cool down. We did eventually make the 15 mile ride home without blowing up the motor in just under an hour. But it was close, she was bone dry when we hit Hampton. I do remember that people were frantically pointing and yelling at the front of my truck the whole way back. Yeah, like I don't notice the 5 foot jet of stream billowing from the front of my truck. Morons.

I dropped it off at the shop so it could get a once over. I should have left well-enough alone. To make a long story short, I had the keys in my hand one week and minus $1300 later.

Billy and I showed up to pick her up and immediately decided that today was the big day and we were going to go out and celebrate in style! The first thing we did? Went four-wheelin'!

We bombed out onto the railroad tracks and started charging along hitting every trail that we saw along the way. There were a few bumps and bruises along the way, but nothing major. Although, I did smack into the railroad tracks backing up to turn around one time. Along that stretch they were raised up on a berm, so I thought that just the bumper hit. No such luck. But everything seemed ok...

A little while later we came upon this really kickass looking trail that went out through a swamp. Being ever so careful, we actually got out to walk a few feet of the trail to make sure that we weren't going to get stuck. It was while getting back into the truck that I smelled something. Gas. Shit! I looked under the car and saw a steady stream of gas pouring out of the gas tank. Apparently I had popped a pretty good hole in it when we backed into the railroad tracks.

So, there we are in a swamp and about 5 or 6 miles away from the nearest tow truck. Not good. So, I did what any dilligent person would have.....I got back in and floored it!

At one point we were doing around 6omph which in itself isn't that impressive but when you figure in the rocks, stumps, and ruts that needed to be avoided...it's pretty good speed. It took us about 45 mins to get into the woods where we were, it took about 6 to get out.

We pulled back into the gas station and looked for a place to park. I didn't want gas getting all over the parking lot, now did I? Ah, there is the perfect spot. Right over a storm drain. The garage and the town ended up not being too happy about that. Something about fumes, explosions, contaminating wells. I'm not too sure, I wasn't really paying attention.

After another week, a new 34-gallon gas tank and another $1100, we were out on the prowl again.

more later......

Why Sports Matter

this is a bit of an unorganized ramble that I don't feel like straightening out right now, deal with it.....
yeah, I'm getting all melancholy on you ass



Well, the first question is "Do they actually matter?"

Who Knows?

One (probably a hippie) can probably look at any sport as an 'organized activity'. All I know is that as silly as it sounds, all sports play a HUGE part in mine, and my family's life.

My average day usually begins by waking up before my boys, watching whatever it is that I want on TV, and then immediately switching over to Sportscenter when I hear their footsteps coming downstairs. I know that they will insist on watching ESPN as soon as they get into the living room, no matter what my excuse may be for the contrary. It is to the point now where I won't even watch it without my boys being there. Hey, I'm all for whatever it takes for a Dad and his sons to spend time together every day...especially as they grow older. How that can be bad, I don't know. Anything that brings any family together must be a good thing. Unless it is ritual killings....

I can't even begin to tell you what it was like being part of a Red Sox family all of these years. One thing that we always did was to take family trips to Fenway Park every May for mine and my grandmother's birthday. Some of my fondest memories from growing up stem from those trips. One time that sticks out in particular was the time that I rode home with Grandma in her new turbo-charged LeBaron (she wanted a Ferrarri...seriously!). We cranked David Lee Roth and proceeded to beat Momma-Face home by over 15 minutes on a 60 mile trip....do the math. Hell, Grammy-Cod was buried with an autographed Red Sox baseball in one hand and a Coors in the other. Man, she was the best!!

My point is that no matter what happened, we, as a family, always had that one trip together every year to see the Red Sox. It didn't matter what anyone's differences/interests were, we always had that trip....and that can't be a bad thing. Let's see Dr. Phil prescribe that!

Now, as we all get older we find ourselves living different lives. We drift apart. Some of us stay close, some don't. It's no one's fault. It just happens. The unfortunate part is when the people who have previously been close, never talk to each other again.

That is where sports can come back into play.

I have had my share of forgotten friends. Everyone has. Do you remember Joe Blow from the 8th grade? How about Tom Schmuck from the Army? Jenny Nobody from prom night? (ok, bad example)

What I am saying is that sports can come into play when you get back into touch with John and Jane Doe. I could call any of my ex-friends after 15 years and the common denominator that we would have is that I could pick right back up with them if I mentioned the local sports team and then we could go from there.

I have also found that when it comes to the Cod family and we all go to "jr's" Little League game(s), it means that we are spending time together. That invariably leads to other things like going out for dinner afterwards or to breakfast before the game. That is also not including the random aunts, uncles, and grandparents that show up. That can't be a bad thing as well.

As trivial as they may seem to you, sports do matter.

The MVP

The Three Stooges

Thank Dan for this little slice of Americana.

Random Stuff

How do you lose a package from Russia with radioactive material in it? You would think that there would be measures to prohibit that kind of thing.

That's exactly what happened 4 months ago and Halliburton (them again) just recently saw fit to mention it to someone. Luckily, it was found a couple of days ago tucked away in some warehouse down near Boston safe and sound, but still. That could have definitely ruined someone's day if the wrong people got ahold of that.

-----------------------

The Red Sox equipment van left for Florida today. Yeehaw!

I can't wait to see the looks on those Yankee pricks faces when we receive our rings while they look on from the other dugout. The schedule god was good to us. Fenway will be rockin' that day!

Speaking of Yankee pricks, what the hell did Jason Giambi think that he accomplishing yesterday when he called his little press conference? Yeah, call a press conference and never once mention the reason that you felt the need to call it in the first place. We all know that you admitted to taking steroids so why not call it something besides "a distraction"? He should have just shown up and said "Hi, I'm Dumbass Giambi. I'm sorry for all the 'distractions' that I may have caused. Good bye" because that is what he said in a nutshell. But somehow it managed to take that shit-for-brains 45 minutes to convey it.

What a douchebag.

--------------------------

How about that couple that threw a one hour old baby from a moving car into a median? Talk about the scum-of-the-earth. If I saw that happen I would have grabbed the baby, then run the "parents" off the road and beat them with a tire iron.

**update**
2:15 pm EST

They just caught the nasty skank that mothered this child. Come to find out, the baby had a plastic bag wrapped around its head.

I can't express how much that this upsets me.

Personally, I would like to wrap a 2x4 around her head 36 times, stomp her corpse and then piss on it...but thats just me.

How can you do that to an innocent child? It still had it's umbilical, for chrissakes!

Thousands, maybe millions, of people would KILL to be able to have children and some crack-whore does shit like this. If you don't want the child at least put it up for adoption you GoddamnSkankyDouchebagWhoreBitch-see-you-next-tuesday.

(the 'see-you etc'. was for the benefit of momma-cod)

**update #2**
3:04 EST

Well, according to the latest report, no baby ever got thrown anwywhere. The weirdo mother gave birth, brought it in and came up with the story.

If that is true, no hard feelings, right psycho-chick?

--------------------------

The wife visciously assaulted me last night. I'm physically and emotionally scarred for life.

I need to look into one of those "Battered Husbands" support groups.

-------------------------

Some fuckstick died after the cops nailed him with a stungun yesterday in Chicago and I say "So what?!?"

The asshole was attacking the officers and threatening to kill them. They were well within their rights to shoot him, much less use a taser. Now some bleeding-heart-tree-sodomizing-hippie-pricks will be all over the cops for doing their job.

I can hear it already....

He was such a nice man.

He never deserved this.

He once pet a cat.

I saw him plant a tree.

Well, you know what?....TOO FUCKING BAD!!! He shouldn't have been doing what he was doing. You fuck around with "The Man" and "The Man" is gonna getcha. It would be like if I was poking a dog repeatedly with a sharp stick and then it mauled me. It isn't the dogs fault, it's mine for screwing with him. It's not like the cops were cruising around and said "Hey, there is some dude walking down the road. Let's to taser his ass so he goes into cardiac arrest!"

I'm just saying....

-------------------------

I just saw this headline- SMALL QUAKE RATTLES ARKANSAS

....and all 6 teeth

-------------------------

Jeff Bagwell's (of the Houston Astros) ex-wife just auctioned her cleavage as advertising space and made fifteen grand. I have never seen her but I bet that my gut is bigger than her boobs. At that rate I should be able to get $50,000 no problem.

-------------------------

Alaska just had the largest oil spill since the Exxon Valdez decimated that area. Now, it said in the article that the ship ran aground after it drifted for two days after the engines died. TWO DAYS!!! Do they not have a boat that could have maybe, oh I don't know, TOWED IT AWAY FROM THE REEF?!?!??

Fuckin' a, some people are just too fucking stupid to be allowed to live. I swear, there should some kind of IQ test that is administered before they would be allowed to procreate. Hey, you have to pass a test to do almost everything else, so why not do it for that? After the test there could be two doors. One on the right that goes back out to the street and one on the left that leads directly into an operating room where you would get sterilized....immediately!

I'd be for it.

------------------------


I heard that Nomar is going to be one of the names named in Jose Mom-Didn't-Hug-Me-Enough Canseco's new book. I have to say that I always thought that he was doing something, but I didn't want to admit it. You don't go from 145 in college to 190 pounds of pure muscle in a few years without something funky going on. But now that he is on another team....kick his ass out! Actually, let those idiots inject each other all they want. It's their bodies. I don't give a fuck. I can't afford to go to the games anymore anyways.

-----------------------

Does anyone care if that ugly-somebitch Prince Charles wants to marry a woman that looks like Seabiscuit? I sure as hell don't but yet it is everywhere that you look.

Must have been a slow news day yesterday.

-----------------------

Bill Clinton came out with this pearl of wisdom the other day..

"I think that the Democrats can win the next election"

I don't know if I agree but I'm giving them a 50-50 shot.

William the Rummy

It was the last day of the season on the party boats and our afternoon trip was cancelled. Someone showed up and started handing out fifths (no matter how many times that I type that word, it still doesn't look right) of rum like they were candy.

Each captain got one a piece. I also received one. Billy got one. My good friend Tim actually ended up with a liter because the liquor store didn't have enough fifths for all of us. After we received the rum, we realized that we needed other supplies.....like pizza.

After we had a few pizzas delivered to the boat, we did what anyone would do...we put the boat away on its mooring. We then decided to sit there in the middle of the harbor, drink booze and eat our pizza over the course of the afternoon. Little did I know where my afternoon would take Billy and I...

After we all finished off our bottles of rum, we decided that it was time to get back to dry land before we did something stupid... like die. As we were getting into the skiff (the little 12 foot aluminum boat with an outboard motor that is used to get back and forth between the dock and the moorings) I decided that it would be funny to drive around with the skiff still tied up to the party boat. Of course, I didn't realize that Billy was trying to get into the skiff at the time.....well, yes I did but I did it anyways.

The next thing that I noticed (between laughing fits) was that Billy had fallen into the river and was hanging onto the rope that attached us onto the big boat. He was dragging in the river like a limp piece of seaweed. This other kid Spike, who worked with us, started to panic and threw him a "lifeline." Spike actually used a 1" line that we would use to tie up the 70-ton party boat with. After Spike threw the giant rope towards Billy, it then hit him directly in the head and knocked him free of the rope that he was holding onto. Luckily, I had my bearings about me enough to grab him by the scruff of the neck like a stray dog and swing him into the skiff as he was drifting by.

After that narrowly averted disaster, Billy and I wisely decided to go head home to my house.

Luckily, whoever was driving Spike home decided to give us a ride as well. Once we got there, Billy was quite drunk. I then guided him quietly into my bedroom and left him with specific instructions that if he were to puke, he was not to do so in there. He assured me that it wouldn't be a problem, so I then staggered off to take a shower. 10 minutes later when I wandered back in, our conversation went about like this....

(before I could say anything)

Drunk Billy- I didn't do it

Me- you didn't do what?

Drunk Billy- I did what you told me to

Me- you did what?

Drunk Billy- I didn't puke in your room

Me- I see that

Drunk Billy- I puked

Me- No, you didn't, you just told me so

Drunk Billy- I didn't puke in your room!!

Me- yeah, I see that, thank you

Drunk Billy- no, I puked

Me- where?

Drunk Billy- (lazily pointing towards the window) I didn't puke in your room

Me- you didn't puke out my window....did you?

Drunk Billy- (still pointing) I DIDN'T PUKE IN YOUR ROOM JUST LIKE YOU SAID!!!

Me- (looking at the window that he pointed at) aw, shit

Billy had two windows to choose from. Of course he chose the one that was RIGHT ABOVE MY LANDLORDS DECK!!

I stuck my head out, looked down and saw a colorful cascade of "stuff" that attached itself not only to the the side of the house, but to the deck as well.

As I was taking a shower, unbeknownst to me, the old man came home.

When I left my bedroom to get some water for Billy, he surprised me by saying....

Dad- what the hell is wrong with Billy? Is he drunk? I heard him mumbling to himself

Me- yup

Dad- (throwing me the keys to his truck) bring him home, ok?

Me- (incredulously catching the keys because I was drunk as well) sure! no problem!

I had decided that Billy was cleaning up his own puke. I didn't care how drunk that he was. I covertly threw a roll of paper towels out my back window so that HE could clean it up while we were on the way out.

When we got downstairs (after I carried him halfway down) I forced him onto the landlords porch. In his defense, he did try to clean it up but I had to stop him. He had bent over at the waist with a bunch of paper towels in his hand to clean it up and then proceeded to fall face first into his lake of puke. I then rescued him from drowning, blotted him dry, and parked him in the truck.


Yes, I cleaned it up and he still hasn't made it up to me!

Anyways, as we were driving home he was telling me to not turn, at all. I calmly explained that I had to turn with the flow of the road or we would die, but he didn't care. All I kept hearing was "If you follow that turn, I'm going to puke!"

My reply was "If you puke, you'll be getting out and walking from right here!"

Once we got to his house (without him puking) I pulled up to the end of the driveway. He insisted that I walk him inside. I did not agree.

Now, his father is a Navy Seal that did several tours in Vietnam. Not the kind of guy that you want to piss off especially when you are bringing his son home hammered! So, I wisely decided to let Billy get into his house all by himself.

I let him out of the truck and then proceeded to watch Billy wobble back and forth up the driveway bouncing off of the fence the whole way. He looked like a retarded pinball all the way to the house.

What I could see, and Billy couldn't, was that his Navy-Seal father was watching him the whole time through their double-glass doors that led into their living room. Billy staggered up, leaned against the glass and semi-passed out. His father, scowl intact, opened the door and Billy fell right at his feet. A few moments later, he wearily got onto all fours and crawled his way into the house.

I didn't stick around to see what happened after that but his parents were none too impressed with me after that.

Yeah, like I twisted his arm to make him drink.


ps- there is still a stain of rum, coke, and pizza that extend from my old window all the way down the side of the house...seriously

The Cod God Cooketh

I can cook the shit out of a steak, or pretty much anything on the grill. But it wasn't always that way. I have had my share of mishaps. These are a couple of them...

One morning after having been out fishing all night (we were fishing exclusively at night at this point) I had come home around 7am and decided that I was ready for "dinner". I spied a taco mix on the counter that the wife must not have used the night before, some hamburger in the fridge, and thought that I was golden. I fired up the stove and did my brown the hamburger and put in the taco mix thing.

Now, me being the natural bunny-humping hippie that I am, I decided to use the toaster oven; instead of the regular oven, to crisp the taco shells. I was trying to save the world by not wasting all that precious natural gas, you know.

Well, that would have been fine except for the fact that I had grabbed a beer and flopped down on the couch to watch Sportscenter. After having worked a 18-20 day (no joke) the day/night before, its safe to say that I was lethargic, to say the least. I didn't fall asleep, per say, but the next thing that I know I smelled smoke.

I reluctantly pulled my fat ass off of the couch and walked into the kitchen. What I saw woke me up quite quick.

There was a bonfire happening in my toaster oven!

Of course, after seeing this possible disaster unfolding before my eyes, I did the correct thing and opened up the door on the front of the toaster oven to get a closer look.

Good god, I'm stupid.

I swear that it made a "whooshing" noise as I opened it up and the oxygen hit the flames. The flames got so high that they actually left soot marks on the cupboards above the toaster oven.

I, being a man of action, ran around in a few panicky circles and then got myself together enough to realize that I might kill my family in their sleep with taco shells. Not the best way for them to go out.

This next part is 100% true, I swear!

I got my bearings enough to realize that I had to get the flaming box (formerly known as a toaster oven) out of the house. I grabbed some oven mitts, muckled onto the flaming bastard and headed for the nearest exit, which was the front door. Halfway there, my pride kicked in...

I couldn't let the neighbors see me out front with a flaming appliance, could I? Afterall, I am a respected member of my community and a known gourmet.

As I was holding this ball of what was now molten metal, I decided that it would best for me; not the family; if I put it out on the back deck. What I didn't know as I was sprinting to the back door was that it was locked. I actually had to set this fireball down on the floor, take the board out of the doorjam, unlock and open the slider and then throw it out.

Thankfully I did it with little more damage than a (slightly melted) spot on the carpet, one burn mark on the deck and one charred toaster oven.

The lesson here is that you wouldn't think that taco shells would burn so well, but they sure do. I'm using them in my next bomb!

---------------------------------------

The next instance of bad cookery was when we had our eldest sons 4th birthday. I was out fishing on a 6 day trip when the arrangements were made, so none of this is my fault.

As far as the food went, we were going to just do some hot dogs and hamburgers on the grill. My wife, in all of her infinite wisdom, decided to save some money and buy burgers in bulk. While that is not normally a bad thing, she thought that the "star" burgers looked especially good at BJ's.

Star burgers are in the shape of a star for the mental-midgets of the world. Once the star-shaped-burger turns into a... oh hell, I don't know.....NORMAL LOOKING HAMBURGER it is then supposed to be done.

Think about that.

In order for it to go from a star into anything that resembles a hamburger, something must need to be expunged from said patties. In this case (and all) that thing is fat!

Fat burns....and it burns quite well.

About 2 minutes after I fired up the grill we had 3 foot flames coming out of it. That led to several things that were previously known as "hamburgers" being turned into a chunks of asphault with steak tartar centers.

We didn't get many people showing up to the kids birthdays after that unless it was promised that I would be anywhere else besides at the grill.

The Drunken Boob (no, not me)

When I worked on the party boats, we often ran different types of trips. Out of the four boats that the company owned, one (The Thumper) was designated specifically for charters. I worked on that boat for two years and usually the charters were great. Since everyone knew everyone there would be no disagreements and there would also be tons of food for not only them, but us as well. Usually, it was smooth sailing.

Sometimes, they weren't so good. Especially when they showed up on a bus together. That usually spelled trouble and meant that they had been drinking for the whole ride. Those ones usually sucked.

One year I found myself working on a different boat, the White Star. Our usual bag was doing 1/2 day cod and mackerel trips and then switching over to 1/2 day bluefish trips when they showed up. You tend to get into kind of a rhythm after a while. You also get a lot of regular customers and we were no exception. A couple of my favorites were Grits (I have already mentioned him in another post) and his partner in crime, Buzz.

Buzz is the type of guy that will give you his last dollar if you need it, but he would also pound the living shit out of you if he thinks that you have crossed him or his friends. He wasn't very tall, but he was strong as hell and a few jailhouse tattoos, so no one fucked with him much.

For some reason or another, one day we found ourselves being responsible for a charter trip. Buzzy had shown up not knowing that and was bummed that he couldn't go with us since, as a rule, we kept freebies off of the boat when we had a charter. Hell, they had paid for the whole boat and that was what they were going to get. So, we ended up asking the "head" of the charter if Buzzy could come. He was an awfully nice guy and agreed quickly. It's a good thing that he did.

The trip started out normally enough but became more interesting as the day went on...

I first noticed the "Drunken Boob" (referred to as TDB from here on out) when he got on the boat. Nothing terribly out of the ordinary, but he did stumble a bit while getting on board. When you see that, you tend to keep an eye on someone. We have had too many problems w/drunks in the past (fistfights, throwing things over the side, harassing other passengers...etc) to not be so wary.

TDB started acting a little funny at about the one-hour mark. He would stumble around looking lost, hat cocked sideways, confused. After the 2nd stop of the day I knew that he was drunk, we just didn't know how. He hadn't come in to buy any beer from our galley-girl.

We have to do cooler checks before every trip to make sure that no one is sneaking booze on board. We hadn't found any in his but after talking to him briefly, I decided to check again. I normally just poke around to find anything obvious and I would also occasionally taste/smell whatever was in any of those drink containers.

I knew I had to look a little harder in his.

After some quick rummaging, and with him leering at me, I noticed that he had some soda at the bottom of the cooler. Now, anyone who has ever had a Jack and Coke knows about the weird foam that forms at the top. It looks like soda foam, but not quite. And with me being an accomplished alcoholic at that point (age 17), I saw it right away.

The bastard had a 6-pack of 16oz cokes mixed with Jack Daniels (half and half I later found out) with 2 already having been consumed.

Me-Hey, I have to take these away.

TDB- (slurring) c'mon man, there's nothing in those

me- is it Jack or Jim Beam?

TDB- (proudly) I only drink Jack!

Me-you just told me that there wasn't anything in there

TDB- (muttering to himself) qvceysjiqjy qchiqcs ssqvy......

me- what was that?

TDB- nothing.... nothing...no problem man, you're just doing your job

I thought that would be the end of it, but it wasn't.

I had kept both my captain (Ron) and my best friend/co worker (Billy) appraised of TDB situation the whole morning, as I had been the only one to deal with him. That's what makes this next part so weird.

TDB must have guzzled those jack and cokes because he was convinced, and I mean convinced, that Billy was the one who took his booze. Even after I had told him repeatedly that it was me. He just wasn't listening.

You need to understand that the only thing that Billy and I have in common is that we are on the same earth. He has dark brown hair; I have beautiful cascading locks of gold (at least I did when I was younger). He has glasses, I have hawk-like vision. He has brown eyes; I have eyes the heavenly blue color of the clearest skies and the deepest oceans. He has often had to avoid the fashion police from locking him up so he won't injure anymore defenseless clothes; I was nattily attired in my Sunday best jeans and t-shirt ensemble. You get the point.

The booze was hitting TDB pretty good by now and he was becoming obnoxious and belligerent.... much like my normal self, actually. TDB was mouthing off to Billy, throwing bait over the side, and telling everyone within earshot how much that we sucked. He kept grabbing the fish that people were catching around him and slamming them off the wall, just to make a mess. He was trying (and once was successful) to hit Billy in the head with the fish as well. That part was actually quite funny, although I could never figure out why Billy didn't agree. Anyways...

At this point Billy and I were starting to get pretty pissed. Like I said, my captain knew what was going on the whole trip. During a short ride between stops TDB started giving me some more shit and it was all I could do not to tell him to go fuck himself and throw him over the side right then.... but, the customer is always right, you know.

A little later on he finally crossed the line. He told me that he was going to "Jump that lil bastard that took my booze in the parking lot when we get in"

Not smart.

I passed that along to old captain Ron and asked for permission to pound his face in when we got in. He eagerly said "Absolutely...just make sure that you do it in the parking lot." He also gave us the green light to stop taking shit from him.

It was like we had our 500lb shackles removed! It's not often that you get to tell a customer what you think, when you think it. Anyone who had/has a job that deals with the public knows exactly what I am talking about. God, it still makes me smile thinking about it now.

Needless to say, we got into a few colorful exchanges every time that he spoke. Always away from other passengers.... I am the consummate pro, you know. He tried to take a swing at me up on the bow between stops, but he was so drunk that I just stepped back and he fell on his face. I believe that I consumed my entire lunch from the time that he started swinging to the time it actually got to where my face had been a few minutes earlier.

On the way home he kept telling us that he was going to "kill both of you bastards" every chance that he got. So when we got in it is fair to say that we were pretty fired up.

Now, I'm no tough guy. I prefer to stay out of fights because I don't like breaking people's hands with my face. I'm just too damn pretty for that. But I was ready for this one. It's not often that you get to take out your work-related frustrations with the source of them.

Right after we got tied up, TDB hopped the rail, said "see you punks in a minute" and charged up to the parking lot. We had to stay behind and make sure that everyone got off of the boat safely. That damn "consummate pro/dedicated employee" thing again. Right as the last person touched the dock we went sprinting up the ramp into the parking lot looking for some fun.

Nothing.

He was nowhere to be found.

I think it was the first time that I wasn't relieved to not do something that could have possibly hurt me.

As we were looking around, confused, the lady that owns a tackle shop/fuel dock business came out and said she had something for Billy. It was $50. She said some guy came in, handed her the fifty and said to tell the kid with the glasses (for the 100th time..it wasn't him who took the booze dipshit!) on the boat "no hard feelings".

So, with nobody to pound on, we wandered back down to the boat and told everyone that had hung around to watch what a pussy he was and all that other manly shit that we always say.

What we didn't know was that Buzz (remember him?) had grabbed him in the parking lot, threw him against a car and put the fear of God into him. He had said something along the lines of "If you touch either one of those kids, I'll show you what we do to guys like you in prison."

We never heard from that guy again and Buzz never mentioned it.


I'll tell you one thing...if that were me that Buzz had grabbed, I would have left us $100.

Simply Amazing

My beloved New England Patriots just won the Super Bowl for the 3rd time in 4 years.

Wow.

I don't even know what to think.

I almost feel guilty.

Between the Red Sox winning the World Series and these guys it feels like an embarrassment of riches. Now I know what it is like to be a Yankee fan. Well, how they must have felt about 5 years ago.

(Year-two-thou-sand!....clap! clap! clap clap clap!)

Sorry, I couldn't help myself.

After watching the Patriots be the laughing stock of football for the better part of 30 years, this is truly amazing. I'll tell you one thing, I'm savoring every fucking moment of this. As the Red Sox have shown, it may be a little while until you get back to the big game. If they don't get to the Super Bowl for the next ten years, I'll be happy. I'll still bitch about them constantly (some things never change) but I'll be content.

The scary part about these Patriots is that they will be returning virtually the whole team next year and Mr. Brady won't turn the ripe old age of 28 until August. Hopefully they will get my other man-crush Adam Vinatieri signed quickly. He has become such a money kicker that it's actually noteworthy when he misses in a key situation. I really don't want anyone else to have a chance to make him an offer that he can't refuse. That would blow monkees.


Man, it doesn't seem like it was that long ago that I drove the 2 hours down to Foxboro to watch a 2-14 team lose a 6-0 game in 10 degree temperatures. It ended up being the smallest crowd in the history of the Patriots. I believe the crowd that day was an announced 5,500 people. I think it was closer to 2,500 of us morons sitting there freezing to death. We all cozied up against one another in what essentially was a 70,000 seat (I use that term loosely, they had metal bleachers...seriously) high school stadium to watch "our team" suck all over the place.

Another game that I went to it was actually so quiet that we could hear the phones ringing on the bench as the coordinators from upstairs phoned down to the players. And, you could hear the players talking on them!

Yep, we were one world class organization.

Now we have a new state-of-the-art stadium with a great owner. The best coach of his day and the winningest quarterback in the world. Players are actually wanting to play here and taking discounts to do it.

The New England Patriots have just won back-to-back championships and the Red Sox are World Series champs.

It's like living in Bizarro world.

Clipped Wings...

Here's the story, about a man named Brady...
who is shining up 3 very lovely rings,
the first one that we won...was not expected
two more times he made us kings

here's the story, of a man named Bruschi...
we are thankful for the defense all his own
eleven men...tackling together
scoring touchdowns all their own

till the one day when we traded for C. Dillon
we couldn't even run for our lunch
Bill Belichick would make us win together
that's how we all became the "Krafty Bunch"

The Krafty Bunch....(duh duh duh)
The Krafty Bunch.... (duh duh duh)
That's the way we all became the Krafty Bunch






Would anyone like "Kraft" cheese on that?

The Love Shack

The love shack was a crappy beach apartment that three guys I worked with on the party boats rented for 3 or 4 summers in a row.

A couple redeeming qualities that it had were that it was walking distance to the pier (always a plus on those "late" nights) and it was located right on the Hampton Beach strip. Well, as close to the front of the strip as possible.

The strip is basically a 2-mile, 2 lane, one-way oval and we were right near the turnaround. The traffic would get backed up in front of the house every weekend as well a few weekdays to boot.

Well, as you can imagine, we did some interesting stuff there. There were usually a minimum of 5 drunken boobs present at any given moment and sometimes there would even be some real boobs there. Not often, but occasionally.

I thought that I would share a few of the better "moments" that we had over the years.

One of the times that stick out in particular was when Mike (one of the renters and the supposed older, responsible one at the ripe old age of 22) purchased a water balloon launcher. It was one of those big ones that need you need three guys to use. Of course for safety's sake, we test fired it a few times before too many witnesses....err, I mean people were around and then waited for the right moment the unleash the beast.

That right moment came, of course, after the first case of beer had been destroyed one evening. We started off innocently enough by launching some over the house behind us to the backed up traffic and numerous pedestrians about 150 feet away on the front of the strip. The best part is that we were close enough to hear the people getting nailed, along with the subsequent yelling, but far enough away that there was no way they could see where it came from.

After a couple of psychotic, soaking wet guys came looking for..."Those frickin' assholes that we's gunna kill!"

Me- (pointing down the street) must've been those guys a few houses down, those college pricks

.... we took a bit of a break.

Then the traffic backed up.

Someone (wasn't me.... it never is) thought that it would be funny to fill the balloons up with beer and milk and then start firing again. Except this time while we were setting up, my friend Joe got my attention before anything had actually become airborne.

Well look at this.... Joe pointed down the street to a firebird with a t-top that looked an awful lot like this group of assholes that had been throwing shit at us every time that they cruised by all night long... for no reason, I might add. While we were slightly irked by this, we had no plans to go looking for them.

Then there they were. Stuck in traffic and only about 75 yards away.

What a target of opportunity!

After some quick discussion as to who was going to do the launching and who was going to give the coordinates, we got into position.

ready..

aim..

fire!

dammit, we missed! it hit the ground about 10 feet away

let's try again....

ready..

aim..

fire!



This one looked good right out of the launcher and I knew it would be close. It had a real nice arc to it and some decent velocity.

splat!!

That thing went right in through the t-top, hit the front dash and douched the shit out of them and their car.

It could very well be the greatest shot that I have ever seen. I probably couldn't have duplicated in 50 tries. Just complete, and total shit-luck.

I ended up laughing so hard I thought that I was having some sort of seizure.

The surprising part of the whole thing was that they never got out of the car. They swore in our general direction, but there were so many people around that I don't think they saw us do it. The traffic ended up moving anyways and they had to move their car. It's probably a good thing because I'm a big pussy and they most likely would have kicked my ass.

I don't know why, but we never saw them cruise by again that night.

Good times, good times.




Another thing that you never wanted to do while at the Love Shack was fall asleep (some would argue that it was passing out) or you would end up getting something done to you. Not that, you pervs.

The last night that Mike was going to be with us, he passed out early. He was never much of a drinker.

After doing the usual stuff to him -- tie his leg to a chair with 30 feet of fishing line so he would fall as he was halfway down the stairs, put makeup all over his face, steal all of his clothes (he used to sleep in the nude, don't ask me how I know), etc-- we were bored.

It was then that I remembered that he had to get up early the next morning and take off immediately to make it in time for school in Mass. So, I figured that I would give him one more going away gift.... we would pack for him!

Knowing that the furniture wasn't his, we proceeded to take every piece of furniture that wasn't nailed down -- and some that were -- and piled them on his car anyways. We didn't think that we needed to tie anything down or stack it on any particular way, we just heaped the shit up.

The furniture that made it on the car consisted of two full sized couches, several lamps, two end tables, two small dressers, two beds (he was sleeping in the other), one easy chair w/ ottoman, one-kitchen table w/4 chairs, and the fridge. There were also some random items like clothes, trashcans, and a picnic table that we found in the neighbor's yard out back thrown in for good measure.

The fridge ended up being the hardest, not because we had to drag it upstairs out onto the roof and set it kind of half-on-half-off of the car to keep everything from falling down, but because it was so heavy and threatened to cave in the roof of his car. But after some adjustments, all was well. The pile ended up about.... now, I’m guessing here....maybe 12 feet tall. I was standing on the apartment roof and it was about eye-level with me, so it might have been a little taller.

I thought that what we accomplished was an engineering marvel worthy of worldwide praise and possibly some prestigious awards.

Mike apparently didn't agree with me.

He left me, and only me, a nasty message before he left the next day. I believe that is consisted of ripping my spine out through my throat and sodomizing me with it, but I didn't pay too close attention. I don't know why he thought someone as innocent as I would do anything like that. And even if I were to do something like that, I sure as hell couldn't get the fridge on top of a pile that high without some help from....say, oh, I don't know, his brother.

The funniest part was driving to work the next morning and seeing the whole thing from about 1/2 mile away. As I got closer I could see a despondent Mike just sitting on the porch blankly staring at this pile of furniture where his car used to be. I made sure to look the other way when I passed so that my ear-to-ear grin wouldn't set him off like the incredible hulk, or something.

Thankfully, when I got in from the morning trip at noon he was gone.

All that was left was some scattered pieces of wood, a cracked kitchen table-top, one kitchen chair (bent) and an open fridge tipped over on its side with seagulls picking through the remnants.

I think that he might have been upset.

Ps- If I can find the picture, I'll post it