I once saw someone's doorway display the tough guy placard: "These premises are protected by Smith and Wesson." As I've gotten older, I've come to the conclusion that my memory is protected by amnesia.
Upon sitting on the bench outside The Christmas Tree store in the Cape Cod Mall in Hyannis and seeing my wife come out pushing a shopping cart with a few items, notably, and quite visibly, two packages, each with four lighted candy canes that were "on sale," I had to remark:
"Don't we have enough of those?"
"Don't you remember, last year you said you wanted to get two more packages so you could stretch them the width of the front yard?"
"No."
"Well, you did."
"If you say so."
Actually, we must not have really gotten too many things because it didn't take us very long to unload the car this time.
We never pass up looking into a bookstore, and there were two on Nantucket that we passed. We've been through here a few times before, so we weren't complete newbies.
Without searching for anything specific, I bought a paperback copy of Carl Hiaasen's "Strip Tease," apparently one of his many books on the machinations of Florida citizens who manage to live just beyond imminent incarceration that I haven't already read.
I checked the copyright year and it says 1993. I didn't give it any immediate thought at the time, but as I make my way through the story of the lunatic politician who whacks someone over the head in a tittie bar—firmly believing that the very drunk groom-to-be is somehow bothering the stripper Erin who he of course is infatuated with, and who of course has a daughter who the courts have awarded custody to her cheating husband, who for a living steals and sells wheelchairs from hospitals and nursing homes to support his cocaine addiction—managing to nearly put the poor schmo in the morgue—I realize that I'm not going to read about anyone getting in touch with anyone via a cell phone, texting LOL, TTUL, or FOMO, or anyone who will be ordering anything from Amazon via the Internet, because guess what, it's 1993 and those kinds of things weren't happening then. It's almost like watching one of those Throne episodes where there's no electricity and everyone seems to have a sword.
To me, no one can economize on words as well as Mr. Hiaasen as when he tells us that Orly, the manager of the Eager Beaver tittie bar, wears enough cologne to "gas termites." The fragrance coming from the guy is more effective than Listerine on bacteria.
When Erin tries to trap her ex by setting up a pretext meeting to lure him into the open to buy stolen wheelchairs, the bouncer at the Eager Beaver, Shad, signs on to help her. He is a little confused why the ex, Darrell Grant, doesn't just steal cars. Why bother with wheelchairs?
Erin explains, "because he couldn't hotwire a goddam toaster." We all should pay attention to our abilities.
I'm only part way through the book. I'm still finishing up 'Prisoners of the Castle,' a story by Ben Macintyre about the POWs that were kept in a Nazi castle prison, Colditz, until the end of the war.
Years and years ago I remember reading an obit about the passing of one of the prisoners who was instrumental in getting a glider built under the noses of the guards. The plan was to launch it with two occupants by getting a bathtub filled with cement, attached to the front of he glider and get it to drop off a ramp tp give the glider the needed forward momentum to catch the updrafts to land beyond the prison walls.
I looked up the NYT obituary for that prisoner, Lorne Welch, who passed away in 1998 at 81. It was a pleasant surprise to see it had been written by the redoubtable Robert Mcg. Thomas Jr. who is still sorely missed.
As for Carl Hiaasen's book 'Strip Tease,' I will get back to it as the war is over for the prisoners of Colditz. It will only be then I learn the fates of Erin, the only decent dancer at the Eager Beaver, Congressman David Dilbeck, who seriously clunked the bachelor party bridegroom over the head, the resolution of the custody battle for Erin's daughter Alice with her ex husband Darrell Grant, the Congressman's fixer, "Malcolm Moldowsky, "Moldy," and his ability to make sure the electorate doesn't learn of Dilbeck's behavior until after the upcoming election, and perhaps best of all, whether Shad can successfully bring a phony product liability suit against a yogurt maker for the dead roach that was found in his yogurt, a roach that to no one's surprise if you knew Shad, that he himself placed there with precision. Perhaps you can fool some of the people some of the time
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