Are You Kidding, The Floor's Still Wet 

    
From Uncle Vellanoff's Journal

   In one town, we got acquainted with the chief of police. He had done more than his share to see that the crowds that came to the theater every night behaved themselves. In some towns this wasn’t the case. 
   To show our appreciation we took him out to dinner one evening, and during the meal he told us several stories about being a policeman in Wichita. 
    One story had to do with a patrolman who, when he called the station, was given the assignment of answering a call from a lady who claimed to have shot her husband because he walked on her wet just mopped floor. 
    After a bit, the patrolman called back and the captain asked him if he had arrested the lady. The patrolman answered, “Are you kidding, the floor’s still wet.” 

   Speaking of strange women, well, maybe not so strange, but this was a couple who traveled with the show. The husband played several instruments in our small orchestra, and she worked on costumes. Anyway, it seems that in one of their trunks, she had a small box that she told her husband never to open. Never! 
    A little background here, as the police chief explained, might help. When this couple was married, the bride’s mother had her promise never to tell her husband that he was wrong about anything. Instead, if the situation came up where he was wrong, she should just knit, or something similar, and keep her mouth shut. 
    This lady became ill and had to seek medical help, which turned into a stay in the hospital. For a couple days, her making it out of the hospital alive was in question. During this time, she told her husband to bring her the box, which he did. She told him to open it. Inside he found a partially knit sweater and $95,000 dollars. The husband was flabbergasted. After she told him about her promise to her mother he felt rather proud of himself because obviously, he had not often been wrong if she was only able to knit part of a sweater. 
    But the money puzzled him, so he asked, “Where did this $95,000 come from?” “Oh,” she said, “that’s from selling sweaters.”

A New Business Is Born 

   First a little background: At the San Francisco International Airport the local SPCA furnishes animals for passengers to interact with. Why? “To help ease the stress of travel.” They’ve used cats, dogs, rabbits, chinchillas, a bearded dragon, a turtle, guinea pigs, and a Moluccan cockatoo. These therapy animals, called the “Wag Brigade”, wear vests that say “Pet Me”. 
    According to Daniel Uria who filed this story, passengers are surprised, well I guess they would be, and delighted to meet these members of the Wag Brigade. 
    The newest member of the Brigade is Lilou the pig. Now you need to understand that not just any old pig can waltz in and be part of this elite Wag Brigade. Lilou had to go through extensive Animal Assisted Therapy training, which we’re told she passed with flying colors. She practiced on several different facilities to show off the tricks she could do, and people loved her so much that she evidently graduated to the gig at the airport. 
    Daniel Uria quotes Animal Assisted Training Therapy Mentor, Dianne Bates, as saying, "Most people have never had the opportunity to meet a pig,” (hard to believe), “and literally everyone wanted to interact with her." 
    Now for the business plan. I can see some old guy, possibly tired of retirement, leasing above-average pigs from pig farmers, training them, then leasing them to airports. The marketing pitch would be the cost effectiveness of less stressful passengers passing through their airport. Less stressful passengers equate to fewer disgruntled customer lawsuits for both the airport and the airlines. These pigs would improve the bottom line for everyone, especially the old man who is going to be working this scheme.     Now all we need to do is find an old man gullib---I mean astute enough---to try this amazing idea. The royalties due me would be minimal.

From My Uncle Vellanoff’s Journal Never Rob This Bank On Tuesdays 

    We were playing at the Edgewood Theater in Blue Gill, Florida. The producer paid us on Tuesdays for our previous weeks work, so on that day some of us would go to the nearest bank and turn our checks into cash, before moving on to a Post Office where we would get money orders, to send home or to pay bills, etc. 

    On this Tuesday, three of us had walked from our hotel a couple blocks to the Blue Gill State Bank -- Larry, Janet, and I. (Larry did a ventriloquist act at which he was very good, and Janet was a dancer.) 

    When we walked inside the bank we found the place to be rather busy. And by the looks of the uniforms, several of the customers were policemen. 

    Janet stepped up to the window, and was just in the process of handing over her check when four guys came bursting through the front door. They were all wearing masks, baseball caps, and carrying guns. The first guy through the door fired a shot into the ceiling and yelled, “This is a hold up, everybody down on the . . .” 

    His speech and forward motion came to a sudden stop as he looked around and saw the uniforms. His companions piled into his back. They were confused, and obviously disappointed at finding themselves sharing the premises with so many police. 

    There were some mumbled curses from the robbers. The leader lifted his cap off his head, reached behind him and hit one of his fellow robbers over the head, while giving him some instructions. 

   If the police had responded quickly they probably could have stopped these guys. However, they seemed as surprised as the rest of us, and didn’t move. The robbers got themselves sorted out and the leader yelled again, “Down on the floor!” 

   It turned out that there was a police station right across the street from the bank and that yesterday was the day the policemen got their checks for the previous two-week’s work. It was easy for them to step across the street and do their banking. What neither we nor the robbers knew was that some of the customers were plain-clothes detectives, but to a casual observer they looked just like other civilians. 

    So what these robbers had was a bunch of bank customers of whom probably fifteen were carrying guns of their own. 

    After the last yelled demand by the leader of this gang, and after he had fired his shotgun and demolished a wall clock on the back wall of the bank, we all settled down on the floor. 

   One of the robbers said, “Well, Joe, that was a dumb thing to do, now we can’t tell what time it is.” 

   Joe turned on the speaker and hissed, “Jerry, don’t use my name, and what? you’ve got someplace you gotta be?” 

   Another robber asked with a chuckle, “Joe, did you pick this bank because of the police being here, or are they just a bonus?” 

    “Bill, just keep your eyes on them, and save the comic remarks for later, okay?” 

    We started to get the impression that this bunch was not well organized, nor too bright. They still had guns aimed at us, so our impressions were not worth much. 

    About this time the front door opened and two more uniformed policemen came strolling in or at least started to--- but when they saw people on the floor and masked guys with guns, they quickly came to the conclusion that something was not right. They turned and dove out the door followed by two shotgun blasts, one of which blew all the glass out of one-half of the front door and all over the two prone policemen. The other blast blew out one of the front windows. It was comforting to see that these Blue Gill police were so quick to figure things out. 

    The two officers scrambled on hands and knees to the sidewalk and around the corner, and disappeared. In two more minutes, there were probably two dozen cops out front of the bank with guns leveled at the front door.         Pretty soon we heard somebody saying over a loudhailer, “This is the police.” (I guess just in case the robbers thought all the men in blue, with their guns pointing at the door, were a bunch of streetcar conductors). “Lay down your guns and come out with your hands above your heads.” 

    In response, one of the robbers shot out another of the bank’s front windows. The leader was first astounded, then angry. “Bill, what are you doing? You think they’re gonna go away because you shot out the window?” Then even louder, “Nobody shoots anything---well, except maybe people---unless I tell you to. Got that?” Bill, Jerry, and the fourth robber who hadn’t been identified yet, mumbled that next time they were gonna elect a new leader. We figured it was only a matter of time before we knew the first name of the fourth, and so far, unidentified, robber. 

    Up to this point, no one had said anything about money, which we guessed was what the robbers were there for. Suddenly the leader realized this. Approaching the first teller he demanded, “Empty your cash drawer into this satchel.” She did. He looked as only a handful of bills fluttered to the bottom of his bag. He looked around and said, “What’s the deal, is this a real bank or what?” 

    He went down the line and got the same result with the other three tellers. Then grabbing the Bank Manager by the back of his collar, he demanded, “Let’s look in the vault.” 

    The Bank Manager led him into the vault. After about twenty seconds, we heard a loud wail. The leader, who we had learned was named Joe, came running out. He looked around frantically, then yelled, “This is the poorest excuse for a bank I’ve ever seen!”

    Bill asked, “So how much have we got?”

    “Oh, maybe ten grand.” 

    “And that’s how much? I keep forgetting,” asked the unidentified one. 

    Adam, how many times do we gotta tell you, a grand is one thousand dollars.” (Now we knew the name of the hitherto unidentified guy.) 

    Adam’s eyes got big, “And we have a couple of those? WOW!” 

    By this time, several of the policemen were snickering. 

    Joe was mumbling, “Next time I’ve got to get a better crew.” 

    One of the policemen raised his hand, cleared his throat to get the attention of the robbers, and when that was accomplished said, “I’m Mel Gibbons, a police officer, maybe I can help.” 

    Joe, aimed his shotgun directly at police officer Gibbons and said, “Who asked you?”       Mel hadn’t been shot yet so pushed on. “Joe, you’re in more trouble than you can imagine.” 

    “How can we be in trouble? We have the guns, and all of you are lying on the floor, so why are we the ones with the problem.”

   “Well,” Mel said, “you guys are trapped in this bank, with not much money to show for your efforts; and talking about guns, you have about twenty-four guns out there waiting for y’all to show yourselves so they can blow you away. To me that sounds like a problem.”

    Bill, Jerry, and Adam were nodding their heads. Jerry offered his opinion, “Joe, he makes sense.” 

    Joe shouted, “I’m the one in charge of this robbery. We’ll do what I say. This cop just wants us to give ourselves up, and go to jail, is that what you want?” he asked his coworkers. By this time he was shouting. 

    In all this the four robbers never dropped their vigilance. They kept us customers well aware that they had the guns. I was lying next to Larry, and whispered to him, “Could you do a ghost, or several ghosts, here in the bank?” He assured me that it would be piece of cake. 

    I raised my hand, “Sir,” addressing Joe, “with all the shooting and shouting, you might have disturbed the ghosts that are believed to haunt this bank. I’ve been told that they can be mean when bothered.” 

    Joe laughed, and said with a sneer, “That’s a lot of bunk. Nobody believes in ghosts.” 

    Just then an eerie voice came out of the vault saying, “Who is this that’s shouting and shooting and disturbing our peace?” 

    Joe and his three helpers, as well as all of us on the floor, whirled around and stared at the vault. 

    While the vault had their attention, I took off a shoe and tossed it behind the teller cages, where it made a clattering sound. Everyone turned in that direction. The next eerie voice came from that location. “Yes, who is so careless as to bother our rest?” 

    Then the voice from the vault chimed in, “Ah, I see who it is. It’s Adam. He’s let Joe talk him into doing something stupid.” 

     White faced, Adam squeaked, “Joe, let’s get out of here, I don’t like this.” 

    Joe sneered and said, “It’s just someone in the vault I didn’t see; watch this.” And Joe walked over to the door of the vault and fired three loads of buckshot into the all steel vault. We could hear little lead balls ricocheting around. In the midst of that was Joe saying, “Ouch, oh, ouch, and several four-letter words. Joe backed out of the vault wiping blood off several superficial wounds he had sustained. This did nothing to improve his mood. 

    Bill asked, “So, did you kill the ghost?” He was trying not to laugh. 

    Joe opened his mouth to respond, but another voice beat him to it. This one came from the back of the bank in a different but still eerie, hollow sounding voice. 

     “Well, Joe, how did that work out for you?” followed by laughter. 

    Then a very loud voice full of authority came from the front of the bank, “Here come the cops!” 

    The four robbers, who had been looking toward the back of the bank trying to find the source for the voice, whirled around. Adam fired a shot through the front doors and one of the policemen in the street collapsed onto the pavement, holding his leg. 

    Whoever was in charge out there yelled, “Hold your fire!” 

    It was obvious that the robbers were scared. They were jumping around, wondering where the next voice would come from. 

    I whispered the next line to Larry. The quavering voice came out of the vault, “Gentlemen, for disturbing our peace one of you must pass over and join us.” 

    The four robbers got noticeably paler and looked at each other. Bill squeaked in a high-pitched voice, “Pass over?” Then after clearing his throat tried again, “Pass over?”     “Yeah, dummy, he means one of us has to die.” 

    “Are you kidding?” yelled Joe. “That can’t be right. I’m too young to die. I promised my Ma I’d rob fifty banks, and I’m only up to six---and I’m not sure this one counts.” 

    Another voice from behind the teller cages shouted out, “Let’s take Adam.” 

    The four spun around toward the sound of the voice. Once they digested what the voice had said, Bill said, talking to the bodiless voice behind the teller cages, “Well, if you insist, Adam would be a good choice.” 

    Joe and Jerry were nodding their heads. Adam, wailed, “But I donna wanna go.” 

    The voice from the back of the bank added, “And then for the other one we should take Jerry.” 

    Jerry jumped, whirled around and fired his shotgun toward the back of the bank. The load of buckshot hit the banks logo, which was hanging on a rock wall, knocking it down. The logo fell onto the manager’s desk, splitting it in two. 

    The voice said, “Well, nice going, Jerry. On second thought we don’t need jumpy people like you here, I suggest we take Joe instead.” 

    The other three voices agreed. 

    Jerry was ecstatic. Joe was shaking and jerking around, still trying to see the ‘ghosts’. 

    He yelled out, “I don’t want to go, what’s wrong with Jerry, or Bill, for that matter?” 

    Bill aimed his gun at Joe and shouted, “One more suggestion from you like that, you SOB, and I’ll help you cross over.” 

    Joe aimed his gun at Bill, and said, “Yeah, just try it and it will be the last thing you do.” 

    The voice from the vault shouted out, “Hey, you idiots, we’re going to take all four of you. It will take us forever to get over this disturbance. Either prepare yourselves to cross over and join us or get out of here. NOW!” 

    The four robbers bolted for the front door. One of the cops said, “If you run out there carrying those guns they’ll gun you down. 

     The robbers caught on quickly. They dropped their guns and with their hands in the air called out to the waiting police that they were unarmed and coming out. Then they eased out the front door. 

    Inside the bank we all slowly stood up, relieved that the ordeal was over. One of the detectives looked around and said, “Now all we need to do is figure out where those voices came from.” 

    The voice from the vault said, “Don’t bother, but if you want to see a good ventriloquist act, go see the show now playing at the Edgewood Theater.” 

    The police and other customers looked around and when what had happened started to sink in, they begin to laugh and applaud.

    Sure enough, all these people did attend the show, with their spouses and family members. Evidently they told their friends also. It was a nifty bit of advertising, but I wouldn’t recommend it as a normal way of attracting an audience. 

Many Are Called, But Few Are Chosen 

    Yesterday Lorraine was in the dining room looking out the window when she spotted a bird in the pond on the 15th fairway. She observed it for a while then called me to come and identify the thing. Now Lorraine is the bird identifier in this family, so if she’s stumped I don’t really have much of a chance. 
     This bird was at the outer edge of good binocular viewing. What I saw was a black duck-like bird, with grey sides, floating on the pond and occasionally diving. Not tipping, but diving. Of course, the dive happened just as I got the binoculars focused and then it would dive. When it surfaced, it would be in a new spot so the binoculars would need refocusing, and so on. 
    It’s good the bird was that far away, otherwise I’d have given serious thought to wringing it’s little neck. When the thing was on the surface and I was trying to focus, there was a mallard cavorting around between me and my target, which didn’t help. Next to the mallard my bird looked rather small. 
    I went through the book. Some birds I was able to eliminate immediately, such as Great Blue Herons and Bald Eagles, but seriously, most of the ducks got eliminated on my first sweep through the book. Then I went through it again, and once more. 
    Finally, we agreed to put in down as another mystery bird. 
    Mystery birds are those that you can put into some kind of broad classification but not really nail down to a specific bird. One requisite for being a mystery bird is that it looks like nothing in any of several of the most popular bird books. 
    Now a person can’t just glance at a bird and designate it as a mystery bird. There is a certain protocol that theoretically should be followed if a person is a serious mystery-bird birder. You have to spend enough time to note all the particular aspects of the bird in view, or as much as you can before it leaves for the next bush, tree, or county. Very few birds sit still for any length of time, and I guess we birders wouldn’t either if some big aggressive person, who depended on our bodies for food, was always lurking around. 
    Anyway, getting as many specifics like color, shape of the bill, head, body, color of everything, special features like size, what it’s doing, and about four dozen other specific things is important. 
    When you get to a bird book, and if you can’t find a bird with the list of specifics you’ve just spotted, then you possibly have yourself a mystery bird. Congratulations!
    Experience shows that most birders, unless they were lucky enough to find a bird in a cage, will only have time to note two or three of the specifics listed above, which actually makes it easier to fit into the mystery bird category. 
    Like I said earlier, birding, if done only for the bird count, can get rather frustrating and intense. That’s why birders are often seen pulling out a PEZ® dispenser and popping a few Valiums. 
    Lorraine and I have compiled an impressive list of mystery birds. We have traveled all over the U.S., or most of it, including Hawaii, seeking out mystery birds. We’ve been to Canada, Mexico, St. Thomas, Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico, the Bahamas, Costa Rico, Brazil, Europe, New Zealand, Taiwan, and Japan. A few of these destinations were not specifically birding trips, but even so we usually managed to stumble on some mystery birds. 
   A mystery-bird list looks something like this: the date, location, the specific characteristics, and then these notations. It wasn’t a _____, it wasn’t a _______, it wasn’t a _____. The blanks of course contain the names of specific birds that your mystery bird looks something like, but isn’t. 
    Our life list of mystery birds is impressive. A list such as ours is not acquired without dedication, perseverance, and a somewhat slovenly approach to bird watching in general. Even then it can be a lot of hard work. If you’re not ready to take this attitude toward mystery-bird watching, then maybe mystery-bird watching isn’t for you.

Animals and Thespians 
    [Editor’s note – once again I must add that I’ve seen some of these stories or variations of them outside Vellanoff’s Journal. Where they actually originated is a good question.]

Zoo Animals 
    While playing in the small city of West Burg, Missouri, the parents of our director and his brother, the producer, were killed in an unfortunate gas explosion which leveled half of their New York apartment building. They lived in the wrong half. The brothers left immediately for New York. We were to stay in Missouri until they got back, after which the tour would continue. It was going to be at least ten days. 
    In the first two days we exhausted all the cultural opportunities in West Burg, and I mean all. The last such opportunity was the city zoo. The zoo manager was enamored with the theater, had seen our show, and was still delighted to show us around. 
    When we finished he said, “Ah – folks – you are actors, and the zoo needs a couple actors.” He went on to explain that on occasion the zoo lost an animal due to sickness or death. When that happened they would put someone in an animal costume and put that person in the cage so people could see something. The costumed person was supposed to act as much like the original occupant as possible. That’s where the acting came in. 
    We were flabbergasted as we had never heard of anything like this before. A couple of the younger members of the troupe, Joe and Avery, decided to help this zoo manager and play the part of his now dead gorilla. 
    The first day it went fine. Each in turn would don the gorilla costume and cavort around the gorilla enclosure, trying to act as much like the original occupant as possible. On the second day Joe, who was very athletic and somewhat of an acrobat acted the part so well that he drew a large crowd. While swinging around on some bars and tree limbs in the enclosure he slipped and tumbled into the lion’s den. 
    Joe was petrified. The lion came over, sniffed him, and let out with a weak roar. Joe started screaming for help. The lion pounced on him and said, “Will you shut up, you’re going to get us both fired.”

Mongoose, Mongeese? 
    Like I’ve mentioned before, we had a gentleman who had a number of trained dogs, and together they did an act. It was quite popular. The man, Sam, was always looking for new ways to improve his routine. At one time he tried a couple cats, but they didn’t seem to care if his act was successful or not. They didn’t seem to care what Sam wanted them to do. They didn’t seem to care whether they were even there or not, well---at least until mealtime. Finally, they ended up as sort of decorations in the act, just laying around where the audience could see them. Every once in a while Sam would order them to do something, and their obvious disinterest in complying seemed to give the audience as much pleasure as if they had actually done something. 
    One of Sam’s great ideas was that he needed a couple more animals that could be trained. So he sat down to order a mongoose. Actually, he needed two of the things. So he was filling out the order and asked us how to spell the plural of mongoose. We didn’t know. We tried “Mongooses, mongeese, mongeeses, who knew?” Nothing sounded right. 
    So finally Sam, after waving us off, wrote, “Send me one mongoose and while you’re at it, send me another one.” 

Rex, The Wonder Dog 
    Back to Beth and her dog Rex. One day she arrived at the theater all excited. She showed us an ad in a newspaper. “Learn the IQ of your dog. Send me $4.99 and I will send you my doggy IQ test by return mail.” 
    We laughed at the very idea, but Beth was dead serious. She had always assumed that Rex was very intelligent. So, against our advice, she sent the money and got back the reply.       She came into the theater with Rex in tow, waving an envelope. “It came,” she shouted. “Now we’ll see how smart he really is.” 
    She opened the envelope and read the note inside which said, “I can assume that if you sent me $4.99 for a dog IQ test your dog is smarter than you.” We wanted to laugh, but refrained in deference to her. It was a couple months before she could enjoy the humorous side of that incident.


Danger! Beware of Dog!

During our time playing at the Kentucky Theater, in Hazard, Kentucky, we had a free day so several of were out exploring the area. We came up to a crossroads out in the hills where there was a country store. We needed some lunch so went inside to see what they had. As we climbed up on the porch, we saw this sign, “Danger! Beware the Dog!”

We eased open the door and cautiously entered the store. We spotted a large dog, lying in the middle of the center aisle, looking to be sound asleep. And the dog looked old. As we looked closer we wondered if the thing was even alive.

As we got closer the dog raised its head, thumped its tail on the floor, and went back to sleep.

We asked the owner, “Sir,” and pointing to the sleeping dog asked, “is that the dangerous dog.”

“That is,” answered the owner.

“So why the danger sign?”

“People kept tripping over him.” 

From Uncle Vellanoff’s Journal 

    Recently I had some time to get back into my Uncle Vellanoff’s journal. Much of it has to do with his day-to-day life, but occasionally he ran into some interesting situations. 
    The following is one entry.

    In our travels, we ran into lots of interesting people. Most of them were, and probably still are, very nice. One such case was in Dixon City, Louisiana. 
    The troupe was playing the Majestic Bayou Theater. It was a three-week engagement. We did shows Friday nights, a matinee and an evening show on both Saturdays and Sundays. We had most of the week to ourselves, except for some rehearsals and the time we spent developing new routines, which wasn’t that much.
    We found the Louisiana people warm, friendly, and easy to know. Besides, they seemed to like our show and packed the theater for every performance. 
    The first week we assumed the crowds attended because of our outstanding shows. But then we noticed that at every show there were quite a number of ‘amen’s’ shouted out, with an occasional ‘praise the Lord’ and a frequent ‘glory be’. 
    This puzzled us because very little of our material would normally elicit what you’d normally think of as a religious response. But we finally put that all together with the fact that on Tuesday and Wednesday evenings the theater was home to a home-town evangelist and his entourage. We concluded that some of our attendees thought they were there to see The Reverend Joe Bob Block. 
    Once we figured that out, we just had to attend to see what kind of show The Rev, as everyone called him, was putting on. One thing that piqued our curiosity was the fact that some people couldn’t seem to tell the difference between our and the Rev’s material.
    You might be wondering where someone who’s English is their second language came up with a word like ‘piqued’. Well, it so happens that we have an ex-English teacher traveling with us. She has a beautiful voice and does a great job singing in several of our routines. Anyway, every morning she gives me two new words that I’m supposed to use during the day.
    Several of us went to see The Rev, including my friends George, Harry, and his wife Pamela. 
    The evangelistic meeting turned out to be a great production. The Rev had a large choir, dressed in their purple robes with gold trim and those white scarf things that hang around the neck and come down over the singer’s chest. I don’t know what purpose they serve, but no good choir can seem to get by without them. 
    Beside the choir, a barbershop quartet, and a couple soloists, he has a small orchestra for back up. He also has a piano player who’s as good as any we’d heard. He can wind up a hymn to where the people are jiving in the aisles. 
    The Rev was dressed in a linen suit that was so white it almost hurt my eyes to look at him. He is about six foot four inches tall and has an athletic build. The ladies in the troupe agree that with his black hair and somewhat dark complexion, he is more than good looking. 
    Later we were to find out that he had played high school football for the Dixon City Panthers as their quarterback and his senior year they went on to win the state championship. After that, he went on to the University of Louisiana where in his junior and senior years he was quarterback of the Ragin’ Cajuns. Anyway, he was an imposing looking guy who had a charismatic way about him. 
    The whole program went off as slick as any commercial production we’d ever been involved in or seen. He wound up his congregation until they were hooting and hollering. ‘Amens’ and other shouts of religious exultation were coming from every corner of the theater. 
    I had just whispered to Pamela that The Rev should work in some miracles when several people who were on crutches went forward. When he laid hands on them, they seemed to be instantly healed. 
    One of the cripples came forward on crutches. The stairs leading up to the stage seemed to present a particular problem for him. Up to this point he had only been putting weight on his right foot. 
    Upon finally reaching the top step he stumbled and fell. The Rev’s assistants helped him up and he pressed on across the stage. The congregation rewarded his courage and determination with a round of applause. 
    On his journey across the stage we noticed he was putting weight only on his left foot. That’s the problem with hired help, some of them can’t keep straight which leg needs healing. 
    At least one other healing seemed blatantly staged, but who were we to know a miracle from a well-staged fake. However, we did know a good show when we saw one, and this one was great. 
    And then there was the blind man with a seeing-eye dog. The Rev gave the man a smack on his forehead while yelling, “Be healed!”
    The dog took exception to this cavalier treatment of his master, so with a lunge latched on to the closest person available, who was one of the The Rev’s helpers. This personage let out a yell and tried to kick the dog which wasn’t having any of it, and letting go of the helper’s arm, tore off one of the helper’s pants legs. 
     The blind man could now see, so he grabbed his dog’s harness and yelled, “Rex, heel!” Since the dog’s name was Oscar, this command had very little effect. A helper grabbed the dog and the healed blind man, and eased them both off the stage. 
    The bitten-one-legged-pants guy, who would rather have tried another kick-the-dog attempt, was hustled off the stage as well.
    All in all, these slight glitches fit into the overall program as seamlessly as if they had been scripted. 
    For those of us who weren’t caught up in the throes of religious ecstasy, it proved quite entertaining. 
    And let’s not forget the money. A good part of his short sermon was devoted to the financial requirements of his ministry. He pointed out the cost of all the humanitarian endeavors his group was involved in and the great need for cash to keep it all running smoothly. 
    He had several stories of how people who had made sizable sacrificial donations had been blessed so that their net worth was now many times what it had been before making their donation. 
    It was a blatant get-rich-quick pitch if we’d ever heard one, but done in good taste. It seemed to be effective, because as the deacons were passing the collection plates, people were putting in fistfuls of cash. 
     As we were leaving the theater, The Rev was greeting his congregation at the main door. I was the first of our troupe to leave. The Rev shook my hand and said, “Vellanoff Spady, I appreciate your being here this evening, and I must say, I really enjoyed the show you folks put on the other evening.” The fact that he knew and/or remembered my name impressed me. Beside being somewhat of a charlatan he was also a charmer. 
    He then introduced me to the woman who was standing by his side. “Mary Jane, this is Vellanoff Spady, and this is my wife, Mary Jane. Mr. Spady is part of the troupe that we saw in the show here Sunday evening.” 
     Mary Jane said, “Yes, I recognize him. Mr. Spady, it’s so nice to meet you, and I must say, watching your show almost made me wet my panties.” 
    Her language, especially coming from a preacher’s wife took us back a step, but as we got to know her better, we sort of got used to it. 
    Her accent was not Louisianan. When I asked, she explained that she had grown up in Kentucky, and the accent and vocabulary sort of stuck, even after she came out of the hills and hollers to get a master’s degree in business, and also her CPA. 
    Mary Jane, who was a tall, red-haired beauty, later explained to us that with her business acumen and her husband’s ability to “Talk a ‘coon out of a pine tree,” as she put it, they had done rather well. I asked her, “By ‘coon, you of course mean a raccoon?” 
    She blushed and said, “Well, sure, why not?” 
    I’m sort of getting ahead of myself here. As we were standing in the lobby of the theater, Mary Jane looked at her husband and getting a nod from him (evidently they communicated some agreement between them), she said, “Folks, we’d like to invite y’all to our place for lunch tomorrow. You don’t have a show and we don’t have a sh - - - I mean a service, and we’d really like to spend more time with y’all. 
    We told her we’d love to be there. Only four of us were able to accept her invitation.
    The next day a limousine picked us up and took us a couple miles out of town. We ended up at this rather modest mansion which was sitting among some very nice gardens, including a scattering of pine and cypress trees. The whole thing was nestled right up against the swamp. We later learned from Joe Bob that the locals called it a ‘bayou’. When I asked about the word, Mary Jane explained that its origin was Choctaw Indian and meant ‘small stream.’ Why they would call a swamp a small stream was beyond me. 
    Their home was larger than most but not nearly as ostentatious as we had expected from the look of these folks and their entourage at the service the previous evening. 
    On the way from the car to the front porch, we noticed a alligator on the front lawn, evidently taking a nap. 
    They met us at the front door, both dressed in blue jeans and simple shirts. They ushered us into their home and treated us like one of the family. It was comfortable and we felt right at home. 
    When we asked our hosts about the alligator they said, “Oh, that’s Elvis. He sort of hangs around and is pretty much harmless, unless he gets especially hungry. 
    I mentioned I’d like a closer look. Joe Bob jumped up and said, “Come on,” and we went outside. As we got close to Elvis he raised his head, let out a hiss, and started whipping his head back and forth. Joe Bob called out, “Now, Elvis, you behave yourself. Vellanoff just wants to get a closer look at you.” 
    For some reason Elvis wasn’t impressed, and continued his antisocial behavior. 
    And that’s when the plan was hatched to take us out into the bayou to show us some real wildlife, and as Joe Bob added, “Besides, we’re short on ‘gator.” 
    At the time I wasn’t sure what he was talking about, “Short on ‘gator?” What could that mean? 
    At lunch I learned. Mary Jane was explaining some of the dishes on the table that she seemed sure we were ignorant of, and she was right. 
    Most had an explanation that matched our expectations, but then she added, “That deep-fried ‘chicken’ y’all have tucked into with such gusto, is actually ‘gator. Pretty tasty isn’t it?” 
    I was in the middle of a bite of the same and managed to keep chewing and swallowing. At least long enough to think, and while trying not to picture Elvis, She’s right, this is actually pretty good, and it does taste like chicken. 
    On the other hand, my friend George, who was also in the middle of a bite, coughed his mouthful across the table and was trying to whip any residue off his lips with his napkin. He was embarrassed at his reaction, but Mary Jane assured him it was alright and that it was not the first time she had seen someone do the exact same thing. She also apologized for not having forewarned us before letting us dive into the ‘chicken’. 
    The next day was Friday. The four of us didn’t need to be at the theater until five in the afternoon, so agreed, and in fact looked forward to, a boat trip into the bayou. Later we agreed that we had been like naïve little kids, being conned with a trip to the zoo, but with a stop at the dentist’s first. 
     The Rev’s limousine picked up George, Harry, Pamela, and me around eight in the morning. We ended up back at the Block’s mansion and specifically at their dock, where we met Joe Bob and Mary Jane. They had loaded some food and water into the boat and were in the process of loading a rifle, a shotgun, and two handguns as well. 
    The first thing Joe Bob asked was “Have you ever done any hunting, and if not actual hunting, have you done any shooting?” 
    George had done some hunting with his dad as a kid. Harry had never used a gun and didn’t intend to start now, but his wife had grown up in Wyoming and out there they would shoot anything that moved, so she was familiar with guns. 
    I had been in the Russian army before having to—ah—immigrate to the U.S. (a somewhat interesting story, I guess I should put it in this journal at some point), and had scored well in the battalion’s shooting contests.
    Anyway, a little puzzled at the gun question, but again naively, we climbed in the boat and with the help of an Evinrude motor went putting out into the bayou. Both Joe Bob and Mary Jane pointed out all the things they thought would interest us, and they were right. From birds, animals, and strange trees, to floating islands, it was all new and interesting. This bayou had a certain beauty to it. 
    After a couple hours we spotted a ‘gator on the shore and Joe Bob said, “That looks like a good one, Vellanoff, you want to do the honors?” reaching for a rifle. 
   It dawned on me that he was offering me the opportunity to shoot this poor ‘gator, which wasn’t doing anything to us, but maybe only because we hadn’t given it the opportunity.
    Feeling a little sick to my stomach, I said, “Sure,” and reached for the gun. Joe Bob said, “I understand that you have to hit it in the back of the head, and from about this angle. I think. The kill spot is about the size of a quarter.” 
   Mary Jane asked her husband, “You’re really going to kill that ‘gator and then take it home for us to do what, pray tell?” 
   “Why, we’re about to get some free ‘gator tenderloin here. And we won’t have to buy it off that skuzzy swamp hunter who comes around at night selling ‘gator meat out of the back of his van.” 
    “And, Honey, you’re asking our guests to help us? Just maybe they don’t want any part of this.” 
    We ‘guests’ all jumped in, acting like we had been hoping for an opportunity like this all our lives. 
    Then I got back to thinking about what I was being asked to do, and blurted out, “Joe Bob, have you ever done this before, I mean, hunted and killed an alligator?” 
   “Well no, but I’ve listened to hunters tell about doing it. What could possibly go wrong?” I looked at Joe Bob and asked, “Are you kidding? From here that’s a very hard shot. And what if I just wound the thing?” “Well,” said Joe Bob, “a wounded gator is nothing you want in the neighborhood. In fact, they’re just plain dangerous.” 
   So I thought, Well, when are you ever going to have another opportunity to shoot a gator?
   I asked everyone in the boat to please sit down and stay as still as possible, which they did. I picked out the spot I thought Joe Bob was talking about and fired. We could see that the bullet had hit the ‘gator, but had no idea of the damage. We sat there for a few minutes watching, and not seeing any motion, we motored to, and landed beside the ‘gator. 
   We approached cautiously, afraid it might come back to life and attack us. 
   Joe Bob pulled some tools out of the boat, then after walking around the ‘gator several times, announced, “We need to roll it over onto its back.” 
    I asked, “Do we know it’s dead?” 
    George suggested we take its pulse, or listen for a heartbeat, but none of us wanted to get that personal with this thing. 
    So Joe Bob grabbed a front leg and I grabbed a back leg on the same side and we started to roll it over. 
    That’s when things started to go sideways.
    The ‘gator let out what sounded like a loud cough, then easily and quickly jerked free of our grasp. It didn’t have to jerk very hard, because when we heard that sound coming from the ‘gator we jumped back, and moved away from the beast as fast as we could move. 
    Once it had all four feet on the ground, it slowly moved around to face us. It was hissing, snapping its jaws open and shut, and whipping its tail back and forth. This appeared to be one angry ‘gator. However, its movements were sort of sluggish. 
    Pamela and Mary Jane scrambled into the boat. 
    The gator was not moving toward the water. Neither was it moving toward us.   
    Joe Bob yelled, “We need to cover its eyes and get some rope around its jaws.” 
    I yelled back, “Good idea; go for it, Rev!” 
    With the tension and the high level of adrenalin we were all experiencing, everyone seemed to find this comment funny, and we all started laughing---hard. 
   Once we settled down, we got to work, trying to constrain this ‘gator; so, I guessed, we could still kill the thing. I grabbed up some sacking and approached the ‘gator’s head which was being whipped back and forth. It was still not trying to run away. I got an idea and circled around, coming up along its other side. The ‘gator made no move to turn toward me. 
    Joe Bob saw what I was doing and approached from the rear, coming up along the ‘gators other side, until he was alongside its neck, then slipped his rope loop over its jaws. 
    Harry, for some reason we still don’t understand yelled out, “I’ll get its tail.”
    Pamela took exception to this and yelled, “Harry, leave that thing alone!” 
    But it was too late. Harry had thrown himself astraddle the ‘gators tail thinking to do what, we didn’t know. The ‘gator was having none of it, and with one swing of its tail sent Harry sailing into the bayou. Other than getting wet and covered with green slime of some sort, he seemed to be okay. The next day his thighs were so sore he could hardly walk, or sit, but that passed soon enough. 
    Pamela was out of the boat and helping Harry to shore while yelling, “Are you okay? Here let me help you get out of the water. And why,” smacking him on the shoulder, “would you do something as stupid as sitting on a ‘gator’s tail?” 
    During this excitement, I managed to get the cloth over the ‘gators eyes, which calmed him down. Joe Bob tightened the loop over the ‘gator jaws. That’s when we realized that the gator was absolutely still, no movement at all.   
    We waited a couple minutes, and then I whipped off the eye covering. The ‘gators eyes had a dull look to them and we could see no evidence that he was breathing. We tried poking him, with no result. We tried kicking him, with no result. I grabbed the end of his tail and pulled it back and forth, with no result. 
    We pronounced him dead. Upon examination, we did find a bullet hole in the back of its head, and guessed that my bullet had hit the sweet spot, but only maybe nicked his brain, therefore taking longer for him to die. Anyway, that was the conclusion from two rank amateurs. Hopefully, the ‘gator wouldn’t wake up and prove us wrong. If so we would be in big trouble. 
    Then came the need to skin and butcher the reptile; I’d never butchered anything. It was plain that George and Harry were going to be lucky just to keep their breakfast down. Now Pamela had shot, skinned out, and cut up elk, antelope, and bear, so she knew more than any of us how to go about this. 
    Mary Jane admitted she was not fond of this part, so she kept George and Harry occupied while Joe Bob, Pamela, and I skinned out the ‘gator, cut off a section of its tail, and the upper parts of each leg, along with a few other cuts of what Joe Bob claimed to be, “Good eaten.” 
    We had another surprise waiting for us. After we were loaded up and ready to leave, the boat’s motor refused to start. After much effort and some very un-Rev type language, he announced that we might as well start rowing the boat toward home. 
    Each of us four guys took turns at the oars. Now the temperature was in the low 90s and the humidity was higher than that. Rowing was hard work, and since three of us were new at it, there was a certain amount of swamp water splashed around. Along with being wet from sweat, we were wet with water that came with green slime. 
    We each ate lunch while one of the others rowed--except for George. At the mention of food, he turned a lovely shade of green that pretty much matched the swamp slime, and thought he’d better abstain. 
    By the time we got to the Block’s dock we were all sweaty, had blistered hands, and were just plain dirty and smelly. 
    We rushed into the theater, all out of breath, about five minutes after we were supposed to be there. The director looked at us in dismay. His mouth hung open and he was speechless---for about a minute. When he finally found his voice, he yelled at us, “What have you people been doing?” Then looking us up down while wrinkling his nose, he started to laugh, and the whole troupe joined in. 
    It made us feel warm all over (well, sort of), to think we could bring this much enjoyment to these people. 
    We got ourselves cleaned up and joined our fellow thespians in putting on our evening show.

An Alaskan Christmas Story 

     Twas the night before Christmas, and all through the hut, not a creature was stirring, (mainly because we hadn’t started cooking yet).
     Our long johns were hung by the heater with care. [‘Care’, meaning we had remembered to close up the flaps this year. The kids had learned that leaving them open was less than optimal when it came to getting a full load of goodies.] 
     The kids and grandkids were all crammed into what beds we could find, (both of our sons and our son-in-law were out of work so were living with us--oh joy to the world), with visions of sugared moose jerky dancing in their heads, (and let me tell you, if that goes on too long it can produce one hellacious headache), ready for what sleep they might be able to get, (what with somebody always clomping in and out of the house to use the facilities.) 
    With me in my camo pjs and Gretchen in her bullet-proof vest nightie (shoot me once, shame on you, shoot me twice, shame on me), we were preparing our brains for a long winter’s nap. [Whatever in the world that means.] 
    [We’d had a little trouble fitting Gretchen with a vest as she is quite well endowed, so we had to get a custom-made vest. She is probably the only one around who has a bullet-proof vest with “Seattle Tent and Awning” stamped on the back.] 
     When up on the roof there arose such a clatter I thought, it’s too bad that squirrels are no longer considered traditional for holiday meals. 
    We sprang from out beds and ran out in the yard. The moon on the surface (we’ll have no breasts in this epic prose), of the new fallen snow lit up the night like it was mid-day. And what to our wondering eyes should we behold, but eight huge grizzlies pulling an old pickup truck. 
    With a little old driver, so stupid and drunk, I knew in a moment it must by my neighbor Jerome Saint Dick. 

 [The grizzlies? A long but interesting story.] [On top of the house? A very short story, but I’ll not bother the reader with it here. I’ll just say that thirty-two grizzly paws, each with five long, sharp claws, can do major damage to the shingles on a hut roof.]

Do We Need Better Mice? 

      The medical journal “Cancer Research” reported that some mice got cancer when fed emulsifiers. Now emulsifiers are used in all kinds of foods, so this information is supposed to be pertinent to us. 
     The experiment consisted of three groups of mice. Two groups were fed emulsifiers and one group was given water. From the sound of it, the two emulsifier groups didn’t get any water, so had to drink the emulsifiers. Anyway, the two emulsifier-groups had “changes in intestinal bacteria that promoted inflammation and colon cancer.” 
     From the tenor of the article, I was led to believe that this was a bad thing. 
      Thinking about this I was wondering what would happen if instead of drinking my daily quota of water I substituted some liquid chemical mixture. Maybe like Coca Cola or some such. I’m guessing that even if the chemical mixture is benign, that that quantity of it would still cause some strange things to happen to my physiology. 
      Then again, the answer might be that we just need to recruit better, more durable, mice. Anyway, it does give us one more thing to be concerned about.