By Buster McNutt
Some weeks are just weaker than others. On a 0-to-10, “skip the blood pressure medicine and have another drink” scale this last one would be like a decimal followed by enough zeros that if they were dollar bills they could simultaneously balance the Federal budget, fully fund “Obama Care,” build a new prison in Washington D.C. so that every member of Congress could have their own suite, and give every Fiat buyer a $10,000 rebate as long as they would agree to drive their car into the ocean and let it float back to Italy. Okay, make that $20,000 if you are on the West Coast because you’d have to float through the Panama Canal and probably weekend in Cancun for this year’s Naturalist Volleyball Tournament.
Where to start … Monday I went to the funeral home for my buddy Spyder’s “visitation” which as expected was a bummer except that his ex-wife was there and, to honor an agreement we made years ago, I waited until she was in the lobby in front of a large mirror, and snuck up behind her to verify, as Spyder always insisted, I would not be able to see her reflection in the mirror. I did see it, so I quickly put the wooden stake and silver bullet back in my coat. Just to be on the safe side I did not remove the garlic necklace.
The obituary said he had “passed quietly,” two traits you would never associate with Spyder. I think he passed a blood test once, but I’m pretty sure it wasn’t on the first try. And he couldn’t stand quiet – he said that if the Big Guy had wanted us to be quiet he wouldn’t have given us vocal chords, Chuck Berry records and Cherry Bomb mufflers.
Many years ago Spyder and I co-owned and drove a race car at the local track. We didn’t have much money so we raced in the Long Departed class, where a car had to be at least 20 years old, have all the glass removed and the doors welded shut. As luck would have it my daily driver was a 1959 Impala, with most of the glass replaced by duct taped on dry-cleaner plastic bags, and the passenger door hadn’t been able to open since a dumpster rolled down the hill and hit it after somebody tried to dump a load of marbles in it and their aim was a little off. So the conversion to race car wasn’t that difficult.
Spyder’s real name was Jerome, but he changed it to Spyder after seeing a documentary on James Dean who died when he crashed his, according to Spyder, “Porch Spyder.” To say the least Spyder didn’t listen all that well, and his attention span was somewhat shorter than a suspension bridge between a couple of atoms.
A week before he died he was planning a “hunting trip” to Montana because he had just read that they had passed a law where you could legally “harvest” road kill as long as you applied online for a permit within 24 hours of the “accident.” And unlike hunting permits, there is no limit to how many you can harvest! He figured we’d load up the Estate Wagon with beer, pork rinds, Jumbo Hefty Bags and a laptop, and ride around until we’d “impacted” six or seven deer. Then we’d bag them, apply for the permits, fill up the back of the car with dry ice and head back home. Hey, the deer were going to hit somebody’s car anyway, especially if the car was out at night with a 30,000-watt search light mounted on the roof.
Spyder wouldn’t own any car unless the car’s name had been around for at least 20 years, which by then he figured they’d gotten all the bugs out. And he was furious if they changed the name. I remember driving up to his house, and his LeSabre was in the front yard with a For Sale sign on the windshield. He said he did it because, “They went and replaced it with a Buick Levitra! What am I supposed to do now – buy a Tieota Coroller or a Porch Nine-One-One?”
Spyder had gotten just about every vehicle related ticket there was. After his third ticket for not wearing a seat belt, he had a local artist paint a picture of a shoulder harness on several of his shirts. Then he got in more trouble when he had a coat over one of the shirts, was pulled over, stepped out of the car, and removed his coat to show the officer he was wearing a seat belt. He actually got a ticket for impersonating a seat-belt wearer. Once he got a ticket for texting, while skateboarding!
The rest of the week didn’t get much better. AAA revoked my card, citing some small-print clause in the agreement where they could cancel the membership if the member has “an excessive number” of tows in a 12-month period. Apparently “excessive” is somewhere around 23. I had the platinum card which allowed tows up the 250 miles. A couple times a year I’d get one tow to Atlanta, and then another from Atlanta to the house in Florida. I was saving hundreds of dollars on gas, and spewing zero pollutants into the atmosphere, which is great for the environment, and you have to figure that tow truck was going to be on the road somewhere anyway, so what’s the big deal?
Then I was tuning up the Estate Wagon and it backfired and caught the grass on fire, which spread to Lady M’s Cub Cadet lawn tractor, which would have been bad enough even if she wasn’t riding it at the time. Other than some frizzled hair and melted shoes she didn’t sustain any real damage. The lawn tractor is pretty much toast, but with all the lawn burned up the timing wasn’t all that bad.
As weeks go I’m glad that one went. I lost a buddy, free towing and a lawn tractor. And to top it off I got the check from my publisher who finally agreed to a “large four figure advance” on the book I’m writing. It was four figures all right — $99.99.
And I still smell like garlic. •
