Throwback Thursday From August 2016 – “Leave The Gun, Take The Donuts”

Throwback Thursday From August 2016 –

“Leave The Gun, Take The Donuts”

WHEN I GET UP EVERY MORNING one of the first things I do is turn on the TV to catch the Weather and local news. The Weather helps me to decide on how to dress and the News either confirms or dispels my decision to get out of bed at all.

One day a week or so ago the lovely Dana Winklepleck (Anchorwoman) ran a story that grabbed my attention like a hungry pit bull on a pork chop.

Dateline: New Albany, Indiana.

Dana Winklepleck

New Albany, Indiana is not so close as to be in the “I can see my house from here,” category, but it does qualify as “Local.” The gist of the story is as follows –

A man and his wife woke up from their night’s slumber, much like we all do I suppose. The wife then expressed her yearning for some donuts. Since there were no donuts in the house she sent her loving hubby-bubby out on a mission to get her some donuts and return. She told him exactly what she wanted and sent him on his way.

This is the point where things began to go sour.

The husband went to his wife’s favorite donut shop and placed his order.

“I’m sorry sir, but we’re all out of those donuts until tomorrow.”

Uh-Oh.

With trepidation in his heart, but no donuts in his hand, he returned home. Wifey did not take it well. She launched into a monologue of her opinion of hubby’s abilities as a shopper and potential father. Hubby did not take this well.

Tired of being verbally worked over by his wife, he tried to leave the house (Not a bad idea, if you ask me.). He tried, but she wasn’t finished with him and blocked his way to the door. It was

at this point that the failed Donut Quixote lost his temper and tried to push his angry Aldonza out of the way.

I guess that she had assumed that this physical altercation was going to stay one-sided. When he pushed her, this seriously intense donut fan escalated things and stabbed her husband in the chest with a Grill Fork. I assume that while he was out looking for her donuts she decided to cook up some bacon or, given her temper, the neighbor’s dog.

Not to be intimidated by mere stab wounds, he pulled the fork out of his chest and made his escape from the house. He may have gotten outside, but it seems that she followed him down the street continuing to say nasty things about him.

Someone eventually called the police, who found the husband sitting on the ground holding his chest. They took him to the hospital. They took her to the jail.

Of course, criminal justice being what it is, they are both facing criminal charges – her for that impetuous forking, and him for shoving her in an attempt to escape.

I’m thinking that he has a better chance of being able to go out for donuts sooner than she does. And I hope that he buys what he wants and she can go pound a cruller.

That woman has the worst eating disorder I’ve ever heard of – short of that scene from “The Godfather.”

“Leave the gun, take the cannoli.”

Throwback Thursday from March 2017 – Joey Who?

Joey Who?

IT LOOKS LIKE SPRINGTIME IS FINALLY HERE. I see robins and cardinals and they don’t look worried about frostbite. There are giant Vs overhead going north and there are new baseball stars on the horizon.

Major League Baseball teams have been heavy into Spring Training for over a month and just like the new flowers that pop up in the spring so do new young players.

Throwback Thursday – From June 2015 – “I’m On A Mission From God”

I’m On A Mission From God

WELL, NOT REALLY, BUT CLOSE. I was on a mission from my wife.

Last Friday was “National Donut Day.”

We’re talking about the pastry and not the parking lot maneuver done by drunken teenagers with the family car on Saturday night.

There is a fact little known outside of Terre Haute (That’s French for “Can I have some more.”), Indiana, but we produce the best donuts this side of everyplace else.

I’m talking about “Square Donuts” here. Not round. Not triangular, and certainly not Kremed and Krispy. I know that taste is subjective, so after an extensive fact finding mission I can “Objectively” state that I am right.

Anyway…

We’re Goin’ To The HEB

WE CONTINUE TO BE DEEP IN THE…no, it’s not the heart. We’re down further than that. …Deep in the Pancreas of Texas. The weather is pleasantly warm once again and, Thank God, pretty much mosquito free.

We are staying in the old family home which is right across the street from the “Bonecrusher Arena” – the football field of Sinton High School. There was a game there last Friday night. The hometown boys lost 54 – 0. “Bonecrusher Arena,” indeed. At least they are showing improvement. The week before they lost 60 – 0.

Let’s Hear It For Gluttony

THERE AIN’T NUTHIN’ LIKE A GOOD BURGER. It doesn’t have to be fancy (and probably shouldn’t be). It doesn’t have to be expensive. It sure doesn’t have to be in some high class restaurant. But it has to be prepared with gluttony in mind.

About a five minute drive or twenty minute crawl from home is a small neighborhood joint (that’s the only appropriate word) that does a burger right.

This particular watering hole has been around for about two million years. It is on its third or fourth owners now and doing well. It is probably also on the Hit List of the American Heart Association.

What Are You Gonna Do?

DURING OUR STAY IN DEMOREST, GEORGIA, on the campus of Piedmont College I must laud high praise on the facilities and the very helpful staff – but I do have one minor, teeny-tiny, itsy-bitsy complaint. I say this knowing that I may be the only person here who cares about it. Excuse my reiteration.

In all of the literature from the college, bent on luring us all to come here, they gleefully state that there is a “Starbucks right on the campus,” in the “Commons” building by the bookstore.

Technically they have told the truth.

Fiction Saturday Chapter 22 – And Pull The Hole… continued

Fiction Saturday – Continued…

Chapter Twenty-Two

 

“Oh, for crying out loud.”

“This is not good, Dominic.”

“Really?  You think so, Peeto?  Jeez, I never would’ve figured that out all by myself. Thank you ever so much, you moron.”

“Well, Dominic, Don Giani ain’t going to like seeing his daughter’s picture all over the newspaper like this.”

“No, he won’t,” said Dominic.  This was serious.

Peeto was scrutinizing the newspaper, looking at the picture and slowly reading the story about it.

“Y’know, it’s not even a very good picture of her, Dominic.  She’s much prettier in person,” said Peeto.

Dominic grabbed the paper from Peeto’s hands.

“That’s my wife you’re drooling over there.”

“Sorry, Dom, but you know what I mean.  She is a fine looking…”

Dominic cut him off with a look and threw the paper to the floor.

That was the second time this morning he had thrown it down.  The first time was when he checked the baseball scores and saw that the Mets had blown a four-run lead to lose to the Washington Nationals.  He was wearing out his welcome.  The owner of the donut shop, standing behind the crullers, muttered something in Chinese.  Peeto picked up the paper again.  It was part of his job.

Dominic was back at his booth in the donut shop.  He still felt uncomfortable going back to his old hangouts.  The jokes were getting to him and he knew that some of the guys were not happy with Dominic’s inability to control his wife.  It was making things a little uneasy for them at home.  Their wives were talking about more than clothes and kids. Several were making secret plans of their own, just in case.

The table was filled with empty paper coffee cups and the remnants of maple bar pastries and crumpled napkins.

“Y’know, Peeto,” said Dominic, a small, lopsided, grin on his face, “There’s a good side to her picture being in the paper.”  He wiped his chin with a napkin, cleaning away the last few shards of sugar glaze.

“There is?  How you figure that?” asked Peeto.  “Don Giani is going to be even more pissed off with you than he already is.  He don’t like publicity.”

“Thanks for that news flash, Peeto.  Just listen.”  Dominic was trying to analyze a complicated situation—not something he did all that often.

“The paper said that they want Beverly about some hit or something.  I don’t know what that’s all about.  I think they must have made that part up.”

Peeto couldn’t keep quiet.

“That part’s going to piss off the Don even more.”

“Oh, well, so much the better,” said Dominic, holding up a finger as if he had just made a big discovery, or was ordering a beer.  “They’ll work really hard to find her, and when they find her, I find her.  And when I find her I get my money back, I get the Monsignor off my back, and I put several holes into Beverly’s forehead.  It’s like three birds with one stone.”

“But, Dominic, I haven’t heard about nobody getting whacked.  Have you?  I dunno, but it smells funny.  Beverly always seemed like such a sweet and gentle soul.  Almost like a nun, but without no penguin suit.”

“Peeto!  Will you stay focused on the problem at hand here?  Quit talking like that about Beverly.  She’s still my wife.  Until I find her anyway.”

 Peeto was on a stumble down memory lane.

“You remember old Sister Modesta, Dominic?  Man, she used to beat the stuffing out of both of us.  Remember when she locked me in the closet all day for calling her a penguin?”

“No, I don’t remember and I don’t care.”  Dominic tried to cut him off.  “‘Cause when she sees her picture and this story she’s going to come popping up out of her hole just like Bugs Bunny and I’m going to be standing there with my shotgun.”

“You’re going to be just like Elmer Fudd, right, Dominic?”

Dominic hit Peeto in the nose with his crumpled napkin.

“Just go get me another maple and bacon bar.”

When Peeto left Dominic alone in the booth he looked again at the newspaper and the first rays of sunlight crept over the horizon of his mind as two and two began to add up and the story started to make sense.

“Oh, my God…the cleaning lady.”

***

Sitting in the study in his barber chair throne, amid the clutter of his life, Giani Montini was reading the same news story and looking at the same blurry picture of his daughter.  His blood pressure medication was getting a test.

He was talking to the Consiglieri, his attorney and adviser, with whom he met twice weekly to keep tabs on the never-ending investigations into the Family businesses.  He also met with him because this highly paid lawyer was the only friend from his early days who was still alive.  They sipped at their coffee and nibbled at some low-fat, low-cholesterol, low-sugar and totally tasteless pastries.

“They think my little girl killed somebody.  That’s nonsense.  She wouldn’t hurt a fly.  It’s not in her.  She wasn’t raised that way.  If anybody had been hit I would have heard about it.”  He tossed his pastry back onto his plate.

“Bobby, what is going on here?  Why are they looking for my daughter?  This doesn’t make any sense.  It’s crazy.  Even if she did do something like that, which I’m sure she didn’t, she’d come to me.  She wouldn’t just take off.”

The lawyer took another look at the newspaper then settled back in his chair.  He looked like an actor from a casting agency hired to play a lawyer on a TV show.  He wore a four-thousand dollar Savile Row suit and had just the proper amount of gray at the temples.  Looking distinguished and intimidating was expensive.

“You’re right, Don Giani.  I agree.  Something is very wrong here.  Have you talked with Dominic about this?”

“Yes.  He says that he doesn’t know anything.  I sent him to Philadelphia and he swears that when he got back, Beverly was gone.  He hasn’t been able to find her and neither have I.”  The Don was feeling powerless.  Things were happening and he had no control.  “She’s hiding somewhere, but where?  And why?  Help me find my girl, Bobby.”

The lawyer, acting as both Consiglieri and as a friend, spoke in soft measured tones designed to impart confidence.

“My Don and my friend, I will find her.  I will bring her to you, personally, and we’ll get this whole thing straightened out.  I give you my word.”

 Giani Montini’s face had turned an unhealthy shade of red from the anguish and frustration he was feeling.  He stopped and took several slow, deep breaths to try to lower his blood pressure.  He was not used to feeling this helpless.  He needed to put his fatherly instincts aside and use his Family powers to find his daughter.

“This mess has Dominic’s fingerprints all over it.  Call Dominic’s captain, the Monsignor.  Tell him I need a meet on this.  Somehow, that smelly animal has put my little girl in danger.  Go and call the Old Man.  I’m going to find her and God help anyone who gets in my way.”

Our Legal System At Work

SOME PEOPLE NEED TO GET OUT MORE OFTEN, and others need to just stay home. I was scanning the newspaper the other day and saw a small item about a lawsuit underway in California.

There is a chap out there in the Golden State, a lawyer himself, who is suing Krispy Kreme Donuts. It seems that he became royally upset with the donut chain when he learned that his Chocolate Iced Raspberry Donut did not have any real Raspberries in it.

Oh, the humanity!

Wait until he learns that The Golden Arches are not really made of gold. He may just faint away.

The Untied States Of America

IN THE MIDST OF ALL THE CHAOS and bitterness of the recent election season I came across one little item that, while not true, sounded plausible and not a bad idea.

Some clever Wag, I’m not sure if he or she is from the US or England, floated a big news story that Queen Elizabeth II had made a proposal.

It’s Only Fair.

IT IS AUGUST IN THE MIDWEST. That can mean only one thing: State Fairs and Deep Fried Food. OK, I guess that’s two things, but who’s counting?

When the gates to the fairgrounds open some people will head to the livestock exhibits, some will rush to get their seats for the entertainment shows, but thousands will head right to the food midway so they can see what’s new on this year’s menu – and there is always something new.

If there is a way to deep fry it – into the fryer it will go.

Leave The Gun, Take The Donuts

WHEN I GET UP EVERY MORNING one of the first things I do is turn on the TV to catch the Weather and local news. The Weather helps me to decide on how to dress and the News either confirms or dispels my decision to get out of bed at all.

One day a week or so ago the lovely Dana Winklepleck (Anchorwoman) ran a story that grabbed my attention like a hungry pit bull on a pork chop.

Dateline: New Albany, Indiana.