Fear And Loathing At The Dealership

I desperately needed a new car.

My Battle Wagon, my beat to hell, bloody-faced version of Mel Gibson from “Braveheart” was on it’s last leg. Like Sir William Wallace at the end of that film, it was on it’s back, having it’s guts ripped out for an audience.

To compound things further, I had to use it to haul my equally non operational/dependable motorcycle back to Maine. It’s here that I decided I should test the strength, not only of my vehicle’s suspension and chassis, but my relationship with The Lady as well.

We’d been meaning to get to Maine since June. Schedule conflicts, etc, kinda made that impossible. She works in an industry that, in the summer months, doesn’t give a lot of time to take off, whereas I, being military, only have a certain amount of time I can be gone for. Literally, things need to be scheduled well in advance if we want to do anything fun for an extended period of time.

So I asked her a week or so ago if she wanted to come with me to drop the bike and the truck off at my parent’s place, all under the assumption that I would be getting a new vehicle of some sort by the end of the few days we’d be up there. She agreed, obviously not knowing what she’d be getting into.

Because, how better to test your relationship with a woman than by taking an ill conceived road trip to your parents house in a vehicle that may or may not die on the three hour drive there?

The trip started off with drama, of course. She drops her car off at her mother’s, for fear that it’ll be towed if we leave it unattended at the parking lot for too long, and we ride over to our house. I want to be on the road no later than noon, because it’s a haul and especially in my little fucked up S-10, it takes a lot out of me when I drive for long extended periods. The science behind this is that the sooner we’re on the road, the sooner we’re off.

But, The Lady doesn’t want to go to Maine without any cash on her. I don’t blame her. Her boss, however, doesn’t have her pay check ready. Also, apparently, he’s too cheap to have direct deposit.

I mean, it’s only the second half of 2008.

But the situation is fine for now; I still have the business of loading my Triumph into the back of my truck. I head out to my truck and bike, take the ramps out, set up everything. When it’s all said and done, I realize that I’ve really only given myself about ten feet of space to work my bike up the 45 degree angled aluminum ramps, with only about six to seven feet of bed space in the back of the truck. I would literally have to gun the shit out of my bike to get it up the ramp (because worst case scenario would be me not getting enough speed, getting the front wheel up in the bed, but then the ramps kicking out, making me fall backwards and ultimately underneath the 500 lb bike, breaking my spine.). I back the bike as far back as it’ll go, which is on the edge of payment and a grassy area, and start to rev it. I keep working the throttle and clutch, goosing and feathering it, and when I feel the rear tire start to spin on it’s own, with my hand clutching hard down on the front brake, I give it as much gas as I can.

White smoke starts to spew from the tire, as she begins to screech on the pavement under me. I can feel the back end starting to swing a little to the left and I adjust my body weight to compensate. Come on, I think to myself, nice and easy, straight shot up the ramp.

This is the most nerve racking thing I can think of doing. The ramp is so light and the bike is so heavy. My tail gate could literally snap off at any moment and send the bike straight down at a high rate of speed, crashing it’s fairing and forks into the back of the bed and sending me over the handlebars and through the rear window of my cab. With the smoke and screeching building, I drop the brake and clutch at the same time and launch forward towards the ramp.

I hit the ramp, and for a very brief moment I’m fucking airborne. There isn’t even time for me to really register this thought before I crash back down into the bed, my front tire kicking a giant dent into the back of the cab, below the window. The tire’s still screeching and smoking, throttle’s stuck open, and the horrible sound of an engine trying to tear itself apart is filling the air.

I clutch in, kick her down to neutral and straight up before putting down my stand and shutting it down. I look back over my shoulder, breathing heavy, sweat in my eyes, as the ramp is flat on the ground, no longer attached to the back of my truck.

“Jesus Christ,” I pant. I dismount, and shakily put the tie-down ratchet straps into formation and compress my forks for the ride. Behind the truck is a littering of spent burnt rubber shavings from the tire.

I give myself a second to relax, breathe in and breathe out, calm my shaking hands. Just then, The Lady rounds the corner and I paste on a smile to try to hide the “Holy Shit” look that I’m sure I have anyway.

“Boss Man doesn’t have the checks,” she says. She’s pissed. If she gets on this ride with me, she’s going to be a total tyrant, if this is the attitude she’s going to start with. She’s already stressed out about an extended meeting of my parents (she previously met them for about five minutes when they came down earlier in the Spring) so with all that going on, I didn’t want an upset stomach from her belly aching, if you dig.

“Hey,” I start. “I don’t want you stressed out. This trip is going to be a lot of stress, and I don’t want you starting off this way.”

She gives me a look, and a sigh.

“I’m not stressed at you, it’s just Boss Man is a douchetard,” and she goes on for fifteen minutes explaining past experiences in how she’s been upended on pay checks and such. She ends with “I love the guy, he’s been great to me, but for all I do around there, all I’m asking is that he pays me on time.”

We go to her bank, and then hit up a Burger King, and we’re on the road.

Things mellow out after a little while. She’s reading one of my Palaniuks, curled up in the seat wearing only a string bikini top and a pair of sweats. I’m in shorts and flip flops, Calvin Klein t shirt, sunglasses, singing along with classic rock hits on the ipod, getting her exasperated looks from over the tops of her sunglasses.

We have to shout to talk to each other, the truck is that bad and loud. The whole body rattles and shimmies and humms when you get to highway speeds. What makes it worse is that with the weight of the bike in the back pressing down on the suspension and whatever else is up under there, the ball joints whistle.

“We’re gonna make it, right?” She asks after about forty minutes into the three hour drive.

“Yeah, of course,” I say confidently. In my heart though, I wonder if it will, and I worry about how the hell we’re going to get a tow with the bike on the back, should we need one. I smile, and this seems to put her at ease, so she nods off. The whole time, like a Buddhist meditating, I constantly chant “a few more miles, a few more miles, a few more miles” in my head.

Apparently the mantra worked, because we eventually pulled into my parent’s driveway that afternoon.

Dad was in the driveway, spraying off a motorcycle engine with a hose. Rain was due any second, and with his giant fox tail of a beard, he squeezed The Lady with one arm while battling me back with the hose in his other hand. We embraced as well, and got to catching up on things, as we all began cleaning up my Shit Wagon.

Time was of the essence, while on the road, I had called a local Honda dealership because I found a pair of Ridgeline pick up trucks on their website I was very interested in seeing. I thought that maybe calling in ahead of time and setting up an appointment would be the best way to go. Give them an idea of who I was, what I wanted, and how important time was to me. If I was the type of person who made appointments to see vehicles, I would obviously be treated as a person who took time as money.

Or so I thought.

We made our appointment on time, and checked in with the receptionist at the front desk. What amazed me the most about every dealership we’d go to from here on in, was how busy they were. Every where you go, you hear about car dealerships crying for help from the public. They’re basically giving cars away, because no one wants to spend money on a gas chugging SUV or pick up. I’m surprised that it hasn’t disintegrated into “buy one get one free” extravaganzas.

So, the place had more than enough people walking around both in the lots and inside the show room. We were told by the receptionist that the salesman we made the appointment with was with a customer, but was wrapping things up. We were allowed to take a seat in a small waiting area, and someone would be with us shortly.

From the jump, as soon as we walked into the place, The Lady was on edge. She glanced upward nervously, and when I finally asked her what the hell her problem was, she simply pointed to the balloons.

You see, at these dealerships, they want to present a festive and party atmosphere. They, those in charge, think that they, the customer, will not buy a vehicle if the scene is similar to a funeral home. They play up the celebratory, party vibe, thinking that if consumers think it’s a party, they’ll want to drop hard earned cash - and potentially fuck up their credit - with a new or certified pre-owned vehicle.

So it was the balloons that were making her nervous. I forgot to mention The Lady has a crippling allergy to latex. This has somewhat been the bane of our relationship, if you’d believe it. Most condoms are made of latex, and the non-latex varieties are extremely tight fitting. Imagine trying to stuff a week’s worth of clothes into a tiny gym bag, and you’ll get what it’s like for me to get myself into one of these specialized prophylactics.

Over our heads were giant-sized balloons in patriotic color schemes of reds, whites and blues. Over sized balloons hanging low over our heads had The Lady ducking and sinking nervously into her vinyl seat. I tried to distract her with some strategy talk:

“Ok, hey, listen,” I began. “When we get in there, and start haggling over price and payments… don’t like, hit me, or get shocked if I start acting like a total asshole towards the guy. I’m not saying I’m going to insult him or anything, but if I start to get a little weird, don’t show our hand by making it seem that that’s not how I am all the time, you know?” And she got it without me having to explain it at all.

“Oh I know,” she says, “I know how to act in public.” And I smile and she sinks a little more into the seat, looking skyward.

After about half an hour, the other side of the time-table I gave the salesman on the phone (when I called and made the appointment, I stated “between four and four-thirty,” and what I was told was “perfect.”.) we were both getting antsy. No one had even approached us, not another salesman, not the receptionist, and certainly not the guy I made the appointment with. I made a big deal out of looking down at my watch, and our conversation about how long we’d been waiting grew louder and louder.

All the guy had to do was come around from his office and say “hey gang, sorry, this is wrapping up here, thanks for waiting, why don’t you get a cup of coffee I’ll be right with you in ten minutes,” and we’d been fine. I was very much interested in looking at these Ridgelines, and possibly purchasing one on the spot, to hell with haggling over price. But no one, in this entire PRIME HONDA DEALERSHIP paid us any mind.

As we were considering just getting up and leaving, my cell phone rang and it was my mother, who was just getting off of work. I explained the situation to her, how we’d been sitting for so long without anyone even talking to us, and she couldn’t believe it.

“You wanna see them jump,” she said, “just stand up and head for the door.”

“I know, I know, but,” I glanced back down at my watch, “I’ll give them a few more minutes,” as the time closed in on the 45 minute mark.

The final straw came when, off the street, a pair of Somalis walked in and were seen immediately by a sales person, as two well dressed and respectable white persons sat in total disbelief!

“That’s it!” Started The Lady, “we’re out of here,” and we both stood, walking out the door. I let loose a pissed off tirade about how shitty a business PRIME HONDA, ON THE SACO AUTOMILE, US RT 1, SACO MAINE was. I was also crushed, because I had set my heart on those Ridgelines.

Being that there were about a hundred more dealerships within two miles of where we were, we simply climbed back into my sad and pathetic truck and started driving north bound. On the right hand side of the road a little ways down from the Honda dealership, was a Toyota dealership.

Before I go any further, I want to make clear I wasn’t solely in the market for a foreign car. It just so happens that the deals I saw online, and the things I heard about certain manufacturers made it easier for me to check out their inventories, say, than that of a domestic car maker. And besides, all the vehicles allegedly made in the US, by US car manufacturers, are actually manufactured in Canada and Mexico.

So we pull into the Toyota Dealership, which was also owned by the Prime Auto Group, and started to just mill about in the lot. They had a lot of 09 Tundras, V8, all-time four wheel drive that they were doing everything but just giving away to every swinging dick that stepped foot on the lot.

We were soon approached by a very rat-like in appearance man named Richard, or Rich, or Dick, however you want to slice it. He had a prominent uni-brow with one long hair sticking about half an inch from the center of his face. His eyes were dark and beady, teeth a horrible mash of stained ivory in his mouth, with a badly gelled comb-over, onion breath, and all the charm of bloated pig stomach. He asked me, as any salesman would, what I was interested in.

“Well, I’m looking for a full sized truck, 2006-08 maybe … it doesn’t have to have all the bells and whistles, you understand, but it has to have some of the basic modern conveniences, like, … power windows, doors, .. keyless entry, … oh and it has to be black. That’s important.” And he took this all in, nodding, and he started to immediately push the $31,000 2009 Tundra, as if what I just said floated out into the atmosphere and missed him completely.

“We have a great buyers allowance on these,” as he leads me over to a row of brand new OPEC supporting machines. “You can get up to 6,000 off the sticker, with 0 down and 4.9% APR financing, if you’re credit’s good.”

“Ah huh, but uh, that’s still pretty much out of my price range, Richard,” I say to him. He nods and invites us inside.

We sit for a while, hashing out what I want. I mention how we were at the Honda dealership just before hand, and how shoddily we were treated over there. I even show him the internet print-offs of the Ridgelines, saying that’s what I was most interested in seeing.

“Well, you know Jim,” he begins, leaning in smugly from his side of the desk, “being that this is a Prime dealership, I have access to those Ridgelines, it’s all just a matter of finding which lot their at…”

“Really?!” And the hook gets set. He gets up and says he’s going to have them located and we can go check them out. I feel renewed, thinking everything’s going to work out. I smile at The Lady, who’s psyched that I’m in line to get what I want. While the salesman is off dicking around, I get another call from my mom:

“Yeah, we bounced over to the Toyota Dealership up the road. Come by if you want,” I tell her. My whole plan is this: My mother is a tenacious negotiator when it comes to car buying. Her last three vehicles she purchased, she sent the salesmen away crushed and crying and unemployed in that order. She’s a heavy hitter who takes shit from no one. She’s my big gun, my secret weapon, my Ace in the hole. I’m calling her in to lay down heavy artillery while I get my captured comrades out of the POW camp.

The salesman, Richard comes back with some print offs, keys and a dealer plate. I let him know what he’s in for when my mother shows up.

“You don’t even understand,” I begin. “My mother is like the bad cop to my good cop. You thought I was bad… you’re gonna wish it was only me you were dealing with when she shows up,” and he thinks I’m joking. He laughs, and at the same time, an actual Saco cop walks through the show room, short, pointy face, Mediterranean skin tone.

“Hey,” the salesman calls after the cop, “which one are you, the good cop or the bad cop,” as he plays on the joke. The cops stops, completely unaware of the conversation we’re having without him, and shrugs.

“I’m usually the bad cop,” he says. Under my breath I add “He’s probably also the bottom, too.”

At about the same time we head outside, my mother shows up. She’s an unassuming, gray haired office drone, who smiles every time she sees me. We hug in the dealership lot and then she turns and hugs The Lady. We all collectively climb into a waiting Buick Skylark and go across the street to the Nissan dealership where the Ridgelines are waiting for us.

“Your mother hates me” says The Lady out of no where when we’re away from my mother’s hearing. I look at her stunned.

“What?! What makes you think that?”

“Body language. I also accidentally called her ‘Mary’ on the phone a little while ago. I think she’s holding that against me.” My mother, pleasant as she is, is very old school. I had told The Lady about this previously, that she should address my dad as ‘Charlie’ and my mom as ‘Mrs. N-’ until told otherwise. The Lady claims I never told her this, or told her something different entirely. I know for a fact I brought this up months ago. I glance back at my mother, smiling, staring off at different cars, holding her bag and walking around the lot somewhat pigeon-toed, with an oblivious smile on her face.

“Don’t be so damn neurotic,” I hiss at The Lady, “make nice with my mom!” And the asshole salesman comes back, as he’s located the Ridgeline I wanted to see.

It’s an ugly gun metal gray and looks nothing like the print off I got from the computer. The inside is plain, and although minimalist is what I go for, this was just … too… minimalist for me. There was just a lot of empty space on the inside. And for it being an 2007 model, it already had 67K miles on it.

I almost half expected lemonade to drip from the exhaust pipe.

“I can’t say that I’m all that impressed,” I tell Richard. Truth be told though, the center console was fun to play with for about a minute, because it morphed and transformed into different configurations. One was like a cd case rack. Then it donned on me, that no one keeps the thick cd cases in their vehicles anymore, let alone actually listens to cds. I was heartbroken again over the Ridgeline.

“That’s ok,” he starts. “Let’s just drive it over to our other dealership and we’ll see if there’s anything over there that catches your eye,” and we take off down the road some more.

He takes us to their Ford dealership and shows me again, the gas hungry V8s. One he shows us even comes with it’s own plow rig and blade. At this point I’m getting tired of his ineptitude.

We drive back to the Toyota dealership and I off-handedly mention something about a sedan, because I heard the Camry’s were good on fuel. This started a whole new … dialogue with this fucking greasy asshole. He tours me around his lot, showing me over priced Corollas and Camrys, one pair being three years old, dented and scratched and showing visible rust. I let him know in plain language that I’m not awed with what he’s showing me.

“Let’s just take this one for a ride,” he says as he pulls out the keys to the Camry without the massive driver’s side door dent in it. We all climb in, and I make it a special point to drive like a total asshole around the back roads that I used to patrol (the dealership bordered the town I used to be a cop in, and the little ‘test track’ lapsed into the outskirts of said town.).

We get back to the dealership and again, I yawn and complain that he’s not impressing me at all. I then go on to tell him that we’re getting tired, we three, and I’d been on the road for three hours and had just spent three hours dealing with him, so we were calling it a day.

This asshole. He gets this look on his face like I just broke up with him. As if, instead of “hey, we’re tired of your fucking miserable excuse for cars, and you’re epic failure as a salesman, so we’re going home to rest now,” we’re saying “hey, this isn’t working out, we can’t see each other anymore, we’re breaking up.”

I have never before seen such a lack of professionalism.

“Why?” He says to me, almost in half a whisper. I stare at him, wide eyed in disbelief.

“Because, you’re not showing me anything that I want.”

“Well, how do you know what you want?” He asks, as if he’s trying to get some psychological leg up on me.

“I know what I don’t want,” I say, “and you’re showing me a lot of that. I told you what I wanted: A full sized pick up, 2006 through 08, modern basic accoutrements, V6, and it had to be BLACK. You haven’t even shown me one black vehicle yet.” He nods absently.

“Ok, I got one last car to show you, just give me five more minutes of your time, and you can go.” And I look back at my family, the two most important women in my life, and I sigh and say ok, and walk over to a display with him., leaving them to wait and starve a little while longer.

He walks me over to a black Scion TC, the equivalent of Pampers Pull Ups for autobuyers. The Scions are Toyotas geared towards 18-21 year olds who love a lot of flash and don’t care about substance. We both stare down at it with different expressions on our faces; his is adoration or some form of it, and mine is general boredom.

He starts his pitch script “What do you think, rad right?” Rad?!

“Uh, sure.” I couldn’t sound any more uninterested.

“Now, here’s what I want you to do, what would be an ‘Awesome Deal’ on this vehicle” he pitches. I pause for drama, and give him my pitch.

“Awesome deal? …I’ll give you 9 for it.” It was stickered as a 2009 for 16900.

“Whoa, well, wait, I mean, let’s be realistic.”

“Ok, realistically, I’d give you…. Maybe… maybe, 9-5.” And he develops heart burn.

“Let me go talk to my guy in the office and see what he thinks,” and he starts to walk back inside.

“Look, let me save you the trouble, Rich: I’m not interested in this car. When I woke up this morning, my mind set was on a full sized pick up. In the very far reaches of my mind, I was thinking sedan, but that was like, the outer most limits of my thinking. I wasn’t even thinking Scion this morning. So don’t try to shoe-horn me into this car, I don’t want it.” And I get that look from him, as if I only just said “I’m not taking you to the prom.”

“Ok, well, I’m sorry then, but… you still have to talk to my manager. I won’t get paid if you don’t talk to him.”

When I was in high school, we had a substitute teacher named Mr. Finley. Mr. Finley worked at a car dealership full time and subbed part time, for a goof. On one day, when he was supposed to be handing out a test or something, he instead gave a lesson on car buying. What not to fall for, what a good deal looked like, what was bullshit, etc.

One thing Mr. Finley talked about was the “let me get my manager before you leave” trick; which is when they bring in their heavy hitter, their big gun, their bad cop. It’s not really a manager they bring out, but their high pressure salesman. The back breaker. The guy who’s going to make you feel like a total shitbird for wasting “his employee’s” time by not buying a car. When you have a tough nut to crack, you break out the big nut cracker.

I saw this coming a mile away.

“Ok, Rich, I’ll be right here,” I said. He gives me his most professional rat-faced smile and goes back into the show room. I turn and bolt for my truck.

The Lady is sitting with the passenger side door open, smoking one of her American Spirits, and she looks up at me through her giant round sunglasses.

“What’s the matter?” She asks with a look on her face that really wants to ask “did you just hold up a bank?” …That sort of panicked, catch-me-up look.

“We gotta go, get in,” I spit. She tosses out her butt and stamps it with a sandal, and we tear ass out of the dealer’s lot, presumably with Richard running after us, yelling for us to stop.

I wouldn’t know, I wasn’t looking back.

That night, feeling utterly disappointed in my lack of ownership in a new car, but feeling triumphant that I was able to stave off the advances of a dipshit salesman, we all sat around eating Chinese from a local restaurant. My mom and The Lady had a chance to talk, as did dad and I. And then we switched when The Lady needed a post dinner smoke and dad followed her outside (it might have been the low cut shirt and bra combination she was wearing…)

Feeling the tension from earlier still coming off The Lady, I straight up asked my mother what she thought of her.

I knew this was a dumb thing to ask my mother, because mom is in the business of making her only son happy and content, even if that means lying to his face. Unfortunately for my mother, I’ve become quite adept at picking up her tells when she’s lying and when she’s not.

I mean, I was a cop for Christsakes.

“So mom, really, what do you think of The Lady?”

“She’s wonderful,” and I squint, looking at her face. “What?”

“Nothing, go on,”

“Well, she’s beautiful, and smart,” still all very generic, nothing specific. “I like her aura, how she looks at you. She loves you James. You two have such a good chemistry together, it really shows through. I catch her looking at you when you’re not paying attention and she doesn’t realize it. She adores you. It’s all over her body language.”

My scans for deceitfulness in my mother’s face find none. I let the skepticism go from my face. At the same time, The Lady and my dad return from outside, and we do the dishes together. When that’s done, we both call it a night and retreat into my old bedroom, now my father’s room.

We watch a little tv and I offer her a backrub. We’re very at home with the door closed. I lean in for a kiss, she rolls on to her back and we start to do what couples do with the lights off.

“We have to be quiet,” she whispers up to me between kisses.

“No, I know,” I whisper back.

“I really don’t want your parents to hear us having sex,” she hisses, all seriousness in her voice.

“I. know.” I say back in the same seriousness. My cock poking her through her PJ pants. We kiss and disrobe each other.

We both agree over breakfast at a little Main Street Diner called Jonsey’s the next morning, that there is no way in hell my parent’s DIDN’T hear us going at it. Twice. In my father’s bed.

Hell has a special section for sons like me.

While at Jonsey’s we play a game of hangman on a sales flyer for a Ford Dealership up in Westbrook, about a twenty minute drive. While The Lady tries to decipher “I Like Big Butts And I Can Not Lie” I notice that this particular dealership has 2009 Ford F-150s for 200 bucks a month, as advertised. Fuck it, I think to myself, what’s the worst that could happen?

As if she read my mind and answered for the both of us, The Lady says “We’re so not going back to The Cape in your ratty S-10.” And I realize then, that we’d better check out this dealership, stat.

We arrived on scene a little after nine in the morning and wandered around the lot. We were met by an older grandpa type named Bob. When I showed him the flyer (discretely covering the hangman phrase with my hand) with the circled stuff I was interested in, he brought us over to where they kept them.

“They’re very bare bones,” he starts in a grandfatherly way, “no power anything, manual stick, no carpeting. They’re really designed for Government and Commercial use, you know?” I think back to my rotting S-10, and decide that there’s no way in hell I’m going back to a similar situation. Stick shift? No power anything?

So I lay it on Bob, the same way I laid it on Rich: “Well, I’m looking for a full sized pick up, 2006-2008ish, power doors, locks, keyless entry, that whole bit. I’d like it to be a V6, maybe an extended cab… you know? Oh, and it has to be Black. That’s important.” He nods along.

“Well, let’s see what we got out back,” he says. He gestures us to follow him down out back to where there’s a whole row of F-1- and 250s. My eyes immediately lock on to one in particular.

“That one.” And I point to it. “Tell me about that one.”

“Well,” Bob starts, “it’s a 2005, uh, only 24K on it, power everything, regular cab, flare side, all weather tires,” and he goes on. What’s got my attention the most is that it’s all black.
“That’s it, that’s the one,” and I look at The Lady. “That’s it.”

She’s happy for me again, and we go inside where I’m slapped in the face and stabbed through the heart at the same time. In the middle of their show room, inexplicably, there’s a Triumph Daytona 990, a 2009 model, just hanging out. My knees buckle a little and I drag myself over to the negotiation table.

We hash out some numbers, mostly what I’m looking for for payments, etc. He goes over to his boss and comes back with a slip of paper and slides it in front of me.

“Well ok Jim,” he begins, adjusting his glasses as he talks, “with 3000 down, and the 800 we’re giving you for your truck on the trade in (about 1000 more than they should’ve given me… figure it out…), you’re looking at this for a monthly payment, which is right where you want to be,” the only problem with that was I had nothing to put down.

That’s not entirely true. I had about 800 dollars in my savings that was exactly that, savings. I just didn’t want to touch it.

“Well, I wasn’t uh, you know, planning on putting anything down…” I say sheepishly. I start to feel a slightly tinge of panic, thinking I might be in over my head. Without hesitation, The Lady speaks up.

“He has 1600 to put down,” she says with confidence. I was about to turn to her and say ‘Bitch, you know I ain’t got no 1600 dollars!’ But it then dawns on me, that she’s going to float me the cash for the down payment right out of her pocket.

Looks like my mother was right after all.

I protest for a second, and she kicks me under the table, hard, right where the calf muscle and tibia meet. I wince and smile.

“Uh, I actually have 2200 I can put down,” I say, after I figure that if she’s going to put up 1600, I might as well put up 600 of my own. Bob goes back with the new figures and I shoot The Lady a look.

“You better know what you’re getting yourself into,” I say to her.

“I do. I’ll just make you sign a promissory note… say, you have to pay it back over the next two years? That way, I get to keep you around for the next two years.” She smiles.

I can’t help but be in love with her.

Bob comes back with the updated figures. We all agree that it looks good and we should get the financing started. I tell him that we’re going to need to hit up my bank to get the cash for the down payment, because she left her check book at home and needs to wire transfer the money up. Bob’s so cool that he lets me take the truck I’m going to buy with me to do these errands.

The Lady calls her bank and she’s told that she has to be present at the bank in order to make the wire transfer go through. I think this sounds a little odd, but I don’t say anything, and we happily drive down the highway back from Westbrook to Biddeford. We get to my bank, and she calls her bank back. Now she’s talking to someone else, and they’re saying she has to be present at HER bank, not mine. We’re left standing dumbfounded in the bank parking lot, looking at my new truck slipping away.

“You sure you don’t have your check book in your bag at my parent’s house?” I ask her.

“Yeah, no I know it’s in the apartment. I left it on the nightstand, or your desk.” I curse. I suggest we drive the truck over to my parent’s house to show it to my dad and see if he’s got any suggestions. And by “suggestions”, I mean “money.”

We get back over to my parent’s house and dad gives the truck a once over. He’s impressed, though being a Chevy man, he won’t admit to it.

“If I were a Transformer, this is what I’d transform into,” I tell him, about the truck. I then tell him about the story of the down payment and he nods solemnly.

My dad has a weird knack of being condescending at the wrong times and not knowing it. I probably do the same thing, but being that one’s unaware when doing it, it’s hard to tell if I do it at all.

“Well Jim, maybe it’s just not meant to be, you know?” He says this right in front of the truck. We all decide that I should call the dealership and let them know the situation, oppose to just stealing the truck outright.

“Hey,” I call Bob’s personal cell phone, “it’s Jim with the truck. Yeah…. Yeah… Yeah, well I just wanted you to know that we’re coming back, but that we couldn’t get the wire transfer from her bank on the Cape. She has to be there in person I guess? Yeah…. No yeah, I’m coming back with the truck. I am. Yeah, like right now. But could you tell the guy doing the financing that the numbers are going to be a little different? Also, tell him I’m coming back with the truck right now. Like, right now.”

When we get back to the dealership, Bob’s super understanding. These things happen, he says. It’s the finance guy who’s shitting a brick.

Apparently this isn’t the usual finance guy. He’s like an understudy, he’s short, slimy-looking like Richard was, highly caffeinated and likes to shake hands a lot, and all weird, with his hand cocked out to the side, which requires me to look at his hand to line up the shake, oppose to looking him in the eyes, like I’m used to. All of this makes me increasingly nervous.

When we finally get down to it, we’re crushing out numbers and it comes down to about fifteen dollars more a month than what I want to pay. But I suck it up and pick up the pen. I’m literally a breath away from owning this truck (or at least holding it while the bank owns it) when this shark starts talking about the Extended Warranty.

“It covers everything, from tire blow outs and towing, to broken glass and mechanical malfunctions. You can bring it back here for almost everything, all for what I like to call, the cup of coffee a day,”

“Well, what’s the price of a cup of coffee these days?” I ask.

“About 2.55,” he says. I laugh.

“That’s some cup of coffee. No wonder Starbucks is closing stores.” The humor is lost on him.

“When you add it up, your monthly payment, with the extended warranty, which covers your truck for the next three years, is going to be X” and “X” represented about 75 dollars more a month than the 15 dollars more than I wanted to pay, period.

“No, I can’t swing that. I still have to pay gas and insurance on this thing. That’s not do-able.” I tell him.

“But you’re protecting your investment,” he starts.

“But this is redundant. I have insurance for a reason, as well as AAA. And this dealership’s policy is a lifetime warranty anyway, as long as I bring it back here when something goes wrong. You’re basically asking me to spend money on nothing.”

He gets noticeably upset. “I don’t think you understand, Mr. N”

“No, I don’t think you understand. I Don’t Want It. How can I be more clear?” He swallows hard, shut down and then prints off a page with all the things the warranty would be covering. With a big green magic marker, he rights DENIED across the front of the page, then under it, he strikes a line with an X next to it for me to sign on. With a lot of strain in his voice, the midget says:

“This here is just for our records, to show that you were offered this program, but have denied it.” And I sign extra big.

There were a few last loose threads, like getting the car detailed and a window button looked at, but after 6 hours, I was done. The truck was in my name.

We left the dealership, exhausted by victorious. The truck got a professional detailing and I had a guilt free conscience. I was flying so high that I even let The Lady smoke inside the truck on the drive home.

Unfortunately, my mom had to work late so we didn’t get on the road til much later that night. She didn’t get a good look at the truck because it was dark out. So I made sure I had The Lady take a picture of me and the truck that afternoon after I got it home. I then took the picture and made it her computer’s desk top wall paper, and shut the computer down, so she would get a surprise when she turned it on.

Here’s the picture:

Also, The Lady hates that t shirt. Yet she was the one who packed it.

Epilogue: It turns out, her check book was in her bag the whole time too. Oh Well.

RIP DAFT

It all started about a month ago, really... the end of June. I had just gotten back from my trip to Laconia when my bike started to have problems.

It was run of the mill-type shit: I'd be cruising along and all of a sudden the RPMs would just drop out. I'd be doing about 70 mph at 6000 RPM and I'd go down to zero, nothing on the throttle, the needle on the tact wouldn't so much as shudder.

So I'd pull to the side of the road and check everything out. It would turn over hard, and I'd have to wait a while before it'd even start at all. So there I'd be, waiting on the side of the road for my bike to make up it's mind if it was going to start or not. It was dangerous and frustrating.

Over time (the span of about a week) the problem seemed to get worse. Added to the fact that I also dropped the bike in the parking lot after I slipped on a patch of sand while backing it, I really couldn't ride at all. It was enough to make me want to take a hammer to the damn thing and beat it until either it or I was broken.

The last straw, really, came about a week ago, when I was trying to limp the bike home from work, some 50 miles away, when it just died at the halfway point. I had to call for a tow, because the bike simply would not move another inch and when I was told that it'd be at least a two hour wait for the right guy to show up with the right equipment (in all actuality, when the guy did show up, he didn't bring the right shit anyway) I did what any good biker would do, and pushed the bike under the shade of a big tree, fold his jacket up under his ass, lean back against the bike and take a nap.

Once I got the bike to the shop, they said they'd take a good look at it. I described the problem as best I could in my layman language, and they told me they'd get it taken care of. One hundred and forty dollars and an oil change later, I pick up the bike only to have it do the exact same thing to me as it did before. Consider the camel's back to be broken.

So I brought it back that same day and complained that I was being charged for basically nothing. The guy behind the counter shrugged sheepishly and said "well, we ran it all day yesterday, it ran fine..."

"Did you 'run' it, or 'ride' it... there's a difference," I said back to him, still clutching my helmet, drenched in sweat from my kevlar jacket and jeans.

"Ran it," was the response.

So the bike's been sitting in the shop for a week, and I finally get a call on it. They tell me that the bike's currently in pieces, and it's going to need a 1500 dollar part if it ever hopes to see the road ever again.

What the fuck. Seriously. I only owe like 2500 on this goddamn thing. I bought it to SAVE me money, not become a fucking money pit.

I tell him on the phone not to bother with ordering the part. Just put the bike back together and I'll come by and pick it up. For the labor, I owe 600 dollars. All for him riding the bike down the road, tearing it apart, and putting it back together. Six hundred dollars.

The guy I bought it from told me he took exceptional care of it, did all the maintenance himself and it was in great condition, given the mileage. I should've been more dubious of the purchase when I thought I was getting a great deal.

So now the plan is to float the bike back to Maine, trade it in for either a new model (I do have my eye on a BMW K 1200 S....) or something that's certified pre-owned. Either way, I'm dealing with a dealership from now on.

This scar from this burn will never fade.

I'll Take A Hot Cup Of Kharma, With Skim And Light Foam...

Honestly, when your business charges 4.00 USD for a cup of fucking coffee, no matter how fancy your despondent 19 year old employee behind the counter makes it, you're business is in line to get whacked.

Earlier last week, the (vastly inferrior, in my humblest of opinions) coffee chain Starbucks announced that for the first time in the company's history, it was going to close some of it's locations, six hundred to be exact. These closings mean that now Manhattanites will be forced to wait in line for a double mocha vanilla latte for approximately two minutes longer.

If you couldn't tell yet, I have zero fucking sympathy for the Seattle-based coffee chain. With the on-set of a recession, gas prices hovering around what some snobbish prick would pay for a cup of hi-test coffee, and the country continuing to spin around the bottom of the toilet bowl, any one could plainly see that Starbucks was fucking itself in it's Colombian-imported asshole.

According to NYT Business editor Brad Stone, alot of Starbucks' trouble stemmed from piss poor real estate decisions. Apparently, the folks at the helm of the good ship Starbucks thought it'd be a good idea to put locations within spitting distance of each other. You know, just in case the five minute waiting line was too long at one store, you could literally walk across the street to the other location, and wait five minutes over there.

I know this for a fact because I used to go to school in Manhattan's Clinton district, what used to be known as Hell's Kitchen. I would get off the subway at 57th and 7th (Q, R, N, W lines), and hoof it three blocks west and two blocks north. In that span of time, which was usually a fifteen minute walk, I would see no less than five fucking Starbucks. Two more if you counted the two inside the Time Warner building (one actual store on the ground level, another inside the Barnes and Nobles on the third floor.)

Coincidently, this is the trend that Starbucks' Board of Directors wanted to take across the country. According to Stone's article, Starbucks planned to have 1000 unit locations in the state of Florida alone. One thousand fucking Starbucks. Are you serious?!

I'm from a small town in Southern Maine, population hovering around 20K annually. I can think of three Starbucks within five minutes of each other back home. Christ.

So The New York Times' Stone thinks it's the location that drove Starbucks to kill 600 of it's own stores. It's not, though it could be seen as circumstantial evidence that would lead one to believe so. No, it's the fact that people, even the ridiculous Upper East Siders, in their lavish 39th floor 9000.00 USD a month apartments in Manhattan can no longer reasonably spend the amount of money they once were on something as frivilous as coffee. Not when you can go to any deli or sandwich shop or little cart parked on the sidewalk next to a newsstand, and get a cup of regular-ass coffee for a dollar.

All you're paying for at Starbucks is the status symbol. The ability to walk around with a cup in your hand, in a little gay sleeve, that says "hey, I can afford to drop 5 dollars on this cup of bland, watery coffee with some fucking milk foam on it." That's all. In the heirarchy of fucking coffee chains, Starbucks is the fucking lowest. It really is, as far as taste, price, employees, everything; if I had a score card for every commercial chain coffee joint I'd ever frequented, Starbucks would be dead last in all catagories.

You know, Starbucks does serve just a regular cup of coffee for about a dollar, maybe a little more. It sucks. And when you order it, as in "can I just have a plain-ass cup of coffee please?" You get a funny look from the cunt behind the register, a completely filled cup of black shit, and a finger pointing to where the cream and sugar is.

How the fuck am I supposed to work with this shit, Gretchen? You do realize that if I try to add creamer to this ... giant cup of hot blackness, I'm going to spill it all over the place, right?

And it's a horrible, terrible, burnt-to-shit French Roast.

I was subject to Starbucks for the three years I lived in NYC. For some reason, they have about a million Starbucks (also, strangely - just about a third of the people I met while living in NYC worked, or had worked for a Starbucks... weird) in the city, but only four Dunkin Donuts. So when I was pressed for coffee (and I drank a lot more of it then than I do now for some reason) and I coudn't find a small diner or deli, I had to go to Starbucks.

And while waiting in line, I'd sooner be driving a rusty nail through my cheek, to pin my tongue to my opposite cheek.

And you have these people, with their ridiculously long orders to the robot-like kid behind the counter. Some trendy bitch in a fur coat and gloves sounding off what seems like a grocery list than a coffee order:

"I'll take a decaff, skim-only, double foamed, chocolate and vanilla latte with a twist of lemon and a little bit of cinnamon. Oh, a little whip creme too!"

I understand now, why NYC has such heavy restrictions on firearms.

Back to the point at hand though, Starbucks shot itself in the foot by trying too hard. Literally like Britany Spears, Starbucks pushed itself to the point of actual implosion, caving under the weight of it's own celebrity. One could see the backlash from a mile away. How long did you think stupid Americans were going to continue to try to impress each other with cardboard cups?

How long were we going to pretend the emperor wasn't really naked and the coffee really didn't suck?

Best Of: June 2007

This was one of Jim's first "Fear and Loathing" pieces, which is generously ripped off from Hunter Thompson, as far as style was concerned. He's argued that he's paying an homage to the late cultural icon, where as the rest of us on the editorial staff call it blatant plagiarism. Anyway, with Jim out of the office for the next week or so,(work related stuff at his OTHER job...) we thought it would be appropriate to run this old post this weekend because it is La Kermesse back in Maine through Sunday. Enjoy- Ed.

All names have been changed to protect the guilty.*

If you live in Southern Maine, passed through on your way some place else, or are vaguely aware that what some consider to be a suburb of Boston, is in fact a totally different state, you might've heard of the little shin-dig the locals up this way call "La Kermesse."

I don't know what the name means, but I can tell you it's a big French festival complete with rides for the kids, poutine for the people who know what the fuck that is, and a beer tent. The festival itself is preceded by a "block party" on Thursday night, followed by a parade that will open up the fair grounds come Friday afternoon.

Basically, it's an excuse for people to be drunk in public. Not that anyone who lives in the greater Biddeford area really needs an excuse to do so.

So over the last few years (aside from the fact I was living in New York) I've pretty much stayed away from the neon colored orgiastic culmination that is La Kermesse. I really have no desire to see people I went to high school with, whether they're doing better off than me or not, nor do I want to run into the citizens of Biddeford on the whole.

But last night, Thursday June 21st, I found myself smack-dab in the middle of the fray, on the York Street Bridge with some friends, most of whom I didn't even know two hours prior, standing and looking at fireworks through blurry bloodshot eyes, and surrounded by Parliment smoking, stroller pushing, tank-tops-with-skinny-arms having trash. How did I get here? Allow me to illustrate.

I get home from the office at about five, and my pocket buzzes just as I'm pulling off of 95 at the Biddeford exit. It's my friend *John*, a guy I went to high school with and is probably the most genuine guy I know, other than Hokie. He asks if I'd be interested in hanging out, and at first I'm thinking he's putting a card game together, and being broke, I say I'm going to pass.

Instead, however, he asks if I want to go to the fireworks "and shit" tonight. I totally forget that it's the La Kermesse weekend, only passing the giant fucking yellow billboard at the 95 on ramp everyday, twice, for the last two weeks. I say sure, and get a time, and proceed about my evening per usual.

I have dinner with mom which is just pizza out of the box. I manage to burn the roof of my mouth.

I get to John's house a little after 1930 and park in front. He calls from the window to come up stairs and I do so, only to find his drunk younger brother sprawled out across his bed, jabbering on about something. He's dressed head to toe in American Eagle and sports a frat-boy tan. I'm not exactly sure what's going on, because John's busy playing Counter Strike on his computer and his mom is yelling at his brother, who's managing to be at his most incoherent.

Apparently, John's little brother just got home from college for the summer. And he's totally shitfaced.

So that being said, I dig into my back pack and produce a can of PBR and sip on it as I wait to see what's going to happen for tonight. John escorts me out, and his mother calls out that she doesn't want his younger brother getting outside. Dumbly, I stand at the door, with it wide open, as like a cat, the little brother scampers out into the bright wilderness.

We go down into John's basement where he has a pool table, as well as other assortments of entertainment displayed about. It's like your grandparent's rumpus room, if this was the 1970s and people still had rumpus rooms. Or even put those two words together. You know what I mean.

Low ceilings, beer cans littered about, a used and tired looking punching bag propped up against a far wall. The door to get in is never locked and requires a leaned in shoulder to pop it open. We stand around, discussing his younger brother's lack of alcoholic tolerance.

"I told him not to come home. I sent him a text. 'You're shitfaced, mom's home, don't come home'" John says as he works some chalk on to a pool cue. I sip my beer and nod along, thinking back to my kidney destroying first year of higher education. At the time being, John's little brother is sitting, splayed out on the back yard, telling everyone who asks if he's ok that he's in fact, twenty-one years old.

"Dude, you gonna be good?"

"I'm twenty-one!"

"....Ok..."

This brings us to John's other two friends who show up at about this time. *Jerry* and *Dan* know John from college and I guess all play musical instruments together. Dan's a tall dark haired guy who still looks collegate and Jerry's built like a keg, and reminds me somewhat of a guy I went to high school with. Both of these guys are cool shits.

A game of billiards breaks out and John hooks his iPod into a stereo and we take turns talking about stupid shit that guys talk about when they play billiards. Who we've fucked, who we want to fuck, how fucked up we are, how fucking gay something is, how fucking gay you are, and how fucking gay we all are. It's a regular round table of fuck patois.

Suddenly, John's mom appears downstairs, visibly upset. She states that the younger brother has "taken off" up the street, with some female friends of his. She wants him back at the house, pronto.

Allegedly, according to John, his brother started drinking around four in the afternoon when he went to a friend's house, and came back stumbling. He's not much of a guy; he's probably 6' even and 150 lbs tops. Also, he's only eighteen, and although belongs in a fraternity, probably can only muster to hold down four Bud Lights at the most. Also, he probably likes to kiss men (John's words, not mine)

Like an crack army assault unit, myself, John, Jerry and Dan climb into John's Mazda and tear off down the street looking for his brother. It doesn't take us long to come up on him from behind, as he's leading a pack of about four high school aged girls down the hill towards the festivities below. He's weaving all over the side walk, hands out to his sides, head lolling from side to side.

John, who is also a former Law Enforcement Professional, expertly puts the car up on a sidewalk blocking his brother's path from furthering. We all step out of the car as if it was planned. We look like something out of a cheesey cop drama on syndicated television. One of the girls in the pack that was behind the little brother even exclaims to no one:

"Wow, you guys are like a SWAT team!"

You're fucking A right we are, missy.

John makes contact, and Jerry and Dan are quick to block the brother in like a wall of flesh. There's a little bit of a confrontation with a young girl who's obviously on something, but I take her aside and keep a perimeter. The girl says to me "I'm not scared of you guys, my dad's a cop."

"So are we."

"Oh."

With some explanation on my part and some coaxing on John's part, we snatch up his brother and pull off down a side street and get him back home. Where he will pass out sitting on a toilet ten minutes later.

Fast forward to later in the evening. The other gentlemen and I have been playing billiards, shooting the shit (shit patois), and throwing ping-pong balls at water filled cups on a ping-pong table. At some point in the evening, purely due to my inebriated state, I produce my scrotum and announce that I've seemed to have gotten gum on my shorts.

This psyches out Jerry, and leads Dan and I to take the title of Supreme Champions of Beruit, 2007.

John then receives a call from a girl he has some history with, and I encourage him to have her come over. My thoughts are that if she gets here, gets drunk enough, we could probably run a train on her.

Seriously.

*Celeste* shows up about forty-five minutes later, and she's your typical cute college girl. Nothing remarkable or unremarkable about her at all. Cute body, cute face, cute personality. John puts her on "myspace picture duty" as we continue to play Beruit.

Soon after, five strong, we make our way down the hill into the pit of sin, all while glittery explosives go off over our heads. The entire time the five-some is together, we're busting balls, laughing, clutching our stomaches, and weaving all over the road as we walk. People are lined up on both sides of the street, heads tilted skyward as they watch the pyrotechnics from their properties.

Almost as if, years ago it had been planned out, we pass by the sewage treatment plant as the entrance to the lower downtown area of Biddeford, where the "block party" is being held. All around us, carnivale-style games, people, food, etc surround us. The booms and sizzles of fireworks rain down on us from over head. The air is coated slickly with a haze of residual burning Marijuana, and it makes your skin feel greasy. Cheap looking, broken people shuffle their dirty-faced children past us. Each one of them clutching a plastic sword and swinging it expertly at crotch level.

We weave through the crowd and make our way to the bridge. Along the way we, inevitably, come across people we know- high school people, teachers, neighbors, etc. A guy I haven't seen since early on in college, comes up to John and I and puts us both in a head lock and squeezes. He goes on to tell us that the next day is the day he's signing his papers to be released from the Army. I tell him good luck with that.

We get offers to go drink at bars and parties and so on. But the collective mood of the five-some is to march back up the hill to John's, play a few more games of Beruit, and possibly clusterfuck.

Seriously.

We weave our way back through the crowd, heading back the way we've come. The fireworks are over now, with a substandard "grand finale" which lit up the sky like it was day time, and twice as loud, and suddenly I become aware of the increased police presence.

It seems all around us, cops in polos and standard uniforms, with ear pieces for their radios have materialized out of thin air. There's probably a ratio of every three people, one cop. It's startling.

Jerry is probably the most drunk out of everyone, and as we pass some carnivale-style games, the chatter starts to pick up.

One game involves a small inflatable pool filled with water containing rubber duckies. I'm not sure the premise of the game but that's exactly what it is. As we pass by, Dan says to Jerry, something like:

"I'll give you twenty bucks if you jump into that fucking pool,"

Of course, Jerry turns him down. It's going to take a considerably higher amount of money for him to engage in such baffoonery.

"Dude, back me up!" Dan slaps John on the chest and John grudgingly agrees to go in on twenty bucks as well. Now the dare's up to forty.

All eyes turn on to me. I look around, knowing that I don't have even ten dollars to my name, because I just paid all my bills today, I nod absently, and the crowd seems to go wild.

"Sixty bucks dude! Just jump in!" And Jerry still throws up the block.

This whole time, the only voice of sobriety and reason is Celeste's.

"You're so going to get arrested. There's cops all over the place," and this seems to hit home with Jerry immensely.

"Yeah dude, I don't want to get arrested on this dumb shit," He says and starts to balk, heading back towards John's house.

To be completely honest with you, gentle reader, I don't know why I chose the words to say at that particular moment, but maybe deep down, I wanted to see a little chubby guy jump into an inflatable pool filled with little rubber duckies. Maybe my dark side came out of me at that instant. Maybe I wanted to see if he'd get arrested, based purely on my deeply routed curiosity. Maybe I just wanted to call his bluff.

I lean over, touching Jerry's shoulder, placing my lips next to his ear lobe and say this:

"Do this, and you'll be the stuff of legends. People will talk about this for the rest of their lives. People you don't even know, but they're standing there, waiting for you to jump into that fucking pool. You'll be remembered forever. This is your legacy."

And with that, Jerry's eyes glazed over. A slow, goofy grin spread across his fat Donkey Lips lips and suddenly I glanced down and saw that he was standing in stocking feet, his shoes somehow coming off.

You see, men strive to leave a mark on this world, no matter how big or small. We want glory in all shapes and forms. To us we live for the conquest. This is why men climb Mt. Everest.

The psychological erection I gave him proved the jolt he needed. Much to the protest and physical strikes I was taking from Celeste, Jerry turned and started at a good trot towards the inflatable pool, some fifty yards back. We all stood watching in mixed disbelief, drunken grins pasted on to our faces, all of us chanting in unison "he's not really gonna..."

And then, he goes sideways in midair.

That's when I turned away, shocked, scared, knowing he was about to be swarmed upon by a mass of trigger happy Nazi, Nixon-esque Biddeford Cops.

What felt like an eternity passed as we four stood looking at each other. John starts to walk off, turning around only to say "I cant be caught up in this, I just applied to these guys like a week ago. Call me when you find out what his bail's going to be, and I'll come down and bail him. But I can't be here for this."

It's Dan who stands tall on behalf of his friend Jerry, stating "dude, we can't ditch him," and Celeste is quick to agree. Admittedly, my feelings were with John, and I teetered on the edge of staying or going, my vote being the decider.

But then, out of the crowd, as if it was the end of the film "Rudy" our pudgy counter part and La Kermesse Carnivale Terrorist remerges, soaked head to toe, jogging back to catch up with us. A roar goes out, as we collectively welcome him back, slaps on his back, hugs, and "holy shits" had all around.

Jerry ends up scraping his knees, and as he takes a seat by the sewage treatment plant, he retells of what happened:

"I fucking jumped in, and this guy, this guy grabs my collar on my shirt and goes 'you're not going anywhere' and I tried to run, but this cop comes up to me and goes 'do you have three hundred dollars for bail?' and I say 'no sir,' and he asks me my name and I tell him, and that was it." And for as simple of a story as it is, we're all huddled around our new hero in total awe.

"That was some pretty stupid shit," he finishes. He also makes it known that he wants his money ASAP.

We climb the hill back to John's house where things eventually wind down. Jerry and Dan decide to go out to Old Orchard to meet up with some other people to retell the tale of the night. Celeste, expertly deflecting my drunken horny advances, decides to go home ("I've gotta get home," she says "You can come back to my home," I come back with, "it's a home....") and I pick up my bag, wish everyone a good night, and manage to drive myself home without getting pulled over.

...And that's why I don't go to La Kermesse.

God Is My Co-Pilot (He Rides On My License Plate!)

For the life of me I couldn't tell you why I was watching FOX News last night when a story about how Florida wanted to sell to it's drivers, a religious license plate that can be registered to your car.

The show featured some obnoxious ultra-conservative spawn of Anne Coulter-twat who was (of course) in favor of the license plate, and a Reverend of the Humanists Church, who was against. As hard as he tried, the reverend was constantly cut off by the show's host, who kept repeating "c'mon, is it that bad, really Rev.?"

I could easily launch into a tirade about how ridiculous FOX News is, but I won't. Instead, I'll talk about the need for seperation between Church and State.

And to answer the blonde Nazi's question, yeah, it's really that bad. I mean, look:

Real subtle Florida.

I mean, my problem is two-fold; on one hand you have this whole, exclusivity to the license plate itself. It's one thing to be religious, but there are hundreds of religions out there, practiced by millions of people. I'm sure there's plenty of dumb-fuck Christian Floridians who would love to add this to their rotting Dodge Daytonas and Chevy Cameros, to show off to all their neighbors that they peel rubber for Jesus, but what about Jews, Muslims, or whatever the hell Chinese people worship?

I mean, not everyone in the world is a fan of NASCAR, you know?

Part two of my rant is that this is in blantant disregard for Church/State seperation. The woman on the show, who I believe to be a robot fueled by Bill O'Rielly's sweat, was like "I think the framers of the Constitution wouldn't mind this at all, I think they'd be for it!"

Bitch, have you ever taken a Con-Law class? Highly doubtful. Why? Because it is against the Constitution of the United States for any state or government enitity to endorse one sole (soul?) religion. And by the looks of things, Florida is all but short of putting "He Died For You!" on the bottom of the plate.

And what about the Aetheist? Are we going to subject these heathens to being stuck in traffic behind some asshole with this plate, silently cursing under his breath as he loads rounds into the magazine of his 9mm?

What about the Witches?! You may become cursed by some sort of Earth Spell should you drive your beat up scratched to hell VW around town with a Jesus plate.

You know, there's a rich Hatian culture in Florida... where's the Voodoo plate?

And the Nihilists! They don't even believe the license plate exists!

Do you know why states put out these speciality plates? It's so the state can earn funds from the people who are buying that particular plate. As far as I know, the State of Maine has like, 8 different plates you can choose from, from Yellow Ribbon plates to University of Maine plates to Abnaki Tribe plates, and so on. Every one of those plates is a certain dollar extra amount every time you register your vehicle for the year. And that money goes to the state.

So basically, The State of Florida is cashing in on Religion. I don't know who I'm more disgusted in; The State of Florida for cashing in on people's beliefs, or the people themselves, who'd go out of their way to spend their money on religion outside of church collections, red cans manned by a bell ringing Santa or Oakie-Fare Tent Revivalists.

Goddamnit.

Sunday: Then and Now

While uploading some pics from Bike Week on my parents computer (and I guess, further procrastinating on that whole article...) I came across some pics of me from like, four or more years ago. It's crazy to see how much I've changed!

Take a look for yourself:

James, as of 2008:

And James back in 2004:


Weird how time changes people.

Short Fiction: Immigrants and Out of Towners (Portland Prelude)

They rode four in the car, three and a driver. It was late, just after one in the morning on an April night where in Maine things seemed wet no matter what you touched or where you were.

They crested on to the Casco Bay Bridge, a billion dollar-project that spanned over the mouth of the Casco River and emptied into Casco Bay. It had four lanes, two going in each direction, and could be opened in the middle to let large ships up river. You got on in Portland and got off in South Portland. If the bridge was down, it took you about three minutes of driving at 55 mph to cross it.

The city lights from the buildings and rigs and ships beneath them shined like cats’ eyes, and the water was still. No one was on the road except a Mazda R6, silver in color that was stopped at the red light in the middle of the bridge, because the gate was starting to slowly climb up.

Watercraft that required the bridge to open for them were usually sent a notice to only enter port between the hours of 2100 and 0400 Mondays through Fridays. Being that this was a Thursday night, the men in the Volvo wagon which was drawing up behind the Mazda, were fully aware of the shipping and bridge schedules.

The Volvo stopped and idled and the driver put it into park and waited. The men seated around him drew masks over their faces and checked their weapons. The man sitting front passenger turned slightly towards the men in the back and spoke through his balaclava.

“No reloading, just empty the gun into the car, and get back here. Julio will keep the Volvo just a few yards up from the Mazda. Charlie will do the finish shots and confirm the kill, ok?” And the two in the back, clad in black ski masks nodded silently. The man in the balaclava turned back and checked the chamber on his German-made G3 7.62x54mm.

They waited for the bridge to finish going through it’s mechanized motion and start it’s decent. The driver put his vehicle back into gear and once the light turned green, he pulled out wide in front of the Mazda, screeching his tires. The lights on the Mazda, which had been red, went out and then pumped back into place as the crazy Volvo wheeled around it.

The Volvo came to a halt just in front of the Mazda, and the men all climbed up, except the driver. With the battle rifle on his hip, the man in the balaclava opened up first into the silver colored coup, spraying fully-automatic gunfire into the windshield and engine block. His two counter parts came by him, and with an AK47, 7.62x39mm and an AR15 5.56mm they joined in on the kill. The blazing gunfire deafened the still night, yet it seemed that there was no sound at all. The car took all eighty rifle rounds to it’s driver’s door and windshield. And when all the weapons were empty, the man in the balaclava turned, dressed in his leather coat and twill pants, and ran back to the idling Volvo, followed by the man who was sitting directly behind him.

By the time the two got back to the car, there were two short pistol pops from behind them, and then more footsteps. Once they were all back inside of the vehicle, they sped away, no one looking back.

They were deep into South Portland, in a little neighborhood called Manor Gates, at a Hannaford’s parking lot when the one with the pistol broke the silence:

“He wasn’t in the car,” he said evenly.

“What?” Came the driver.

“He wasn’t in the car, it was just a female by herself. She’s dead now,” he finished and looked out the window. The four sat in silence.

The front passenger side door clicked open and the passenger stepped out, peeling his balaclava off and leaving his G3 in the car.

“Fuck,” Jimmy Dreamer said under breath, while wiping the sweat off of his face. He walked towards the Hannafords, and through the back alley, ditching his mask in a dumpster along with a pair of leather gloves. On the other side of the alley was a parking lot for an Osco Drug, and that’s where he found his Jeep Cherokee waiting for him.

He checked behind his back, looking around, and then shined a small LED flashlight into the interior of the vehicle, as well as under it. When he was satisfied, he took one more look around, and climbed in.

So I Should've Been Eating Grapefruit Every Day For Lunch?

Or, you say 'fuck it' pack everything that will fit in the back of your truck, and drive the four hours back to Maine and emotionally breakdown at your parent's doorstep.

Best Of: May 2006

This was my very first "unmailed letters" article (there'd go on to be about five installments, each getting angrier I think...) so I thought it'd be nice to show you guys what was pissing me off roughly two years ago.

Hope you enjoy!

Often times people say that if you have a problem with something, you should write a letter, but not mail it. It helps get all the anger out. Well, for the first time ever, exclusive to this blog, here are some of my more favorite Unmailed Letters....

To the white trash family that lives at the top of the street:

Good morning, crackers! It's your neighbor James, you might remember me from a few weeks ago when I came over to politely ask you to stop having the three of your nineteen kids that drive, to stop driving so fast up and down the street in their shitty cars? Do you remember that? Remember how I even identified myself as a Peace Officer, and we shook hands? You were shirtless at the time, and presumably barefoot as well. Your smaller children were scattered all over your makeshift property? They had dirty clothes and dirty faces? You smelled like burning marijuana?

Anyway, I just wanted to let you know how much I love being ignored! Even more so, I wanted to let you know how much I love the fact that you also ignore safety on a regular basis! I love how your property is littered with shitty cars, some running, some not. I love how you all decide to use our tiny street as your personal drag strip! I love hearing the shitty loud exhaust at all hours! I love how you keep me from maybe taking a 45 minute long nap by racing up and down the street all day. Also, that tinny whine from that mini bike you ride, which is illegally unregistered and illegally operated by an unlicensed individual, makes my ears bleed. So thank you for ruining some of my more favorite t shirts with a fad toy from two years ago that you just got off of lay-away.

Also, thank you so much for providing me with a real life episode of COPS twice weekly. Having Biddeford's Finest respond to your domestic issues at all hours, and screaming obscenities into the night air gives me a warm fuzzy feeling down in the base of my balls.

By the way, you're also very poor.

I hope that life finds you all well, with unscrubbed faces and unlaundered clothing. Also, the can of paint I plan on tossing on to that shitty primer gray VW Golf that keeps racing up and down the street is complimentary.

Bests..... James.

To my former upstairs Jewish neighbors in Queens, NY:

Shalom! I hope that whatever crazy Jewish holidays that have passed recently found you all well. I'm so sorry things didn't work out for us better... I was really looking forward to the man of the family letting himself into my apartment to turn down my appliances again. Nothing says "welcome to the neighborhood" like a creepy Jewish guy standing with muddy boots in my freshly washed kitchen floor, touching my property while I'm taking a piss.

I'm sorry that my work schedule was inconvenient for you and your family, and you had to report my landlord to the authorities, after less than a month, instead of just catching me while I was home and asking me to not play my tv/stereo/lady I was having sex with so loudly.

However I commend you on your ability to find a corrupt Russian landlord in a city that's only filled with them, and then reporting him to the City's Housing Board so that the only punishment that would be meeted out was me losing my home.

Anyway, I hope your small child grows up unathletic and greedy.

Mozel Tav! ...James.

To Howard Stern:

Howard... just a quick note to say that you're really not that funny. You're not god's gift to free speech. Just because you can get porn stars to fuck each other with modified power tools on your radio program only means that you were the first to put the idea in action. There are literally a million other people out there that had the same idea/s as you, but you only had the good fortune of getting on the air first.

Good luck with the satellite radio thing. It only downside is that your replacement was a post-rehab David Lee Roth, who is the only person on this entire planet who is more opinionated/bitchier than me.

Oh and I miss the awkward pauses on live radio early in the morning.

Baba-Booey.... James.

To Tv's Jack Bauer from FOX's '24':

You're awesome. Keep up the good work.

Man-crushing on you..... James.

To Olympian Bode Miller:

As if it wasn't already hard enough to be American in the world's eye, you come along and make it that much harder, you fucking choke artist.

Granted, the Winter Olympics in Torino were months ago, but you know, I just wanted to take an extra second here and tell you how much you suck. You suck harder than Howard Stern's show. You suck more than the Yankees, and they suck a whole lot.

All I can think of is the poor kid who worked his ass of, who wasn't born with the same talent as you, who missed the team cut off and was forced to be an alternate by maybe three seconds. He would've appreciated going to the Olympics, and he would've represented America proudly. Instead of going to night clubs all night, fucking ridiculously hot italian broads (the ones with the waxed mustaches), and presumably doing ice booze louges into the wee hours, he would've been at practice, and shit, maybe would've medaled. But no one will ever really know, will they?

So again, thanks for all the unnecessary hype. Thanks for affirming the idea in the international community that Americans are excessive consumers and have zero respect for age old cultural traditions, you fucking hack.

Next time you choke, I hope you die.... James.

To President Bush:

At the risk of having my door kicked in by federal agents (maybe... Jack Bauer? That'd be really hot actually...) I'll keep this short and thinly veiled... you're not doing a very good job sir.

I don't necessarily blame you, I mostly blame your administration. See, as a proud republican, you guys are making it awfully hard for me to stay along the party lines. You all are so super fucking conservative that you make the Nazi Party seem somewhat warm/friendly.

Everyone in your administration is on their own agendas, and quite frankly sir, you were somewhat under-qualified for this job you took on to begin with. When you first took office, we all thought that "hey, we're progressive! This will be a quick four year stint, and then we'll get back to having an actual president, not a funny go-betweener." The 9/11 happened and the shit hit the fan. We all turned towards the administration, with their figure piece, and collectively said "oh shit..."

We still are progressive though, ... we're the first country to elect someone who is clinically retarded to the office of President. Hey, we got a retard in before a black guy! NICE.

You're actions in Afghanistan were warranted, but then the whole Iraq thing happened. Your administration poured honey into your oversized ears and told you to lie to us, to coddle falsified reports about Weapons of Mass Destruction. Cuz I mean, basically, you're just the pretty face on the program. You're the picture of Mr. Clean on the bottle. You don't really do anything at all, except go to press junkets and do photo ops holding a giant turkey at Christmas for our troops overseas. You're a bastard, but the rest of your crew are even bigger bastards.

In closing sir, I'm still going to stay the course with the Republican Party, however, as a formerly staunch Republican, I'm going to ask that you consider maybe lightening up a little. I mean, fuck, you love to quote Jesus this and Jesus That.... dude, Jesus was the definition of bi-partison.

And don't even get me started on gas prices around here... dude, you worked in the oil business... that's no excuse to why I put 20 bucks into my small 4 cylinder truck and the needle doesn't even touch the half-way mark. Goddamnit.

Anyway, good luck with the next two or so years fucking us all in the collective asshole.... James.