Naming Names

When I was young, I bragged about being able to drive half way across the state without ever touching a paved road, those days are gone. Now, one can go to Atlanta, and once they get on Martin Luther King Boulevard, they can travel across several states without getting off of it. There are 777 streets and everything else you can imagine, named after him.
There are so many things named after American Presidents that the internet provides this disclaimer with any information supplied on the subject. Sorry this question cannot be answered effectively and is constantly being updated. If you have any information, please contribute. I did find out that more things are named for Woodrow Wilson than for any other president. Why?
Okay, I do understand these; I’m not quite as thick as a brick. But while researching this, I did come across a few I don’t understand. How about Bubba Gump, Lane, Walk This, Way, Not A, Street or The Long And Winding, Road? On that last one, the streets of the entire neighborhood are named after Beetles songs. There is an entire community in Spain where the streets are named for the characters from the Mario Brothers video game.
I hate to get on this one, but a dummy cannot write a story this dumb without mentioning it. There are 71 streets in Atlanta named Peachtree. All or none of them may or may not end up at the Atlanta Botanical Gardens after being lost for four hours. I learned this one the hard way, I eventually stupided myself to my destination, five minutes after it closed. Warning, do not put Peachtree into that little black box on your dash, smoke will come from it. Do not try to figure it out on an old fashioned, out of date map, smoke will come from that little black box between your ears. Do not ask the average person, on the sidewalk of Atlanta, for directions to Peachtree. I got, you’re on it, from at least a dozen and I don’t know, from fifty who were on various forms of it. If your destination is on Peachtree, you’re better off taking a right on 285 and just keep driving until you reach the end or run out of gas.
If you’re headed somewhere to have tests which will determine how long you have to live, it’s best to stop by the Varsity and have a few dogs instead. At least you’ll enjoy the last six months of your life instead of dying while lost on Peachtree. I’ve decided Atlanta designed Peachtree to keep the idiots from the rest of the state busy while in town. This keeps them from bothering state officials, who are too busy not making progress, to be bothered with us. Half the idiots in Georgia are constantly circling Atlanta on 285, those who escape it, end up circling inside Atlanta on Peachtree. If you doubt this, you’ve never driven on either.
How about these, Psycho, Path, Just A, Road, Nameless, Road, Chain Gang Creek, Road and Labor in Vain, Road, there are millions. Here, is a fascinating question for you. What is the most popular street name in America? Second Street, what is that about? Second Street is in first place, and First Street is in second place. I have given up on understanding what people are thinking. I understood all I needed to understand by the time I was in third grade. That’s when little boys notice that there is something different and intriguing about the little boy sitting next to them with the pig tails and pink dress. It’s pretty much all downhill from there. Of course, this is also when little girls notice there is something different, and revolting about the girl sitting next to them, with the cowlick and worn out jeans.
Most of us learn all we need to know by the third grade, future politicians go on to learn that the rest of us are dummies in the fourth grade and lobbyists go on to learn politicians are dummies in the fifth.
This story was inspired during a conversation with Mike and Judy Boyce at the Cobb County Library Foundations, Wild West Festival. Mike is attempting to become the Cobb County Chairman. I found his humor to be refreshing, and his determination to be inspiring. We joked about why the loop in Marietta is called the loop and not the snake and about why places and highways are named after people. Both of us fear our expansive notoriety may ensure that a public restroom is named for us in the future. Judy was delightful and displayed the consummate wit and charm one would expect from a true Southern Lady.
While Mike may go on to have many things named for him, I expect an old fallen down outhouse in Milledgeville might be as close as I come.

Dust Bunnies and the Elephant Upstairs

A Naval vessel is constantly cleaned. Most Sailors believe they are simply being kept busy, and to an extent, this is true. However, it serves another more vital purpose. When you are at battle stations and other states of readiness, you are confined to exceedingly small airtight spaces for many hours. When the guns fire on such a craft any dirt or dust, is shaken loose and spreads through the air. You must not only breathe it, but try to see through it as you perform your duties.

Surely you know what dust bunnies are. They are little gray clumps of undetermined materials that appear under your bed and defy all cleaning efforts. In the Navy, they are called ghost turds. No matter how much you clean and scrub, they will appear and dust will fill the air, every time a gun fires or the ship smacks into a wave with immense force. Back to this momentarily.

Why would a person live in an apartment without a gun being held to their head to make them? I’m living in one, and although Mary Carmen did not hold me at gun point, she may have held me at lip point. It’s astounding what a man will do for the lips he chooses to kiss, forever.

Apartments are not man’s natural habitat. Well, they are natural for the man who owns them and has a burgeoning bank account to prove it. They are sometimes akin to dog kennels and often look like them. You can not own a car without door dings, and you must attend all your neighbor’s parties as you try to sleep in your bed. The gate works at times, but most times the only people it keeps out are the actual residents of such places.

The pool and other facilities are usually so full with non residents that you can only stand at a distance and wonder what’s it’s like to have a pool. You must jump through hoops to prove you are suitable to be a resident, but then watch as the parking lot fills with derelict vehicles possibly belonging to those who are not. You get to stand around in parking lots and discuss the latest car break-ins with your neighbors as they walk their dogs, which are against the rules. If you own a grill, you may store it on your deck, but must never use it. It’s not like you don’t pay dearly each month for the right to char grill a steak.

You must be privy to your neighbor’s arguments and their choices of television shows. The apartment above us has had three sets of residents since we moved in. Once, as we sat outside on our deck enjoying a glass of wine, the neighbors upstairs broke into a fight. It spilled out onto the deck above our heads. Then is developed into a loud, amorous encounter which caused me to blush and it’s hard to make an old sailor blush. I was embarrassed the next time I ran into them in the breezeway. The next occupants had kids, but we never heard a peep or step they made.

Last weekend new residents moved in up there. Immediately their pet elephants started running through the apartment. They start long before dawn and thunder across the apartment until late in the night. The apartment shudders and shakes and any dust that has escaped Mary Carmen and trust me that’s a hard thing to do, falls and fills the air. I love to be reminded of my days in the Navy, but this is a memory best left unremembered. I was beginning to think they had installed a wrestling ring up there.

With great anticipation, I struggled to catch a glimpse of the four hundred pounds Samoans who had moved in upstairs. I kept watching the parking lot as I have never watched someone walk a pet Elephant. I was curious about how they would accomplish it or what the leash looked like. Okay I was more curious to see what the pooper scooper looked like.

I was beginning to believe they were wrestling Samoans, with pet elephants who used a transporter, they never came and went. I never saw them move in, and I’m here most of the time. I was wondering if they were a tribe of Swahili’s complete with drums. This does kind of sound like a Star Trek or Twilight Zone episode, hummmm maybe they’re blue.

Then yesterday I saw them for the first time. Two young girls who if balled up and thrown on a scale would scarcely weigh a hundred twenty pounds combined. This revelation created more questions than the answers I needed. I guess they could be practicing for the Olympics or preparing for their roles in an upcoming Kung Fu movie. Sadly I’ll never know, but knowing might confuse me more.

A Freddie in the Flowers

Once upon a time I owned a store. Anyone who has ever owned a store, knows, the store owned me. I planted a flower garden behind it which was my excuse to escape the store as often as possible.
Anyone who has ever owned such a thing will agree. As time passes you do everything imaginable in the store, seeing as you practically live in it. You will eat, sleep, drink, play games, build a carburetor and yes Virginia you might have sex in it too.
This particular day was hot, and I knew I needed to be careful, but better to fall out outside than go crazy inside. I was weeding and doing other mindless things, trying to relax. Suddenly I heard a young girl say “Hey Freddie.” Now I have many names, but Freddie ain’t one of them and it never has been.
It was broad daylight, and I hadn’t been out long enough to be loopy. That’s not to say that I’m not naturally loopy, but this seemed out of place, it sent chills down my back and ran the willies up my arms. I wanted to look around to see if there were someone standing behind me. It seemed too much like someone looking under a bed in a horror movie.
Slowly I scanned the yard and saw exactly what I expected, I was alone. A little rat scurried away on my left toward the store. I caught a glimpse, it was green. Standing, I moved toward the store peering into the wild flowers, it moved again, there was another flash of green. I scanned my surrounding to make sure no one else was witnessing my trip to the funny farm.
After everything quieted down I squatted and went back to work. I was pulling weeds and singing when a burst of curse words ripped the air. They were so strong they embarrassed me, and I can throw together colorful words with the best of them. Looking around the second time was akin to going into that basement, you know the one.
I don’t know about you, but I decided long ago. If I ever find myself in a horror movie with a bunch of teenagers, and freaky music starts playing. I’m not looking under beds, going into basements or attics, opening doors, and I’m not using the outhouse, if there is one. I’ll let the others run through the woods, get chased by the mad man and see all the horrible stuff that needs seeing before you die. I’m gonna sit in the living room, eat boiled peanuts and drink Budweiser and make the killer come to me. Maybe he’ll be worn out from chasing teen age girls with wet Tee Shirts on and won’t have the energy to kill me when he finds me. Maybe the horror movie will end with him and I sharing a beer.
Anyway the curse words were uttered with a course, crude voice, so I stood as I searched the yard for their source. I had no idea if I was going to fight or run, but I could do neither on my knees. Another scan verified I was alone. I decided it was time to go inside as the broad daylight was scaring the bajebies out of me.
Then the cursing started again, followed by the sweetest little girl voice saying, “Hey Freddie.” I saw it again, a green bird broke from the cover of the wildflowers and started toward the store, it was scurrying like a green streak through the underbrush. I started toward the store at breakneck speed trying to keep my eyes on it as it appeared now and again through the flowers. When I reached the store, which was made of brick, I was so focused on Freddie I didn’t see the store coming at me. I hit it head first at full speed.
Waking up in the hospital twelve hours later, I had a few stitches and a concussion. I found myself in a battle of wits with a Physiatrist. It took me another twelve hours to convince him that the cursing bird I had been ranting about while I was out, was caused by the heat and not an indication of my mental state. I played the game and made him believe that I didn’t believe, but I did.
As soon as I got home I headed to the garden to prove, if to no one but me, that I wasn’t crazy. It took an hour, but I eventually corralled Freddie in a corner and took him in the house. This proved my sanity to a worried wife. Freddie was a little green Parrot, with a broken wing, with the vocabulary of a drunken Sailor. He spent the next ten years in our house offending visitors and teaching another generation the intricacies of colorful language.

The Big Chicken

I was in Marietta, Georgia yesterday for a local writer’s expo. There ain’t much more disturbing a thing, than to be cooped up in a room with 24 other writers. You will hear more stories than you can rightfully digest in such a time. The invitation did not state that a shovel was a necessary piece of equipment, but I should have figured. At times, it got so deep, I was might near swimmin.
There were old writers, young writers and others who were doing a fair impression of being dead writers. Well, until someone spoke to em and then they would pipe up and sing their own praises until folks moved on or they run out of steam and passed out again. There were big writers, little writers, writers of children’s books and writers of conspiracy. There were mystery writers, history writers and folks just sellin thing, dressed as writers.
Then there was me. On some days, I’m called a writer, most days I’m called thing I can’t say. I’m pretty sure if you know my ex-wife she might give you a few names that’ll make your face red and your ears burn. Mary Carmen might give you a few you can’t understand. Others might give a few unsuitable for new brides, children and grandmothers, to hear. I had fun and met some cool people, but next time, I’m takin a shovel, a bottle of toilet water and a set of hip waders. Just cause you’re full of it, don’t mean you got to smell like it.
So afterward we were to meet my publisher at the Marietta Diner. Did I mention for a free dinner? If someone says free food, my ears are comin off and going with them, with or without me. They are probably takin my mouth too and seein as a writer can’t exist without a mouth, the rest of my body might as well go along. Come to think of it, if my ears had went off and left me yesterday, I’d have been better off.
I learned how to sell books, listen to books on Cd’s, cover books and Lord I learned how to talk about books. It seems I learned everything about books except how to write em and sell em. Maybe I should have dropped my ears and eyes at Kennesaw State; they got more girls than the Florida Gators have on their football team. Maybe I should have dropped my brain at brain daycare; I didn’t need it where I was.
Anyway I remember going to Marietta when I was younger. At that time when you asked for directions, they would give them to you based on the most prominent focal point in the small city at the time. That bein Elmo Tolson’s farm, which was the exact location of his moonshine still. So the directions might go like this.
“Well if in you go as far as you can see down that away, you’ll see some new fangled cows in a field to your right. Turn left thereabouts, then be lookin for Rutherford Cuth’s old dog, it’s been dead for three days. Don’t mistake the brown one you’ll come across first, it ain’t from around her, shot it myself yesterday. Anyhow after you pass Rutherfords dog you’ll come to Elmo Tolson’s place, turn right and Johnny Mae Wilkinson’s place is the third on the right. Look for all them big ole tractor tires painted white and full of flowers, you can miss it.”
Ah, the good old days. Anyway when I asked about the diner, I got the following directions.
“Just go to the big chicken and turn right.”
“Do what?”
“Lord son, ain’t you ever heard of the big chicken? It’s a Georgia icon, people come from all over the world to see it, it’s right near where Elmo Tolson’s farm used to be. You ain’t from around here, are you boy?”
I ain’t, but I hit myself in the head with a hammer, twice to appear like I was. Sure enough, after a mile or so there was this chicken the size of Ole Ted Turner’s head, just sittin there, pretty as you please. I got to tell you, eatin anything beside an egg that comes from, the southern end of a chicken is a little disturbing. What do I know? I tried, hard, to keep going, but had to stop and take a few pictures; maybe I am from around there after all. Paris has the Eiffel Tower, Pisa has the leaning tower of pizza, Rome has the Sistine Chapel and Marietta has the big chicken.
Alright get your panties out of a bunch; I’m just poking a little fun. I had a fabulous time and met some outstanding folks. And that free meal, the Marietta Diner has some of the best food in the south. Thanks to the Cobb County Library.