Thirty Days Hath Google

"Hey! Look at that!" Bernard said over his shoulder as they stepped off the ferry.

"How could I not? It's as long as the ferryboat almost!"

"Yeah, I know! I'm a little disappointed actually. I think it should be bigger."

"Keep it up, Mr. Bighead, and I'll switch to the other side!" Ann shoved him on the right shoulder just as he started up the steps at the end of the boarding platform. Bernard stumbled but caught himself on the railing with his right hand. His gym bag slipped off his other shoulder, making him fumble with that hand to catch it.

Ann didn't bother hiding her amusement at her brother's expense. She laughed loud enough that the three people that had shared the ride to the island turned around and looked back down the steps.

"Fine! Go ahead" Bernard said in mock anger. He reached into his jeans pocket and pulled out a slim red phone. "And kill me too while you’re at it! Good thing that railing was there or I'd have fallen into the surf and been sucked away into the ocean and drowned!" He harrumphed loudly and spun on one heel.

Ann followed him up the steps, giggling. The ferry’s wake was still slapping the beach below. At most it was a two foot drop from the dock to the beach. "Drowned. Yeah, right. Whatever, Drama Boy. You’d have a better chance of knocking your brains out on a pebble down there than drowning."

“Hey, anything’s possible, traitor,” he said over his shoulder, still pretending to be mad. Then, he grinned. “Hey, I’m proof of that, right?”

The siblings had reached the top of the stairs now and were level with the parking lot. A white placard bolted to two concrete posts pointed to the North Hatton Island Visitor’s Center on their right. Dwarfing that sign, however, was what had caught their attention earlier. A long white vinyl banner, probably close to thirty feet long, was strung high between two of the parking lot’s light poles. On it was a message printed in blue block capital letters each three feet high: "THINK POSITIVE, ST. BERNARD! WE DO."

Bernard held up his cell phone and snapped a couple of pictures of the banner. Then, he turned and held the phone out backwards so that he could be in the foreground of the shots. After each click, he spun around and changed his facial expression into a different emotion. He went from happy to surprised to proud to dazed to nauseated in just a matter of a minute or so.

Laughing, Ann set down her bag and pulled out her digital camera. She started hamming it up with her brother. She alternated between taking backwards shots of herself with her brother’s welcoming banner in the background and snapping photos of her brother’s hilarious poses. When he jumped onto a bench and threw both his arms up directly beneath the ST., she shouted, “Work it, Miracle Boy!” like a runway photographer to a model. Bernard burst out laughing and fell onto the bench. Holding his sides, he waved her away as she kept taking more pictures.

“No, Sis,” he scolded, hugging his sides to try to stop laughing, “Don’t take pix when I’m down! It’ll ruin my image!”

“Ha ha! Can you say blackmail? extortion?” Ann cackled dramatically, still taking photos until he straightened and flipped his phone shut against his thigh. With his other hand, he also flipped her off, which to her delight she caught on camera. She danced around in a circle with the camera clutched to her chest. “Oooh! Pay dirt, brother! P-A-Y-dirt!”

Bernard jumped at her as though he were going to wrestle the camera away. Instinctively, she leaned forward and curled her body around it. All he did though was lock his right arm around her neck and rub his left knuckles briskly across her scalp. She squealed but didn’t drop the camera.

“Ha to you, Anna Banana!” He let her go and stuck his tongue out at her as he called her by the nickname he gave her that used to make her cry as a little girl. “The only thing you’ll get out of me will be more noogies!”

Ann was leaning on her knees laughing but still had her arms pulled close to her chest. She shuffled over to her bag like a crab guarding a morsel of food and stuffed her camera inside. Straightening, she grabbed her brother’s elbow and tugged him toward the weathered white building at the far end of the sidewalk.

“Come on, Mr. Saint Bernard, let’s stop playing and get to that Visitor Center. They’ll tell us how to get to this Cutie Pie Man you have to see.”

“Mercutio Pieta, Ann.” Bernard snorted. He fell into step behind her. “I am meeting with Cardinal Mercutio Pieta. Get it right. Cutie Pie Man makes him sound like some pedophile or goofy Pokemon collector.”

Ann raised an eyebrow and smirked, “There’s a difference?”

Bernard chuckled. “Just call him Church Guy if you forget, okay.” Ann nodded, and they walked a few steps in silence. As they neared the building, they noticed that a large crowd of people had gathered on a big veranda on its far side. The sidewalk they were following looked like it led right up to the crowd. The building’s main entrance had to be there.

“Do you think he’s meeting us here?” Bernard asked quietly as they approached the crowd. “I figured you’d have to go to a church to talk to a canonization expert, but I see a whole lot of people up there.”

At about the same time that Ann noticed that signs bearing Bernard’s name stuck on poles and hanging from the building’s roof, the people on the veranda started cheering. The cheer was obviously heartfelt but a little ragged since probably three-fourths of the crowd was quite elderly. Ann sighed. Ever since her brother’s powers became obvious, she’d seen crowds like this one many times. Her heart still ached for how eager they were though.

“It’s just talk anyway, Little Brother. If this ‘expert’ is here or not, these people have brought some work for you to do here first, I think.” Ann jerked her chin toward the waiting people. Her brother nodded, his young face suddenly very composed. His exuberance and goofiness of only a few minutes before had gone somewhere deep within himself, and a look of intense sincerity and caring had taken its place.

They neared the veranda, and she started counting crutches, wheelchairs, walkers, and even a stretcher or two. A few people who were more mobile had canes they waved, and Ann counted them, too. The faces of the hopeful but obviously healthy she ignored.

“Looks like we’ll be maybe an hour or two,” Ann whispered. “Unless more show up, that is. And it’s possible. I mean, obviously, you’ve got quite a fan club going on here. Who knew. I thought this island was an out of the way place.”

A grin flitted across his face, showing that her brother was still her brother, no matter what wonderful things he might be able to do.

“Yeah, me too, Sis,” he whispered back. “You know, I was really hoping when I agreed to this canonization petition that it’d at least get us a trip to Rome. But no, we get to meet someone in an island in Maine. Ooooh! Whoopee!”

Ann had time to smother a laugh before they reached the end of the sidewalk. Then, arm in arm, the brother and sister stepped up onto the veranda into a sea of outstretched hands.

It Was a Dark and Googly Night

It was a dark and stormy night. A perfect night for murder.

“Hey! Joey! Man, it’s way too dark back here!”

Well, almost perfect, Eddie thought as he turned to look at his partner. Why Mr. Lee wanted this to be a two-man job, I don’t know.

“Shut up!” Joey hissed. “You want to give us away? Blow the whole thing?”

“Nah, but can’t we move closer to the elevator? Light’s better there. Here, I can’t see my own hands in front of me.”

“You don’t need to see your hands – you only need to see the vick.”

“But by the elevator…”

“He’ll walk out, we’ll jump out. Surprise! Whammo with the bats! We'll take a few pics, send them to the boss, then go get some Starbucks and coffee cake! It's that easy!”

Joey set his the tip of his baseball bat between his feet to hold it steady. He peeled off his thin black gloves and flexed his long fingers. His knuckles popped. Waiting always made him tense. The partner Mr. Lee had assigned wasn’t helping matters either.

“You’re not listenin’, Joe,” Eddie whispered, leaning in. His breath smelled like the peppermints he’d been crunching earlier until Joey stopped him. “What I’m sayin’ is that we’d have more light if we waited by the elevator. I’d do a better job if I could see what I was hittin’.”

“What’s to see, Eddie? We have baseball bats! Hit the guy anywhere and he’s going down. Keep on hitting and the job’s done.”

Eddie was silent for a minute. Joey kept his eyes on the brightly lit square of the parking garage by the elevator. Their target would walk out of that elevator exactly eight seconds after its bell chimed. Joey knew because he’d been able to time it twenty-five times already. In the final seconds of the game, the two hit men had slipped past security to the team’s private level of the garage, five levels below the arena. The northeast corner held some maintenance equipment, storage bins, trashcans, and a sweeper mounted on a white Chevy truck.

Joey had decided that a spot next to the sweeper was dark enough to keep the players from seeing them even if they’d lost and walked out slowly. Plus, the spot was still close enough to the elevator that they could watch everyone leaving the locker rooms and getting into their cars. All but two spots were empty now – a red Honda and a bright yellow Hummer. They were waiting on the vick – the hockey team’s mascot, Pucky the Purple Pig. Or more specifically, the guy behind the pigskin mask.

And everything’s going perfectly! Two cars left, just like Mr. Lee’s email said, Joey thought to himself. We’re in the perfect spot. And the storm up top sets the perfect tone.

Even through three levels of steel and concrete he could hear the boom and rumble of the thunder. The rain hadn’t made it this far down, but the air was damp and heavy. His thin cotton ski mask felt like a wet bag pulled across his face. He pulled the neck up for a second and breathed deeply twice. The air tasted like exhaust. He grimaced and covered his face again.

Joey slipped his gloves back on and swung his bat up slowly to his right shoulder. He slid his grip up and down the wooden handle a few times. Finding the right spot took only a second or two. College ball hadn’t been so long ago after all, he reminded himself.

His knee made him stop playing, but obviously his hands hadn’t forgotten what to do. Grinning under his mask, he lowered the bat and tapped its tip gently against the soles of his Converse sneakers. They were all black, like his mask and his sweats. He’d even chosen black ash wood for the bat.

Perfect bat for slamming home runs. And perfect for slamming the head in on hockey mascots, too! This is turning out to be a perfect hit.

Crunch. Crunch. Crunch. The sound of teeth grinding hard peppermints brought him back to reality.

Almost perfect, he thought for a second time and turned to Eddie. The younger man was dressed just like Joey but had his ski mask pushed up past his forehead. He was unwrapping a green-and-white peppermint slowly, muffling the crinkling plastic somewhat . He stopped when he saw Joey staring.

“You don’t chew hard candy on a job! I told you that already!” Joey whispered, forcing all of his annoyance and anger into his eyes and into his voice. “And you’d better not be dropping any of those wrappers either! The last thing we need is a trail of candy wrappers leading back to us!”

“Course I’m not droppin’ the wrappers – I’m not a noob,” Eddie grunted as he shoved a handful of mints back into the front pocket of his sweatshirt. “Just don’t see why we have to hide in the shadows and dress in all black and use these stupid bats.”

The younger man kicked with one toe at the bat he’d leaned against the sweeper. To Joey’s dismay, he’d shown up at the assigned meeting place dressed like a college kid and carrying a cheap aluminum bat. Only Joey’s threats to text Mr. Lee made him reluctantly change and then cover the shiny barrel with tape on the ride to the arena.

Eddie kept griping. “This whole hit’s been a hassle and a waste of time, right from the start. I could’ve picked the vick off with my M40A3 from outside and avoided all this clichéd crap.”

“Dammit, Eddie! We talked about all this back at the gym!” Joey fought the urge to brain his co-worker with his ash bat. “If you want to call the shots, go freelance! Get a MySpace and advertise! Then, you can do it your way. Wear a clown suit and hit your vicks with a frying pan if you want! But for now, you have to do it the way the boss says!”

Eddie grunted, but the elevator chimed suddenly. Silencing both men, it reverberated off the concrete walls and steel pylons supporting the roof. Joey’s eyes snapped to the lighted area. Eddie tugged his mask down into place.

Eight seconds! Joey mentally began counting them down. He flexed glove fingers around his bat. He readied his stance. At his side, he sensed Eddie doing the same thing.

Seven seconds! According to the email, the vick would walk out with #71, the team center. The vick drove the Honda. The center drove the Hummer.

Six seconds! The vick and the center always left the locker room last so that no one would know they were dating. The center would be wearing a jersey. The vick would be carrying the mascot head.

Five seconds! Jealous spouse? Angry fan? Owner afraid of bad publicity if it leaks that the star center’s being gay with a purple pig? Joey didn’t know and didn’t care – his job was just to follow the boss’s orders.

Four seconds! The vick and the center would walk to the Hummer and make sure that no one was around. Then, the vick and the center would share a long kiss.

Three seconds! The kiss would be the best time to get to work. The vick and the center would be occupied and caught by surprise. Kill the vick and do whatever to the center. That’s all the orders had said. That’s all Joey needed to know.

Two seconds! Behind the closed doors, the elevator settled at the bottom of the shaft with a dull thud. Joey bounced slightly on the balls of his feet. He tightened his grip on the ash handle of his bat. A rush of adrenaline flowed through him. He felt like he was back at bat in the state finals.

One second! Joey heard muffled crinkles coming from his left. Ignoring it, he clenched his teeth. He had to keep his eyes on the elevator doors. Out of sight, gears began grinding. A metallic clang echoed as everything locked into place.

Open Sesame! His timing was perfect. The doors parted with a hum at that exact moment.

Out walked a tall blond-haired man wearing a red, black, and silver jersey emblazoned with the number 71. He was smiling and laughing.

The center! Joey breathed.

The second person walked out of the elevator. Just like the order emailed to Joey said, the vick was carrying a giant purple pig’s head. Much shorter than the center, the vick was laughing at whatever his boyfriend had said on the ride from the locker rooms.

Her boyfriend, Joey corrected himself as the couple looked around and then walked hand-in-hand toward the parked vehicles. She's laughing at her girlfriend. The vick's a woman.

Beneath the mask, he bit his lower lip. His thoughts whirled around like the gears grinding the elevator doors shut. Damn. I assumed it was a guy. Stupid to assume anything. I know better. But it doesn’t matter. It’s just a mistake. Mr. Lee forgot or got some papers mixed up – that’s all. Left out a detail on the order. It happens all the time probably. Just hasn't to me before. But nothing to get upset about. Easy to fix. Just got to talk to Eddie for a secong...

Eddie leaned over and pressed his face against Joey’s left cheek.

“How about that! The vick’s a girl! I had no idea! And she’s cute! Lucky us, huh, Joe? Maybe doing this up close won’t be so bad after all!”

With Eddie’s face pressed against his, Joey could feel the young man’s molars ever so slowly crunch down through a piece of candy. And even through both of their masks, he could smell the peppermint. Eddie chuckled quietly as he pulled back and looked at the couple. They’d reached their cars.

“Look! They’re getting’ ready to kiss! God, she’s hot! It's time. You ready for some fun, Joe?”

Joey exhaled and held it. He stepped back and set his weight on his right leg. With muscles trained by years spent on high school and college baseball teams, he swung his bat up and smoothly to the left. His speed was incredible – a decade spent pursuing his present career ensured that the younger hit man didn’t have a chance.

“Shut up!” Joey hissed as his muscles went through the familiar motions that had once given him the most joy in his life.

As he spoke, the tip of his hard ash bat connected with a solid thonk against Eddie’s left temple. The man dropped to the pavement without a sound. His legs twitched a few times but stopped after Joey slammed down another hit. He hit a third time just to be sure. It was kind of a tradition when he did a hit – he called it the Power of Three. It worked just as well with a ball bat as it did with a gun.

Satisfied, Joey finally inhaled. He straightened. He laid the bat down carefully and pulled out his phone. Behind him, the vick and her hockey center boyfriend broke their kiss and started getting into their vehicles.

By the time Joey finished his text, the Hummer and the Honda had left him alone in the parking garage. The storm still rumbled up on the surface.

It took him longer to text than most people. Refusing to use silly abbreviations, he typed out each word. He even put commas where they belonged. When he was done, he hit and started planning what to do with Eddie’s body.

A few seconds later, Thomas Lee received this text message during dessert with his wife and children:

Mr. Lee, I apologize for any inconvenience, but I did not finish tonight's project. I had not been told that the pig was female. You will remember that my application and my resume both specify my policy regarding females. I shall pay for wasted resources, time lost and also for company property I destroyed (ED). Also, this message is my two weeks’ notice. I’m considering pursuing freelance work elsewhere. Would you consider being a reference?

Happy Googles to You!

Who knew that nature sucked?

I sure didn’t.

I mean, I knew that I liked being indoors. I knew that I’d miss air conditioning and the internet, but I thought nature would be all right. It was just for a weekend anyway – actually a four-day weekend, but I survive five days of school each week, so I didn’t think it would be a big deal.

I mean, four days of nature couldn’t be worse than school, right?

Wrong!

If I’d known how wrong I was, I would have told my mom I had a sore throat. I’d have come down with sudden violent constipation. I’d have faked seizures. I’d have done something – anything! – to have gotten out of this stupid field trip!

Trust me, national parks suck. I know that now. It’s too late for me, but if you find yourself with the choice of hiking to a waterfall or spending the day at school, pick school everytime.

Don’t go on the trip.

Trust me.

See, I didn’t know. No one told me. I fell for the hype: “Think of it, class! Two days out of school! A four-day weekend! You’ll get to share a tent with a friend and go canoeing! We’ll see the highest waterfall in the state! We’ll explore a cave with three species of endangered bats! You’ll reconnect with nature!”

Blah blah blah.

Mrs. K. might as well have added that we were going to dress like 1920’s flappers, smoke dried banana peels, and discover our animal spirit guides. I wouldn’t have cared. She had me hooked with the two days out of school.

Big mistake. School is so much better. Even right now – I’d be in Keyboarding, but I don’t care. That’d beat this by a long shot. I need some technology right now, even if it’s with Mrs. Crowell. That’s how much nature sucks.

Now don’t get me wrong. I don’t have anything against waterfalls or against nature in general. I’m not a tree hater. I don’t abuse animals. I always throw my trash in the trash can. I recycle when I remember to. I don’t start forest fires. I’m taking environmental science as an elective. I think nature’s cool.

In theory. From a distance.

But up close, in person, for an extended period of time? Trees all are looking alike. Kids are getting excited about chipmunks and caterpillars. Lungs are hurting from all the fresh air. Sinuses are itching from pollen and God knows what else I’m breathing. Brain is shutting down from inactivity. I probably going to slip into sleep mode and roll back down to the trailhead.

And the packed parking lot, let me add. That’s right – packed. And not with motorcycles or little cars either. We’re talking other school busses, tour busses, church busses, busses from old folks’ homes, SUV’s the size of busses, enormous hummers seating ten or twenty probably, ancient station wagons, minivans with campers – not a two-seater in the bunch. Some major car pooling was going on to protect the ozone, I guess.

It’s got to be all the stuff on the news about the greenhouse effect. Everybody’s rushing out to blow their CO2 on the trees and suck up all the oxygen while it’s still free. My sister’s really into all that conservation-ecological crap. She’s always bookmarking environmental sites and downloading signs to hang in her bedroom or on her locker. I have to fight to get time to level my Warcraft toons or download new music for my iPod.

Oh yeah, this is great trip, Mrs. K!

I’m really reconnecting with nature here! Yeah, me and about a million other people.

We’re all pitching tents and singing “This Land is Your Land”, snapping digital photos of anthills, and looking up the types of bark in our free field guides from the welcome center. What a fantastic wonderful time we’re having standing in line watching moss grow! We’re making memories that we can treasure forever!

I’m being sarcastic, of course. I can reconnect with nature way better in my bedroom. Link to the park’s virtual tour. Watch a Photobucket slide show. Eat some trail mix. Even read a book. All way better than standing for an hour on a nature trail just to see a freaking waterfall!

Stand in line for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows? Probably.

Stand in line for Guitar Hero III? Definitely.

Stand in line to ride the Kingda Ka? Of course!

Stand in line for Bloodhoung Gang tickets? Absolutely!

Stand in line for a waterfall? No way! We’re talking cruel and unusual punishment there! And probably against the Geneva Convention, now that I think about. Prisoners have rights, too, you know. I’ve read blogs about Guantanamo Bay.

But not Mrs. K, I guess. She’s oblivious, and here I am.

Me and just about a billion other people all here on the same day, all doing the same thing. All lined up down a nature trail just to watch what basically goes on in our bathroom showers. And back home, I only have to wait on my sister to get finished.

Not here though. Mrs. K woke us at seven, just so we could come here and wait. It’s been an hour. I can’t see the top of the trail. I can’t even hear the falls yet. My ankles hurt. I’m bored. But I’m stuck.

What other choice do I have? Run off the trail into the wilderness in search of civilization? No way – I’ve seen Deliverance. Email mom and dad? No luck – too many trees, no Wifi, and they were too glad I was getting out of the house. Fake heart trouble because of the rigorous climb? No chance – I wouldn’t get sent home. Mrs. K showed us the emergency first aid station at the campground, and I thought the ranger there looked like a serial killer. No one else agreed, but my luck’s not running so good. He’d say he was driving me to a hospital, but I’d probably end up down a well in his basement having to rub lotion on my skin so he can do his little kooky dance.

Nothing to do but stick it out.

And record everything. So in a few hours when I go Donner Party and start eating the kid in front of me, the police’ll find my Blackberry and know the reason why.

I was just reconnecting with nature, officers. Survival of the fittest. Circle of life. Nature of the beast.

Sucks, doesn’t it?

Just Sign on the Dotted Google

Ham Shapiro had worked at Jackson Lampmakers Ltd. for a little over thirty-five years. In that time, he’d done lots of jobs, from starting out sweeping the assembly rooms to being one of the top assemblers in the factory. According to the chalkboard by the time clock, he currently held two records that the other line workers hadn’t beaten: The Most Consecutive Days Without Illness or Accident (312) and the ‘Catch-All’ Clear Line Award (62.4 inches).

The ‘Catch-All’ Award had to do with his working the very tail end of the Floor Lamp Base line. Only the best workers could be put in the last spot of any line. It’s what the foremen call the ‘Catch-All’ position. His job was to put the final twists and turns on all the bolts and screws that the workers in front of him had laid into place. If any were missing or crooked, he had to correct them, and at the same time, he had to lay the brass top plate on each lamp base in its exact position and set its fasteners. Only then could he slide the finished base to his right to switch it over to the next line. A lot of clear line between the Catch-All and the first worker of the next line meant that the Catch-All was fast and accurate. A fast Catch-All meant his line could move faster, and a faster line meant more units could be manufactured. The factory bosses gave the Catch-All’s incentives to move more efficiently – the key to the foremen’s lavatory and free meals in the canteen, not to mention the higher pay for more units produced. The line with the fastest Catch-All got daily bonuses also, so that motivated the workers to make few mistakes and to work faster themselves.

With over two yards of clear line to his right and nearly a year of perfect attendance, Ham Shapiro couldn’t be touched by anyone trying to beat his records. He was so good that there was even talk going around in the canteen about his name being moved from the chalkboard to a metal plaque. He was the factory’s golden child, people said. The foremen loved his speed and consistency, the workers on his line loved their bonuses, and the bosses loved the figures on their production sheets.

Add to those things these three facts that everyone at Jackson Lamplighters Ltd. knew about Ham: he never lost his temper, he never laughed at off-color jokes, and he always smoked a quarter of a cigar in the canteen at the close of each day’s shift. People also gossiped that he had studied with Prussian scientists at a university in his home country. Others reported that as a youth he had sworn secret oaths to the Kaiser and then fled to America just before the War ended. One or two Catch-All’s from other lines even whispered that he had a portrait of Kaiser Wilhelm II in his apartment. But no one really believed those tales. They were too unlikely.

What people did believe were his work records and those three facts. Everything else people said about him was idle rumor. Ham always went straight home after his cigar, and always alone. He never invited anyone, and the few curious enough to invite themselves were always kindly turned away. Nosy people could never get him to say anything about his personal life either. If pushed, he would reluctantly talk about only two subjects – work or temple. Nothing more, nothing less.

So people thought that’s all there was to Ham Shapiro – just the factory and the scriptures. Even his landlady believed that was all there was to the quiet, middle-aged assembly line worker who rented the basement of her boarding house.

When he didn’t come to the factory on what would have been the 313th day, the foremen knew something had to be terribly wrong. When they telephoned his boarding house and heard that he wasn’t answering the landlady’s knock and had bolted his door, they feared the worst.

When men from the factory came to the boarding house to help break down the door on what would have been the 314th unmissed work day, they expected to find Ham Shapiro dead.

When the men discovered an empty apartment filled with a homemade forge and crates of metal tools and parts stolen from the factory over the past thirty-five years, they all scratched their heads and wondered why Ham needed all that metal.

When they learned that police had found strange chemicals and foreign schematics among the stolen goods and that federal agents had come in to investigate, they all remembered the rumors about Ham having sworn secret oaths to the Kaiser before the War.

When they read in the papers that the U.S. Government had confirmed that the basement apartment had been a bomb factory for at least the past thirty years, they wondered how where Ham had taken the bombs and how many he could have made over three decades.

When they heard on the radio that the discovery in Ham’s apartment had led federal agents to over a dozen similarly abandoned basement factories in cities across the country, they realized that Ham must have had many more connections that just at the factory and at temple.

When the explosions started a month later, they all realized that they hadn’t known Ham Shapiro at all.

How Much Is That Google in the Window?

Sparky’s tongue always got him into trouble.

He was just a puppy, but he knew that all the trouble couldn’t be his fault. It was his tongue!

Like today, when Sparky managed to pull snag the ice cream container out of the trash can. He wanted to show the master that he had thrown the tub away too early. He could smell cookies and cream stuck at the bottom. He was really careful and, even with his recent injury his tongue had caused, he hadn’t spilled any garbage on the kitchen floor. His tongue, though, wanted a taste, and that’s what started the trouble this time.

It was always his tongue that made Sparky misbehave. It made him break things. It created hopeless messes. It provoked the master and made him shake his finger at him. It even made the master call Sparky a naughty little dog! His tongue sometimes made Sparky feel so sad that he had to run and hide behind the big recliner in the master’s den.

However, even back there out of sight, he couldn’t get away from his tongue. The sneaky pink thing was always right there, right in his mouth, just behind his teeth. It even popped out of his mouth all the time, wiggling and drooling all over the place. No matter how hard Sparky tried, he could never keep it tucked away out of sight. It was always looking for trouble.

And trouble was so easy for his tongue to find.

Once, it found trouble in the kitchen when the master dropped an ice cube. Sparky just wanted to sniff it, to see what the cold thing smelled like, but guess what his tongue did?

It popped out, it touched the cube, and it stuck there! It wouldn’t let go!

Sparky shook his head until his ears clapped. He hopped in a circle. He yipped and yapped. Then, he ran all around the kitchen, shaking and hopping and yipping and yapping, but he couldn’t get his tongue to drop that ice cube. When Sparky knocked over his water bowl, the master yelled, and only then, of course, did his tongue finally let go. The ice cube fell right into his food dish where it melted all over his Nibbly Dibbles – Yuck! Sparky liked his dibbles crispy! Not soggy and mushy!

His tongue didn’t care though. It liked everything wet.

His tongue found trouble once when the master had company. Sparky hopped onto the bed just to wag his tail and say hello to the master’s friend. He wanted to show her the new trick his master had taught him. He just wanted to be friendly. He didn’t want to scare her and make her scream. His tongue did that. The master punished Sparky though. He shook his finger, called him a naughty little dog, and then locked him in the garage with the noisy crickets.

His tongue didn’t care about the garage. It kept trying to lick one of the crickets.
Another time his tongue caused so much trouble that Sparky had to visit the vet. The master was cleaning the hallway upstairs, and Sparky was having fun playing one of his favorite games – tag the vacuum cleaner. He was having a good time, and everything would have been fine if his tongue had behaved itself. The vacuum didn’t mind barking, the vacuum didn’t mind snapping, the vacuum didn’t even mind a little chewing, but Sparky found out that it hated wet dog tongues. Sparky rushed in to tag the machine, his tongue stuck itself out, and the vacuum bit his tongue right on its pink tip. Sparky yelped, jumped back, and fell right down the stairs. He hurt his back and had to ride in the car to the clinic. Sparky hated that place – the scary smells upset his stomach, and he was already hurting from his tumble downstairs.

His tongue didn’t mind getting hurt though. It didn’t even care that the vacuum had bitten it. It was still having a great time licking the strange thing the vet put around Sparky’s back legs.

Then, his tongue caused this latest disaster with the ice cream container. It just had to have a taste and got Sparky’s head stuck inside the plastic tub. The tub covered his eyes, it covered his ears, and his nose couldn’t smell anything except ice cream. He tried to bark, but the tub was too tightly wedged around his face. He wanted to roll on his back or run around, but he still had the vet thing on his back legs and couldn’t.

He could shake his head from side to side. The tub didn’t budge though. It was stuck on his collar, he thought. Then, he knocked something over. The trash can, he realized when he felt crinkly wrappers and slimy banana peels under his front paws. It made a big mess, he guessed, and something yucky had probably fallen into his Nibbly Dibbles, too. With what felt like wet coffee grounds stuck in his paws, he backed his way slowly out of the kitchen, whining for help the whole time.

It took Sparky a long time, but he finally found the master. The master had his friend over again. Sparky heard her laughing and knew that it was at him. He whined louder and shook his trapped head. The tub hit something, and there was a huge crash and a female screamed. Then, the master shouted the dreaded words – “Naughty little dog!” – and even through the plastic container, Sparky knew that the finger was shaking at him.

His tongue didn’t care about words or fingers though. It didn’t care about being stuck in a tub or knocking over trash cans or soggy dibbles or tracking coffee grounds all through the master’s house. It didn’t even care about loud crashes or screaming ladies.

His tongue did like ice cream though, and, no matter how much Sparky whined and tried to keep his mouth shut inside that ice cream tub, his tongue just kept licking and licking and licking…

Fe-Fi-Fo-Google

My grand-dad is a quiet man. He always has been, for at least as long as I can remember.

But don’t get me wrong, he’s not quiet in the sense that he sits around and doesn’t talk to anybody. That’s not true about him at all – he’s always enjoyed joking around and telling good stories. What I mean by quiet is that he thinks about what he says before he says it. Looking back, I can’t think of a single time that he ever went off the deep end and yelled at me, not even when I broke the lock on his car trying to pick it with a piece of copper wire. Sure, he was mad, but he wasn’t loud. He was calm and in control, and that made me listen. His quiet way of dealing with things worked, and I really admire that now that I’m a dad myself.

I admire it even more when I think about how hard he worked back then. I mean, I work two jobs now to take care of my family, and my temper gets short, but I’m super-lazy compared to how hardworking he was and still is. I learned that about him first hand when I was nine and my mom and I moved in with him and my grandma.

He worked at the glass plant then, but he still made time to farm a couple of fields, keep a few cows, and get us all to church three or more times each week. And when he finally retired, he didn’t just kick his heels back and take it easy. No, he cut wood, bush-hogged fields, planted fruit trees, and took care of the house, the church, and all of us whenever we needed it. When he got sick a few times, he always bounced right back up and got right to work. When my grandma got really sick, he cut back on some things around the farm but worked extra hard taking care of her.

Now that I’m in my thirties, I look back and really admire how quietly and patiently he works at taking care of everything. But as a kid, I didn’t appreciate all that extra labor, especially in the garden – I was a city boy at heart, I guess, and enjoyed the air conditioning too much. I’d always sneak back to the house to cool off or play a quick game until my mom made me go back and help. I just didn’t understand back then why we had to do all that extra work. I sure didn’t mind the fresh corn on the cob and beans when my grandma cooked them though.

A lot of years have passed since then, and a lot has changed. I still like to eat, but we lost my grandma this year, and the garden’s not as big as it was when I was a kid. But this much hasn’t changed though – my grand-dad can still work circles around me and a lot of people who are only a quarter of his age. He never boasts about it though, and he never tries to make anyone feel bad. He just keeps moving along and getting things done.

I guess it’s a combination of his being quiet and always working so hard that makes me admire him so much. I have three little children that I want to be a good example to, and so did he when my mom was little. I know that it’s hard for me to work hard and then keep calm when my kids act crazy, so I think about him when I get really stressed.

I remember a story my mom tells me about my grand-dad getting mad at her when she was little. She’s the oldest and was maybe four or five at the time, my uncle was a couple of years behind her, and my aunt was only a little baby. My grandma had gotten the whole family going to church, and she and my grand-dad were both pretty strict about having their children behave during the services.

The church was a little building with a narrow auditorium made all out of wood. There was no carpet on the floor and no padding on the seats. My mom says that every little sound echoed in that auditorium. They had to sit extra quiet and not kick their heels on the chairs or play with little toys or do anything noisy. My grand-dad especially didn’t want them misbehaving and disrupting the services.

Well, on the day that my mom talks about, the preacher was in the middle of his sermon when a big swarm of termites buzzed in through an open window. My mom remembers sitting and staring at them, but a look from my grand-dad was enough to keep her in her seat and quiet. Then, the termites flew up and started hovering around the preacher, who just kept preaching the Word like nothing was happening. It was too much for my mom, who jumped up and ran out into the aisle to get a better look. She says those termites kept circling in the light over the preacher's head like a big halo. She pointed and jumped and called to her brother to come see the bugs on the preacher’s head until my grand-dad scooped her up and took her out. She laughs about it now when she tells the story at family get-togethers, and she has a few more like it.

What I admire though is that she always starts off the stories by telling about what she or my aunt and uncle did to get in trouble and then finishes with how my grand-dad corrected them. He didn’t scream, he didn’t lose his temper, he didn’t throw things or scare them half to death. He just quietly explained what they did wrong and worked at getting them to do better the next time.

I admire that about him, and I hope that I can work at being a dad and later a grand-dad that’s even a quarter of the kind of man that he is.

Seven Deadly Googles

“Hey, Gret? Turned out to be a beautiful day after all! No rainclouds anywhere and a nice breeze so we won’t sweat to death! Told you there was nothing to worry about!”

Robin literally bounced into the junior bathroom to share this good news with her best friend. She was wearing a rabbit costume, but bouncing seemed to come naturally to this girl. She couldn’t stand still more than a second, hopping from mirror to mirror and wiggling her pink-painted nose at her reflection.

From inside the stall, Gretta wondered for the millionth time how her best friend since fourth grade could always be so full of fun and energy.

“You alive in there, Gret?” Robin yelled and jumped over to kick at the closed stall door with one big fuzzy foot. “Everyone else has already gone outside to line up!”

“Just fixing my costume!” shouted Gretta. “I’ll just be a second. And you’re right, I shouldn’t have worried!”

“Yeah, you not worry? Ha! I’m going to wait just outside, so hurry up! We can’t be late!”

Robin kicked again at the stall door and then bounced back out into the hall while her friend struggled to get ready.

Gretta sighed. She was already wearing most of her costume – the suit and the matching shirt and tie. The only part left other than a few accessories was the mask. It waited in the brown paper bag at her feet. Unable to stall any longer, she pulled it out and started wiggling it onto her head. It was a little difficult to get on, but that was how she had wanted. Hard to put on, hard to fall off, she’d reasoned while she was working with her grandmother to put everything together in the weeks leading up to Duggan Academy’s homecoming parade.

While Gretta didn’t have her friend’s energy, she did have more than enough creativity for both of them. With help from her grandmother only on the hardest bits of sewing, she’d made the shiny purple three-piece suit almost entirely by hand . She’d sculpted the paper mache lion mask herself and, for the mane, she’d attached strips of brown velour and felt with thin wire that let them curl and bounce the way she wanted. She’d even Scotch-guarded it all in case it rained on the parade day. For the final touches, she’d borrowed a her grandfather’s cane and her older sister’s yellow stiletto heels. Her family had loved the final product.

And Gretta had thought her costume looked really great, too. At least, that’s how she’d felt last night and even earlier this morning. Then, during first period, everyone started showing off their professionally-made or expenisve store-bought costumes. By second period, she’d begun to feel queasy and had asked Robin to check her iPhone to see if the weather forecast had changed. In the next class, she prayed during the whole biology lecture that a big storm would roll in and cancel everything. It didn’t though, because after lunch, the principal’s voice came over the intercom and told everyone it was the time to get dressed and line up with his or her classes,.

So, Gretta had hauled her bags to the bathroom and shut herself in the first available stall. She’d then lingered until everyone else had dressed and gone to the back of the school.

Everyone but her best friend, it seemed.

Gretta sighed and fiddled with the mask a bit more. Outside, Robin apparently had decided Homecoming Day was special enough that the teachers wouldn’t mind her singing at the top of her lungs in the hallway. The words to “Little Bunny Foo Foo” started to drift into the bathroom. In spite of her nerves, Gretta giggled.

“I’m the goon,” she said out loud, her voice echoing inside the mask. “Especially if I make Rob miss the whole parade because I’m hiding in the bathroom.”

With a final twist, she set the mask straight, eyeholes and everything lined up just right so that she could see and breathe at the same time. She pushed open the stall and looked at herself in the long mirror over the sinks. The lion face she’d painted sneered arrogantly back at her with downturned pipecleaner whiskers studded with tiny rhinestones. The brown and gold mane curled just right down to her shoulders. She twisted slowly, and even under the fluorescent lights, the purple lame suit and yellow sequined vest shimmered. In sunlight, she hoped it would be dazzling. She smoothed her yellow tie and straightened the matching handkerchief. She tugged on a pair of shiny yellow nylon gloves and pushed and pulled at a few more places until she heard Robin yell her name from the hallway.

“Coming!” Gretta shouted back. Her voice echoed a bit in the mask and sounded a little spooky. With a half-smile and clenched teeth, she slipped on her sister’s shoes and picked up her grandfather’s cane. She walked out just as she’d practiced, careful to keep her head and back straight so that the top-heavy mask wouldn’t slip. The three-inch heels didn’t help, but she’d decided that she could sacrifice a little comfort and balance for the overall effect.

It worked, too, because her friend squealed excitedly when she saw her.

“I knew you’d look awesome, Gret, but wow! Just wait until those seniors see us! We are so gonna win!” Robin bounced over and offered a big fuzzy paw for a high five. Gretta carefully slapped it with her gloved hand and then laughed when Robin turned and shook her fluffy bunny tail at her.

“Ha, Rob! You make the cutest bunny ever!”

“Of course, I do! All the boy bunnies are crazy about me, you know!”

Robin stopped bouncing long enough to strike a pose like those wannabe glamour shots that she and Gretta made fun of on MySpace. She pursed her lips, tucked her chin down, and fluttered her lashes. Then, she wiggled her pink nose and glued-on whiskers until the two of them burst out laughing.

Suddenly, the principal’s voice boomed over the intercom, telling everyone left in the building that the parade would get underway with or without them in exactly five minutes. Robin’s mood was contagious, and Gretta found herself squealing in excitement along with her.

As they moved down the hall, Robin leaned in and whispered conspiratorially, “You know, my mom spent a lot of time online buying this. Nearly starved, it took her so long – thank God that we don’t have dial-up! And, Gret, she clicked her poor mouse finger to the bone! To the bone! And then, why, she even had to type in the credit card number herself. Herself!”

“Oh! However did she survive?” Gretta gasped in mock horror and dramatically placed the back of her right hand against her lion’s forehead. The two girls laughed.

Their friend Cameron was waiting near the exitdoor at the end of their class’s hall. Robin leapt ahead cheering, “Go Juniors! We’re gonna win! We’re gonna win! Go Juniors!”

Cameron was wearing a chubby paper mache snowman suit covered in glittery snowflakes, so she couldn’t jump. She was wearing her ballet slippers though, so instead, she spun a happy little pirouette and chimed, “Go Sophomores!”

She spun again as Gretta walked up and said, “Typical Gret craftsmanship! You look spectacular! Everyone’s going to love it!”

“You, too! I love the carrot!” Gretta replied. Cameron’s mom had cut an oval shape from the snowman’s face and powdered her daughter’s face stark white except for glittery eye makeup and lipstick that gave her a jolly smile. A big plastic carrot nose was the final touch. “How’s it stay on?”

“I know! Duck tape!” Robin giggled before Cameron could answer. Gretta laughed as the bunny and the snowman both pirouetted at the same time.

“You both look so great! Let’s go meet the others before the parade starts!”

The three friends walked outside toward the soccer field at the rear of the school. Robin moved a lot faster in her professionally made bunny costume, so she bounced up ahead and then back, sometimes circling her two more cautious companions. Gretta was feeling a bit more confident, so she prissed a bit on her heels and occasionally spun her crystal-tipped cane. Cameron gracefully walked en pointe along side her, pirouetting occasionally, and waving a candy cane that she’s pulled from somewhere in her costume.

A resounding chorus of oohs and ahs from their classmates greeted their arrival, and Gretta blushed beneath her mask. Her queasiness had vanished, and so had her worries. It was Homecoming Day, and she was with her friends. It was time to have fun.

“Thanks, guys! Everyone looks so wonderful!” she shouted as she joined her class. “But not as wonderful as I look, of course,” she added jokingly, puffing out her chest so that the sunlight dazzled off her sequin vest.

All of the girls laughed at her words. Those whose faces were visible stuck out their tongues. Robin turned and shook her bunny tail in mock anger. The whole while Gretta leaned on her cane and acted as though she was oblivious to the rest of her class.

“Well done, ladies!” a lively voice said suddenly. Gretta turned to see Ms. Tilton, her literature teacher and the junior class sponsor, approaching from farther down the field. The gray-haired woman wore her formal academic robes but was laughing just like her excited students. On one arm, she had a big wicker basket full of differently colored silk sashes. In the other, she held a brown leather clipboard bearing the school emblem. Gretta waved one gloved hand in imitation of a queenly greeting while at her side Cameron danced and Robin bounced.

“Well done, all of you,” Ms. Tilton repeated before addressing Gretta directly. “But I have to say, Miss Bassett, that I overheard your comment to your classmates, and it was the most arrogant, ungrateful, perfectly sinful thing I’ve heard all day! Well done!” As the juniors around them cheered, she removed a thin white sash from her basket. “And your choice of costume is so wonderfully appropriate! You never fail to impress me.”

The teacher handed Gretta the sash, which bore the letters P-R-I-D-E embroidered in gold thread, and added, “Although, technically, you are short a few lions, but we’ll let that little inaccuracy slide in light of this being Homecoming Day and a special occasion.”

Gretta laughed happily and curtsied as she took the sash. She was afraid a bow might knock her head off. While Ms. Tilton passed out sashes to everyone else, Robin helped her pin hers across her jacket and vest, which both almost blindingly reflected the bright sunlight. Once everyone wore a sash, the two best friends and their fellow juniors cheered again, loud enough this time, that the juniors must have heard it. A chant – “Seniors Rule! Seniors Rule!” – rolled in around the school from the front lawn. Gretta thought she could hear the sophomores shouting something, too, from the softball field. A tiny rumble from the rear parking lot meant that even the freshmen were getting into the spirit of the day.

Everyone yelled and laughed until they heard the sound of bagpipes and drums coming from the other side of the school. The junior girls quieted in an instant and looked to Ms. Tilton.

“Come along, my Little Vices! Fall in! Prepare yourselves! The pipers approach! Onward and outward after the Seniors, and not a second earlier!”

The girls waited, giggling and fidgeting as much as their costumes allowed.
The Duggan Academy Marching Band rounded the building first. Then, behind it, proudly marching and singing the alma mater in Latin, came the senior class. Their banner proclaimed their theme for this year’s homecoming – The Seven Holy Virtues – and they wore sashes over their costumes, too.

The juniors fell into step and sang like the seniors. Gretta pranced proudly right behind the banner proclaiming her class’s theme. Robin bounced along at her side, flapping her bright pink sash reading L-U-S-T with every leap. On her other side danced the most graceful paper snowman as Cameron spun with her candy cane – her sash spelling out G-L-U-T-T-O-N-Y. The rest of the Seven Deadly Sins followed along, all singing at the top of their lungs.

By the time, Gretta passed the sophomores – the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World – and the freshmen – the Seven Dwarves – her throat hurt from singing, her legs ached from prissing on those heels, and her face dripped inside the hot lion mask.

But she couldn’t have possibly cared less, she was having that much fun. She laughed and pranced with her friends, pride personified.

It turned out to be beautiful day, she thought to herself as the parade marched down the school driveway toward the waiting town.

And we are going to win!