WOW! WHAT A REUNION ! v 2.0

                               Another Fiction Story


He had hoped that after 20 years of not seeing each other she would be thrilled to hear his voice on the phone. Yes, she was excited and there was that unstated but yet implied inflection in each of their voices that said more than the words---- perhaps a dinner date could soon be arranged. After all she had never married and he had been a widower for 12 years.


Time seemed to stop as the last week before their reunion dragged through the calendar, phone calls, texting, and eager anticipation. Each had very vivid and sensuous memories of their high school dating days. It is funny how time enriches good memories and mutes bad memories. Man, what a romance! Their parents, friends, and even casual acquiesces just knew these two constant companions were destined for the altar.  


In fact, she received an engagement ring just prior to her soon to be husband was drafted and sent to basic training. They were to be married when he received his first leave. Invitations were sent, dresses purchased, church scheduled, reception planned, and even honeymoon reservations made.


Sometimes events in life happen with little explanation or thought of consequences. Enter the first open post weekend for the young, virile soldier in training. He really did not set out to go with some of his platoon mates to a rough and ready strip joint just a mile from the main security gate.


Following several drinks and half a dozen lap dances he went to a crummy, broke down motel room with a pimple-scarred pole dancer. When he wakes up the next morning his wallet is missing and a match book with the dancer's phone number written with lipstick was on the sink. He hurriedly put on his uniform and calls a cab to reenter the post. A long talk at the security gate with the first sergeant and NCOIC of the security company got him back to his barracks. He drew two weeks of KP for his dumb stunt. But that was far from the worst.  


The first shirt told him to forget the evening and never go back to the strip joint. Somehow, six weeks later, the dancer finds him and informs him that she is expecting. Also, she has no idea what happened to his wallet. In this pre-DNA era he felt compelled to marry her. A short courthouse ceremony made it legal and binding.


His waiting sweetheart had to be admitted to a mental institution for three years when she got the news. The forced marriage produced a little boy that looked nothing like the supposed father and many nights of arguing until his wife was murdered late one night as she came home from her waitress job at an all night truck stop. The crime was never solved. The ME's report only concluded that she was killed at very close range.


The son was adopted by the bride's parents and grew up to be a lawyer specializing in divorce and adoption. His supposed Dad remained unmarried for all these many years. 


Now it was time to focus on the upcoming dinner date and the future. He was sure his high school heartthrob would understand the full reason their planned marriage fell apart. In fact he was so sure, he withdrew 8,000 dollars from his account in the hopes of just taking off with her to a month of fun and sun in Jamaica. What a grand way to get reunited!


The dinner date was as perfect as imagined. The food, the wine, the dancing: It was all top-notch. No one kept score but he must have said, "I am really sorry" a dozen times. She smiled and gave an approving nod each time. Each of them had gained a pound or two since high school but not in places that detracted from this night of rejoicing and plans for the future.  She was super excited about the get away plans and his big bucks already to go. All she needed was a suitcase and a new two-piece bikini. She had a suitcase and would buy a bikini in Jamaica that he liked. He let her out and slowly walked back to his car.  


The lead story on the local TV newscast next morning told of a murder, the victim was shot at close range, his wallet was missing, and police have no leads.She caught a cab to the airport and flew on to Jamaica. She wondered as she made the 3 1/2 hour flight how a pink bikini with black polka dots, at close range, would look.????


Glenn <><
Just West of Yesterday






    

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN OF THE JURY

Every piece of evidence presented by the District Attorney against my client is bogus and circumstantial. Let me remind you:


1. The loaded pistol found on my client at the time of his arrest was not a weapon used in the commission of any crime. Rather, it was a weapon of protection to keep rabid skunks, raccoons, and squirrels away from his prized Blue Tick coon dog and his 8 precious children.


2. The identification of my client fleeing the crime scene was based on purely circumstantial evidence. Let me remind you that are probably several hundred red1956 Ford Pickups with a left rear tail light inoperative, and a red fox tail attached to a homemade coat hanger radio antenna.


3. The admitted argument between my client and the deceased was about a friendly football wager that the deceased owed my client from last year's Orange Bowl. To suggest it was about  the deceased being seen with my client's wife in the Big Deer Saloon is merely a vicious rumor and totally unfounded.


4. Finally, let me remind the members of the jury of the upcoming election for district attorney. As you know, incumbents for this important judicial position like to parade Won-Lost figures to impress the electorate.


5. The citizens of this county demand and deserve an honest, trained, and skilled prosecutor of the law by the district attorney. My demonstrated record of successful representation of my clients in our county makes me the only real choice for a new district attorney.


You must find my client innocent and vote for me next Tuesday.


Glenn <><
Just West of Yesterday  

GRAHAM CREEK SABER TOOTH GROUNDHOG V.2.0

           GRAHAM CREEK SABER TOOTH GROUNDHOG

                                     Science Fiction

                               (VERSION 2.0 CONTAINS SOME ADDITIONAL INFORMATION)

“There!.... There!..... There it is!” Fourteen year Phillip was hardly able to breathe as he excitedly jabbed at the scratched screen of his iPhone. “I told you it was real!”

Phillip’s father remained silent for several seconds and then hit the speed dial button on his own iPhone that almost immediately connected him to the County Sheriff’s office. “My son has a photo I think you need to send someone out here to examine. …..No, it’s not about a meth lab or dead person…… It looks like a 50-60 pound saber tooth groundhog…..No, I’ve not been drinking……Ok, we’ll wait for a deputy sheriff to come out…..Thanks.”

When the deputy arrived he exclaimed, “If this is the real deal we have a problem that makes that Hollywood Jurassic Park look like a petting zoo.” The deputy took Phillip’s report of exactly where on the banks of Graham Creek he had encountered this strange creature. Phillip said he had seen the creature at about the same place at least three times before today’s photo was taken.

The deputy gave Phillip’s father an evidence receipt and took the iPhone containing the photo back to the sheriff’s office. Furthermore, he advised Phillip and his father not to discuss the situation with anyone. “Fear and rumor are kissin’ cousins,” according to the deputy.

Back at the Sheriff’s office, the sheriff, who was a better candidate for late night cable TV Comedy than a candidate for the ministry, sarcastically remarked, “I’d sure as @*%* not want to meet that *%$#&  dude without plenty of  &*^#$@  backup!”

Both the Indiana Department of Natural Resources and a multitude of federal agencies demanded more proof before they would take the sheriff’s pleas for help seriously.

In desperation, the sheriff called the Indiana University zoology department who acknowledged they had received  a half dozen similar requests from citizens all along the Graham Creek watershed. They politely stated they would contact Dr. Yoshi Kumasi, Tokyo University, who was the world’s leading expert in the field of cryptozoology. Professor Kumasi would be contacting the sheriff directly. (The sheriff was not told this was the weekend of the IU-Purdue game and the entire campus was more concerned about the final score than some snipe hunt on the Graham Creek.)

Three weeks later the sheriff, county commissioner chairman, and a member of the Japanese-Jennings County Friendship Society met Professor Kumasi at the Indianapolis Airport. The sheriff had been practicing his greeting bow and hit it for a perfect ten, but immediately relapsed into his off color language. “Welcome to $#@* Indiana and we sure as &(%$# hope you solve this $#%%& for us.” Professor Kumasi, who earned his doctorate at UCLA, said, “Sheriff, I sure as $%#@^ do too.” After a big group laugh the sheriff forgot all about international protocol and slapped the distinguished professor on the back and said, “Doc, this is going to be the start of a beautiful ^%$&* friendship!”

The sheriff and Professor Kumasi located the 41 motion-sensitive cameras used by the Tri-county Drug Task Force along both sides of Graham Creek for about two miles from where the saber tooth groundhog was photographed by Philip. After two weeks, 11 different saber tooth groundhogs were captured on the digital cameras. The cameras clearly revealed the four to eight inch long saber teeth to be green with yellow tips.

A juvenile saber tooth groundhog was caught in a box trap constructed by a local 4-H Club member. Professor Kumasi took multiple blood and hair samples for DNA analysis. He had earlier collected samples from all of the soil and vegetation near the creek. The young groundhog chewed through the orange crate which served as a makeshift lab cage and made his silent escape.

With the help of the now interested, and Nobel Prize-seeking zoology depart at IU, Professor Kumasi concluded the saber tooth ground hogs were as result of a dormant primeval recessive gene being activated by the large amounts of herbicides and ammonia nitrate that flowed into the Graham Creek from adjacent corn fields. The groundhogs also ate the immature corn ears, which quickly produced gene altering alcohol, and within two reproduction cycles, the saber tooth groundhog resulted. He estimated the saber tooth groundhogs would double in size every other reproduction cycle!

The sheriff asked the professor what could be done to reverse the looming disaster. Professor Kumasi said he would have to return to Tokyo and study the data and return with a definitive plan of action. 

Professor Kumasi smiled, bowed and shook hands with each member of the Jennings County send-off party at the Indianapolis Airport and proceeded to the security screening area. As he put his shoes back on he thought to himself, “If those @#$%^ Hoosiers think I am coming back to this $%#@  place they have another %$#@ idea coming. I’ve seen all of those %$#@^ Godzilla movies and I know how all of this %$#% situation will end!”

 

                                                            ---- Glenn