TIE ONE DOWN

Man, you know, I don’t drink, I don’t smoke, I don’t do drugs. That doesn’t make me boring. It makes me, me.

Things is, I always get the ‘You’re boring,’ thing from people, even though I often do more than they do. But once in a while I come across someone who really doesn’t like the fact that I won’t have a beer or drink, or smoke with them.

The kind of person that threatens to MAKE ONE do it.

This is a True Story I Call TIE ONE DOWN

This happened many years ago, around 1995/96. I’m out of college, looking for work and struggling with my writing. I have my degree in Business and Work Study experience in one hand, and my writing resume already filled with dozens of published credits in the other.

While working a part time job at a mail processing company (I worked there during my last semester in college as well), I made friends with an artist co-worker. We both wanted to work in comics, so we clicked.

His artwork was passable, but not great and needed to be refined. It didn’t really suit any of my stories, but it worked fine for his. We agreed that I would write the comic book series based on his characters and original idea, he would draw it and we would submit it out.

Through him I made some other friends and we all started to hang out on a regular basis. Unfortunately nothing ever really happened on his side of the deal. I wrote stuff, but the art was very slow forthcoming.

He liked to drink – a lot – and was always trying to get me to have a beer. I never did. It started to take a strain on what I thought was a friendship. He really didn’t like the fact that I didn’t drink, and somehow thought I was disrespecting him by not having a beer with him.

It came to a head during his birthday party at a club his uncle managed. I don’t even know if the place still exists, or what the name of the club was.

It began about two weeks before the party. He told me about the party and invited me. All was good until a few days later when he told me that if I was coming I was going to have a beer. I told him I wasn’t. End of story.

A couple of days before the party he brought up the beer issue again. This time telling me that he’d make me have one if I didn’t do it myself. That should have been a clue, but I was being a friend, and thought he was.

I went to the party, had a good time for a little while, then it happened. Stupid of me to go to the party in the first place. I was sitting at a table with a few people when he walked over with two beers in hand. One was for me.

I don’t drink.

He was really FUCKING serious about this. Two of the bouncers that worked for his uncle came up to either side of me. Both encouraging me to drink the beer. Before I answered, he told me that if I didn’t, he’d force the beer down my throat.

The people at the table didn’t like this. Some just said for me to drink the beer. Two girls told him to leave me alone.

I was pissed. I slammed a fist to the table, grabbed the beer, stood up . . .

He raised his glass, expecting a toast . . .

And I emptied the beer into his face. He froze in shock. I grabbed the beer from his hand and poured it out over his head and into his lap.

The bouncers didn’t do anything as I backed off from the table. They thought this was just some game between friends, they didn’t realize I don’t drink and his threat wasn’t a joke.

The little fuck that he was recovered from the shock of what I did and started to make threats and tried to jump me. Now the bouncers did their job.

His shouting brought out his uncle. Some quick words of explanation and his uncle lit into him. Ironically, the bouncers backed me up. Turns out his uncle didn’t like him very much, but he was blood.

I really tried to hold back my anger at this point. I didn’t want to pour the beer on him, I wanted to put him through the window and into traffic.

I left the club, never to see the guy again. I later heard from someone I am still friends him that he was arrested for assaulting someone at a gas station.

Moral of this story: I DON’T DRINK.

Oh, and Friends (REAL FRIENDS) don’t force friends to do stuff.

Ace.

DARK MIRROR

Years ago, between jobs, I would do side work from some people. Computers, handy work, errands, I built a small clientele in retirement communities. There were was one lady I never really liked, but she was never home when I would do stuff for her.

Her house was on a manmade lake in the far North West Valley of Metro Phoenix. The back yard was about ten feet deep, ending at a walkway with stairs down to the lake’s edge and a paddle boat for use on the lake.

On this day I was to pick up a couple of mirrors and hang them up for her.

This is a True Story I Call DARK MIRROR.

I picked up two mirrors for this lady from a no-longer-in-business store, and went to her house. She was out, but a key she gave me let me in. The mirrors were fairly large, but I had little problem in hanging them.

The living room one went up without a hitch.

The dining room had an even larger mirror on the wall she was replacing. The good news was I found out when I took the mirror down, I could still use the hooks there to put up the new mirror. It fit perfectly.

The dining room was adjoined to the Kitchen, like most houses built in this era. No separation at all. In the mirror was reflected the kitchen, kitchen window and the lake beyond. As I looked into the mirror I blinked and . . .

There was a black figure reflected in the mirror. I looked behind me, out the window: nothing. I looked back, the figure was still reflected in the mirror. It was the silhouette of a man’s upper body – as if someone was standing outside the window.

For the first time in my life I felt an icy chill run over me. It wasn’t my reflection, I know that. The figure stood off to my right.

I glanced back again and again nothing. The figure was now gone from the mirror as well.

I ran out back and looked around. I even went to the walkway and there was no one.

I have no problem in saying I was freaked by the moment. I tried to figure it out, but nothing I did brought the figure back. There was nothing that it could have been a reflection off.

This happened long before any show like Ghost Hunters ever hit the air, so there was no influence from that.

All I know is that briefly there was a figure in that mirror, and there was nothing there it could have been.

It only happened that one time. I was back there a number of times after that, I even looked in the mirror again, seeing if the figure would reappear. Or, if I could see something that would have caused it. Nothing.

The figure had no features, only the shape of a man. It was pitch black, not transparent and never moved. Yes, I know the different ideas of what it could have been, and what it could have meant.

Fortunately, none of those ideas have come to pass.

Ace.

This Is Another True Wal-Mart Story I Call WHY I HATE . . .

I really don’t like Wal-Mart. In fact I hate it. I only shop there when my mom asks me to pick something up, or one of my clients insist I get items they need from Wal-Mart.

Once again, I had an issue at Wal-Mart with one of their employees. I have never had issues like this anywhere else.

This is border line wrong to say, but sometimes it is hard to not say I hate people who work at Wal-Mart. I don’t hate them, in general. However I know the negative atmosphere that Wal-Mart creates, and that often seeps into how their employees treat people.

This is a True Story I call WHY I HATE . . . .

I went into a super Wal-Mart to get food and items for a client. This bitch nice lady insist that is must be from Wal-Mart. In fact she’ll refuse to pay if the receipt is from anywhere else, even if it is cheaper.

Any, I went to the Super, I picked up her stuff, and a couple of things for me. Two DVD’s and a bottle of soda were my stuff. At the self-check I scanned all of my client’s stuff, leaving mine on the side. Her stuff came to over a hundred dollars.

As I started to pay, the clerk there came up to me and she said, “You know you have to pay for this stuff.” It wasn’t a question, but a statement.

I told her I would, in a moment.

She grab the stuff and started to walk off with it! Seriously!!

I told her I wanted it. She again told me I needed to pay for it. I told her I am going to, but I am paying for the stuff separately.

I paid for my client’s stuff. This bitch clerk stayed there next to me, ignoring others, watching and making sure I scanned and paid for my stuff. The whole time she talked about how this was stupid, she’s never known anyone to pay separately.

Once done, I held both receipts up and asked if she wanted to see them. She said no, she knew I paid.
I left, put my stuff in the car, but I couldn’t let this go.

I went back in, talked to her and asked her out. Yes, I did. To my surprised she said ‘Sure.’ That worked out nice for what I wanted to do.

My response, ‘Do I have to pay first?’

She didn’t like that. :-(

Ace.

This is a True Story: NAILED IT!!!!

My mom might not be happy with me sharing this story, considering how she reacted to this event.

This event being me coming home at 9 or 10 years old with a nail through my finger in a True Story I call NAILED IT.

During this time my dad was stationed in England (US Air Forces) and we lived in Base Housing in Biscter, in a community called Glory Farms. I liked the place, except for the fact that our house was across the street from my school. (Boo!)

That made it hard to skip out, or even get out of school being sick. And I sure couldn’t miss the school bus. However, it did mean that I could go home for lunch! Which I did every day to a homemade lunch courtesy of my mom.

Well, one day I came home, crying my eyes out and screaming in pain. I had a nail through my middle finger, blood ran down my hand and stained the nail. My mom freaked out, unsure what to do at first. She sat me down, put a wet cloth around my hand, and tried to calm me down as she grabbed the phone to call an ambulance.

That is when I took the fake plastic nail off my finger and showed it to her, laughing. The nail and the blood were fake! I was acting and got one over on my mom big time. She truly believed I had a nail driven through my finger.

PERFECT.

Until she almost knocked me the hell out. She was pissed and didn’t find it funny. She went to hit me, but stopped herself and didn’t (she NEVER hit me no matter what I did.).

I felt bad at that point, and tried to apologize, it was just a joke. (A good one). Turns out, she was more upset with herself for her reaction, then me. All good.

When I got home from school later that day, it was my mom’s turn. She told me to pull the same prank on my father, she even went along with me.

My dad’s response? “Nice nail.” Dumb dad.

This is one of my fondest memories because it worked. Not so much my mom.

Ace.