BRAINPAN LEAKAGE

E K is evil. We all know that. Those of you who don’t have any first hand experience in that area will simply have to take my word for it. Trust me, it’s better that way. Save yourselves, escape while you can. Don’t even look back, there’s no hope for me at this point. Really. Just leave me and get out of here before she catches you.

Okay… Now that you are safe I can continue… Seeing as E K is pure, unadulterated evil, as well as a ruthless secret agent who makes Jack Bauer look like a pantywaist, (see: Kay… E Kay…), The Evil One is generally armed for bear whenever she leaves the house.

You know, all the standard lethal force, 007/CTU killing and torturing kind of stuff – stiletto heels with real stilettos, poison lipstick, exploding PDA, miniature rocket launching mascara, electrocuting cell phone, .40 caliber hairbrush, etc… Yeah, the whole nine yards.

Now, since her top secret cover is that of a soccer mom, she drives a heavily armored mini-van that has its own rocket launchers behind the headlights, ejection seats, special cubbyholes for hiding bodies, machine guns in the fender wells, and it can even drive underwater.

Still, my dear and lovely is a hands on kind of killer woman. Something about liking to be up close and personal with her victims before stomping the life out of them. Like I said, she’s evil…and cruel…extremely cruel. I mean, we don’t call her E K for nothing.

At any rate, since she likes the hands on approach, in her soccer mom mobile, she carries a miniature Louisville Slugger. Yeah, exactly… A small, wooden, novelty baseball bat. From what I gather, she uses it to render her victims unconscious before she tapes them to a chair and tortures them. (Yeah, she carries several rolls of duct tape too. Go figure.)

So… The other day we had occasion to do a bit of shopping – grocery shopping, in fact. After all, an active assassin woman like E K has to eat balanced, healthy meals and such, so that she can stay in top form. Well, after we climbed out of the armored urban assault vehicle disguised as a soccer mom mobile, and I was rolling the sliding door shut – I severely wrenched my shoulder from muscling all that armor sideways, btw – I happened to notice her pint sized noggin knocker laying on the floor next to the offspring’s rear seat. Now, I happened to know that this wasn’t the secret hiding place for this particular piece of weaponry, so I pointed at it and asked the munchkin, “What are you doing with that?”

To which she replied, “I think it’s cute.”

Hey, she’s nine. Right now, in her world, just about everything is “cute”, except for the boys at her school and asparagus.

“Well, that’s fine, but it belongs to Mommy,” I told her.

For whatever reason, that idea didn’t sit well with her. As we started across the parking lot, the short person turned to E K and said, “You don’t need a bat, Mommy.”

Since we are trying to keep E Kay’s secret agent status a secret from the offspring right now, but also trying not to make a habit of lying to her, I piped up and said, “Sure she does. She has it for emergencies.”

“Yes I do,” E K agreed, then decided to expand upon the comment with an explanation. Unfortunately, she must have been receiving an urgent encoded message on her microwave transmitter dental work at that same instant that effectively diverted her attention, because what ended up tumbling from her lips was, “I have it in case I need to beat someone off.”

Yeah… Trust me, we were both thinking exactly what you are thinking right now…

And, because I was thinking the same thing you are thinking, I couldn’t help but snicker. Really… I simply couldn’t help myself. And, I was safe from retribution for it because neither could E K. Had we been drinking at the time there would have been a mess to clean up, know what I mean?

Of course, our stifled laughs were definitely preceded by one of those  split second, heart stopping, “Oh shit, that definitely came out wrong” moments. I’m sure the dropped-jaw, wide-eyed, deer-in-headlights expressions we both wore in that instant were utterly priceless. Too bad we didn’t have a camera handy. Fortunately, the unintended euphemism went right over the offspring’s head – literally and figuratively.

I have no idea what Freud would have made of the comment, especially since E K was wearing blue jeans at the time and no slip was involved.  Still, sometimes a cigar is just a cigar, and a faux pas is just a faux pas. Still, as we entered the store I made the mistake of saying, “That’s definitely blog material.”

E K just sighed and said, “Why is everything blog material?”

“Because it’s funny,” I answered.

I didn’t catch all of her reply, mainly because she seemed to be mumbling to herself. Still, I’m pretty sure I heard something about needing to find a place to hide my body.

More to come…

Murv

I like to sing.

Now, please take note – I did not indicate in any way that I am good at singing. I simply said that I like to do it. Therefore, you aren’t about to find me in a Karaoke bar, belting out Bon Jovi or Heart tunes and downing Kirin with a bunch of visiting Japanese businessmen. For one thing, I never have occasion to be socializing with the aforementioned Asian moguls. Just doesn’t happen in my line of work. Maybe someday a Japanese publisher will pick up the foreign rights to the Rowan Gant Investigations and do a translation, but something tells me by the time they were done, he would end up being a Mystical Samurai Pokemon or something of that sort, so I’m not really sure how I feel about that prospect. I guess it all depends on how much Kirin I’ve had, and how much money is on the table when the offer is made.

But, let’s get back to the story…

The truth is, it really doesn’t matter if they are Japanese businessmen, or a visiting friend from the FBI, since the latter actually does happen. You still won’t find me hanging out in the Karaoke bars, because even though I like to sing, I can’t carry a tune in a bucket, even with help and I know that. I didn’t used to have this problem. Once upon a time I could cart a tune around in a brown paper sack with no backup whatsoever, and sound pretty good. But, at around age 13 I was afflicted with a bad case of swimmer’s ear. (I bet you thought I was going to say hormones… Well, that’s a different blog…) At any rate, both of my eardrums were perforated by the blistering, which left behind a whole mess of scar tissue. As I have grown older the extent of my frequency hearing loss has worsened considerably. So, no matter whether we are talking brown paper sack, plastic bucket, or galvanized pail, I can’t carry a tune.

Still, I like to sing.

Just ask Anastasia, good friend and co-founder of the “Murv’s Stalkers” fan club. She and her husband are regular visitors to the “Murv Cave,” and were here for the Yule Bash 2007. They were also here for Yule Bash 2008, but 2007 has more to do with the singing thing… You see, that was the year of the 14 inch snowfall type blizzard storm that struck on the very day and evening of the Yule bash. So, Anastasia actually got to witness me shoveling the back deck – repeatedly – while I was holding a Vodka-Tonic in one hand, and belting out my own renditions of A Fairytale of New York, Run, Run Rudolph, and countless other holiday tunes. What I’m trying to illustrate here is this – I am likely to start singing at the drop of a hat. Especially if alcohol is involved, but while it is a good impetus, booze definitely isn’t a pre-requisite.

Such was the case just the other day. And, no, this time there was no alcohol involved.

You see, I had just picked up the offspring from school. We returned home, and following the usual schedule the short person set about doing her homework while I started fixing dinner. After all, E K would be home in just a little over an hour and we all know what happens if I don’t have her dinner on the table when she walks in.

So, anyway, it had been a fairly good day, I was feeling somewhat chipper,  and I was far enough ahead of the game with fixing dinner that I could reasonably assume E K wouldn’t beat me and lock me in the closet that evening. Well, at least not on account of dinner being late, that is… Therefore I started bellowing out some Traveling Wilbury’s tunes. I happen to like the Traveling Wilbury’s. Not only are their songs catchy, but also they’re a lot of fun.  If I remember correctly I started out with Tweeter And The Monkey Man then flowed right into Handle With Care. I think Last Night might have even been in there somewhere as well, although I’m pretty sure it entered the mix a bit later. I left Margarita out of it because it doesn’t sound nearly as good without the 4-part harmony.

Somewhere around the time I was taking a breath before launching into the chorus of one of the above songs, I was cut short by the offspring calling out to me from the dining room…

“Daddy!” she yelled.

Well, it didn’t sound like anything was terribly wrong… Parents kind of have a sixth-sense about that sort of thing believe me. What it sounded like was that she was simply trying to get my attention before I started bellowing again. I made the logical assumption that she might need some help with fractions or some such. She absolutely despises math. It’s not that she’s bad at it or anything. She just hates it with a passion for some odd reason.

Anyway, I stepped out through the kitchen doorway and asked, “What’s up?”

She looked at me, and with all the seriousness she could muster she asked, “Daddy, are you going to be a Pop-Star?”

You see, the offspring is all about that Cyrus kid… The one named after a state…  And the somebody or another brothers… And Denny Tomatoes, or some such… You know, the latest Disney sensations, most of whom probably won’t have the staying power of an Annette Funicello… But, that’s just my opinion… Either way, she is so all about these “Tween/Teen Idols” in fact, that she has abandoned her grand plan to become a Doctor and has decided instead to become a “Pop Star” just like them. When I was her age I think I was planning to be an Astronaut. Shortly after that it was Oceanographer, closely followed by Veterinarian… So, my point is, I’m not worried about her current career choice. I’m sure it will change soon enough. As a matter of fact, she has such a gift for gab and penchant for arguing with us, that I wouldn’t be surprised to see her become a trial attorney. I mean, I hope not. Then when people at the old folks home ask me what my kid does for a living I’ll have to make up a lie and stuff… But, I digress…

So, the kid had just asked me if I was going to become a “Pop Star”…

I looked back at her and chuckled as I replied, “No, honey, I write books for a living. You know that.”

She pondered my answer for less than a heartbeat before replying, “That’s good, because you don’t sing very well.”

Critics. They’re everywhere. But, at least I know my kid is honest, so that gives me some hope that she won’t become an attorney after all, and it should definitely keep her out of politics.

As for me, I guess I won’t be quitting my day job.

More to come…

Murv