BRAINPAN LEAKAGE

I happen to like fried chicken…

I mean, after all, I’m from the South. I would probably be disowned by my kin if I didn’t like fried chicken. You see, much like Texas has the “he needed killin'” law, there’s one of those unwritten little ditties in the original South as well. It’s the “I ain’t eatin’ it” rule. Basically, you are allowed one free pass on a regional comestible. In my case I used my freebie on Head Cheese – that gelatinous loaf of aspic and cranial meat that comes from boiling down a hog head.

Truth is, one would think that having grown up on a farm, and therefore having been physically present (and even directly involved) during an actual “chicken running around with its head cut off” incident (several times, to be honest) I would have been more likely to use my “get out of eating it free” coupon on just that. However, I’ve also seen a hog’s head floating around in a soup pot. And, witnessed my grandmother digging the eyes out of the skull… And…

Well… You get the picture. Suffice it to say, in my way of thinking the crazy, bleeding, headless chicken made a far less horrific impression, believe it or not.

So, now that I’ve whetted your appetite, let’s move right along…

This past weekend I headlined at Festival of Souls in Memphis, Tennessee. FOS is a fantastic alternative spirituality gathering put on by Summerland Grove and held at Meeman-Shelby State Park. Incidentally, Meeman-Shelby is where a piece of my luggage now makes its home, but that’s another story… Thing is, this wasn’t my first time at this particular fest, but it had been a few years, so I have to say it was great to visit with old friends once again.

But then there came the chicken.

Now, as I said, I love fried chicken, so when I saw that it was on the menu for Saturday night’s dinner feast, I was to say the least, pretty excited. Granted, we were in Tennessee and not Kentucky, but hey, it’s still the same geographical area, so they oughta know how to fry chicken. So, all good… I was going to have fried chicken… My mouth was all set for it.

Fast forward a bit to Saturday evening. The feast was scheduled to begin after the main ritual for the fest. Some of us – namely Tish and Patrick Owen, E-Mac, Johnathan, E K, and Moi – who were not attending the ritual had parked ourselves at the Group W book signing table in the dining hall. Here we played with pencils, chatted, signed books, talked about the mysteries of the universe, reveled in the lovely fried chicken smells wafting from the nearby kitchen, and watched E K torturing wayward insects that fell into her “you don’t belong here” category.

(NOTE: E K will rescue insects that belong here, but if they are an invasive species, or are just plain nasty and annoying… Well, let’s say it sucks to be them. See “Mistress Of The Flies,” “Missouri Kat And The Scarab Of Doom,” “Eeek Of Destruction,” etc…)

Eventually, the ritual was over and folks began rapidly filing into the dining hall for dinner, and as hungry people will do, they lined up in front of the window, anxious for a plate of chickeny goodness. Seeing the length of the queue, we all decided to kick back and wait for it to die down. So, we continued chit-chatting while E K continued introducing various bugs to the sole of her shoe as she giggled that cute, intensely evil giggle of hers.

However, the kitchen staff had another idea. Not about E K and her bug crunching, more like about us not eating right away. Because, out of the blue… Well… not blue, really… More like out of the kitchen door if we want to be completely accurate… Anyway, suddenly a couple of tray laden folks appeared and placed loaded plates of fried chicken, mashed ‘taters & gravy, green beans, and glazed carrots in front of us. We were also duly chastised for not having walked into the kitchen ahead of everyone else to be served at the head of the line, since Tish and I were the headline authors and everyone with us qualified as our entourage, so to speak.

Well, truth is, Tish and I really don’t buy into that dynamic. There are many authors and presenters out there that do, but we aren’t them. So, if the staff of an event hustles us into the dining hall ahead of everyone even after we strenuously object, we will go. We don’t always have a choice.  But we are NOT about to jump ahead of paying attendees, and we aren’t big fans of folks who do.

But now I digress…

So… Where was I? Oh yeah. At any rate, we were now in a quandary. We were embarrassed that we had been literally served our dinner while many folks were still waiting in line, but by the same token we were hungry. Fortunately, nobody minded that we had been brought our plates, and they insisted that we eat before it got cold. So, we did… And there were these piles of fried chicken. And the fried chicken was not good. The fried chicken was freakin’ EXCELLENT. So very excellent, in fact, that we just kept eating since they had a surplus and they had provided us with monster chicken pieces.

Fast forward again…

Late in the evening we stood about, smoking cigars, chit chatting, watching EKay step on things, and being amused by a field mouse that chased Johnathan around the porch after it had used the restroom. Well, we assumed that’s what it did. It went into the restroom, then came out later and started chasing Johnathan. At any rate, we eventually piled into our room and retired for the night. Sometime during the wee hours of the morning, however, the “incident” happened.

“The Incident”? you ask…

Yes. “The Incident.” We still aren’t positive about the hour of the occurrence, but when sunrise arrived, as usual we climbed out of bed and headed for the restroom. It’s one of those morning things, ya’know. Upon opening the door to the cabin we found “it”…

It being two large pieces of fried chicken affixed to our cabin door with duct tape. We had been vandalized… We had been victimized… We had been the target of a “Drive By Chickening”…

Being a mystery-thriller author, of course I launched a full scale investigation, co-opting whatever I could find in order to process the crime scene. I even interviewed witnesses, one of them being a rather wet and naked young lady in the unisex shower facilities. She seemed to know who it was, but was unwilling to give up the info. Since she was wet and naked, and I really wasn’t all about interviewing her in that state, I was unable to pursue the line of questioning any further.

Later we discovered that we weren’t the only victims. It seemed someone using the very same roll of duct tape had attempted to tape Tish and Patrick into their cabin. Obviously we had a “serial tapeist” on our hands…

While the perpetrator of these crimes still runs free, we are relatively certain we have narrowed things down to a single suspect. During her interview she was evasive, and even offered a rehearsed answer, stating that we had been the victims of Tennessee Hoodoo.

That was when we knew for certain she was lying. Everyone knows that if fried chicken is involved, it’s Kentucky Hoodoo.

So, she might as well just fess up. Otherwise I’ll just have to invoke the Colonel. Trust me, I have a secret blend of eleven herbs and spices, and I’m not afraid to use it…

More to come…

Murv

…how to walk in high heels. Trust me, she knows… But, I suppose I should back that up with an explanation.

Now, I have to begin with the fact that we are not talking about E K here. This is not to say that she doesn’t have the aforementioned talent, because she does, in spades. However, in this particular instance I am waxing poetic (as you will see) about another young lady.

As you all well know, I travel a fair bit for book tours and the like – that much is a given. And, during my travels I see things. Sometimes they are frightening, sometimes they are strange, sometimes they are interesting, and sometimes I have no clue what the hell I am witnessing.

And then, there’s Leg Girl.

The Legend Of Leg Girl began several years ago on a weekend trip to Nashville, Tennessee to do a book signing and seminar. My dear friend and fellow author, Tish Owen, also owns a bookstore called Goddess And The Moon. I’ve done several signings there, and I always have a blast hanging out with her, her clientele, her husband Patrick who is my cigar smoking and booze drinking buddy, and all of my other friends there in “music city”.

Well, as the true story goes, one Saturday night after spending the day presenting a workshop on writing, and then signing a mess of books in one of the meeting rooms at the shopping mall across from where Goddess and the Moon was then located – it has since moved – we were going back to the store for a bit of a soiree. Wine, beer, booze, cheese, crackers, munchies, etc. You know the drill. Folks were going to come by, visit, have books signed, get a photo op or two, and all that jazz. Typical book store event sort of stuff. A great chance to just chill out and relax.

Unfortunately, the day had been so hectic for poor Tish and her staff that she had not yet had the opportunity to go pick up the aforementioned noshing items and beverages. Since I had nothing to do between finishing the seminar and the start of the soiree, I volunteered to ride along with Tish and help with the toting, lifting and other such stuff at the grocery store. And so, off we went…

No more had we pulled into the parking lot and begun our search for a space than out in front of us steps “Leg Girl”… All of mid twenties, great hair, hourglass figure, and most prominently on display a set of legs that a Rockette would sell her soul to have. And, I do mean prominently on display, for you see, this entire package was wrapped in nothing more than a sheer blouse, blazer, flared miniskirt – and I do mean MINIskirt – and patent leather stiletto heeled pumps. This was despite the fact that we were at the end of November and the temperature was in the mid forties or thereabouts.

And no, she was NOT a figment of my hormone driven imagination. Tish saw her too. In fact, Tish saw her so well that she was infuriated…

Allow me to explain. You see, Leg Girl literally stepped right out in front of us and began to slowly saunter up the middle of the aisle in the parking lot. Not to the left, not to the right. She was smack dab in the middle of the lane and Tish was unable to get around her. And saunter Leg Girl did. Slowly, deliberately, and swaying with a rhythm that would bring any red-blooded heterosexual male to his knees.

Well, suffice it to say, I had no room on the floorboards in order to get on my knees, not that I didn’t try. Still, even though I was unable to assume the appropriate position of Goddess Worship, I was mesmerized. Tish, however, was most assuredly not. Somehow, and I don’t know how, through my hypnotic stupor I was able to recognize this fact and managed to persuade Tish not to run over Leg Girl – trust me, that took some doing because that was exactly what Tish was intending to do.

Ever since that day, Leg Girl has been a running joke between Tish and me. Every time she books me for a gig at the store, or at PUF, she asks if there is anything special I need, and I always reply, “I need Leg Girl to be my handler for the weekend.” (“Handler” as in liaison / gopher / assistant… Let’s keep it clean here folks…)

Fortunately for me, though always promised by Tish – followed by a healthy chuckle, of course – Leg Girl has never materialized for said duties. Not that I would complain, however E K probably wouldn’t be particularly excited by it. In fact, I’m not really sure which one of us she would kill first…

But anyway, the Legend Of Leg Girl kind of… well… ummm… the legend has legs so to speak – no pun intended. Really. Seriously… But, pun or no, the events of that evening actually inspired a lyrical parody, written by yours truly.

Maybe someday, if we happen to have someone on site who knows all the chords to the original song, I’ll get drunk enough to perform this ditty at PUF…

Leg Girl

(To the tune of Two Hangmen by Mason Proffit)

As I rolled into Nashville with my friend her name is Tish

I saw what I’ll relate to you and it was quite a pretty dish

It seems there was this woman, who had this pair of gams

They went all the way up to her neck, and that’s
where it began

The woman’s name was Leg Girl, the best that I could see

She like to show her legs off, and that’s okay with me

I guess she saw me coming, and donned that mini skirt

And stockings and stiletto heels just so she could
flirt

She walked across the parking lot, right down the center aisle

She swayed and sauntered like a dream, it really made me smile

She stopped a moment in our way and then she tossed her hair

The wind picked up and her miniskirt billowed with
much flair

The driver’s name was Tish Owen, she said this bitch is slow

I’m gonna run her over now if she doesn’t start to go

I said to Tish please don’t do that, I really like this sight

She went to all this trouble so just let her make my night.

The wind continued blowing and gave Leg Girl a goose

She moved a little faster now, but still shook her caboose

Tish was laughing hard at me, as I began to drool

Leg Girl was such an awesome treat that made me
act the fool

Tish finally found a parking space and pulled in with a squeal

Leg Girl was going into the store on teetering high heels

We followed along behind her, and then she disappeared

But I saw her again as we checked out, with a case
or two of beeeeeeeeeeeeeer…

(Chorus)

And she’s my Leggggg Girrrrrllll, there in Tennessee, and that don’t bother me, at all-all-allllll…

And she’s my Leggggg Girrrrrllll, there in Tennessee, and that don’t bother me, at all-all-allllll…

(Repeat Whole Bunches Of Times)

One more time!

And she’s my Leggggg Girrrrrllll, there in Tennessee, and that don’t bother me, at all-all-allllll…

And she’s my Leggggg Girrrrrllll, there in Tennessee, and that don’t bother me, at all-all-allllll…

More to come…

Murv