BRAINPAN LEAKAGE

If you are looking for a stock to add to your portfolio, I would like to suggest that you look into any company that produces Raisin Bran.

Seriously.

It can be Kellogg’s, Post, General-Mills, Store Brand, or even Happy Fred’s Generic Cereal Company. The real deal here is that it doesn’t matter one iota who it is, just as long as they produce, package, and sell Raisin Bran, and are publicly traded on the exchange, you probably want to grab yourself a few shares.

Why?

Well, I’ll tell you. Because E K likes Raisin Bran. In point of fact, not only does The Evil Redhead like – nay, love – the shriveled-up-grape and flaky goodness of said cereal, I am fairly certain she is addicted to it… If not addicted, then damn close, because she goes through entire barge loads of the stuff, and on top of that, it is no less than number 2 on the hit parade for her daily routine.

THE E K DAILY MEANNESS AND EVILNESS SCHEDULE

1. Get out of bed and scare the hell out of Satan… Or, scare Satan right out of hell, whichever works. Then stand over him and giggle while he cowers in the corner.
2. Eat Raisin Bran while watching the morning news.
3. Feed and medicate cats.
4. Get ready for work.
5. Beat husband. Beat husband again if the mood strikes. Then stand over him and giggle while he cowers in the corner next to Satan.
6. Go to work and generally be evil. If necessary, and again if the mood strikes, be specifically evil as well as generally evil.
7. Come home and beat husband. Find where Satan is hiding and beat him too. Stand over both husband and Satan and giggle while they cower in the corner.
8. Lock husband and Satan in basement then go to bed.
9. Sleep with evil grin on face.
10. Wake up, start at item 1 and repeat ad infinitum.

See what I mean? I’m pretty sure number 2 would actually be number 1 if it weren’t for the fact that she takes such joy in scaring Satan senseless. I mean, she is after all, Evil Kat. But, if it weren’t for the amusement she gets from torturing the prince of darkness on a daily basis, I’m sure she’d just have me bring the Raisin Bran to her in bed so she could skip that annoying first step altogether. In fact, come to think of it, on Katsmas when she lets Satan slide for the day as a Katsmas present, she does in fact have me bring her Raisin Bran to her in bed, so there you go.

Oh, and BTW, she’s always quick remind Satan that he can be the prince of darkness all he wants, but she’s the Queen, so “neener neener”… Then Satan starts crying. Blubbering actually. It’s pretty sad to watch.

But, anyway, back to this whole Raisin Bran thing. One time when we ate the complimentary breakfast at a hotel where we stayed, I witnessed E K stab a desk clerk to death with a spork because all they had were Corn Flakes and generic Cheerios. You just don’t mess with her two scoops, as it were.

So, I’m sure you can see that E Kay’s schedule of events is pretty well set. And, if something causes her to deviate from that course, things tend to go awry. Take just the other morning for instance…

It started out just like any other day. Beelzebub was at the back of E Kay’s closet trying to hide under one of her shoe racks while crying for his mommy. The Evil One had enjoyed her morning giggle, and then traipsed into the kitchen so she could move along to number 2 on the list.

Now, I have to point out that even though she’s had her morning giggle, E K can be a bit on the glassy-eyed side for the first hour or so after her feet hit the floor. Hence the strict routine.

Well, for whatever reason, be it that she was wracking her brain to come up with a new husband torture, or maybe even that she was simply drunk with mirth from the horribleness she had already perpetrated upon the whimpering devil upstairs, E K deviated from her routine.

Yes. The Queen Bitch Of The Whole F*cking Universe made a left at Albuquerque.

She put number 2 on hold and moved number 3 up a half step on the ladder – meaning she elected to feed the cats first. Just so there’s no misunderstanding I want everyone to know I would have gently nudged her back onto the schedule had I been aware this was happening. Unfortunately, I was preoccupied with putting a spit shine on the shoes E K wanted to wear that day lest I be in even more trouble than normal.

I honestly had no clue whatsoever that anything was wrong until I heard a loud, exasperated groan followed by E Kay’s voice exclaiming, “DAMMIT!”

(As an aside, I think she might have picked that whole “dammit” thing up from a friend of ours we call “Helga”. She’s been schooling “Helga” in the ways of evil and husband torture, so they’ve hung out together a bit and, well, ya’know what I mean?)

At any rate, I stopped what I was doing and rushed to the kitchen to see what might possibly be the problem. Things were going through my head like perhaps I had set out the wrong color cereal bowl, or the spoon wasn’t shiny enough, or the milk wasn’t cold enough, or any of the hundreds of other things that would upset the E K.

My heart was stuck in my throat and fear of an impending beating was already welling in my stomach as I rounded the corner. However, instead of seeing blue fire shooting out of the redhead’s eyes, I found myself gazing upon 4 cats – well, actually 1 grumbling Kat and 3 quite obviously confused four-legged felines. I looked at the furry threesome as they cocked their heads side to side, then looked up, down, and all around. Then I looked at The Evil One. In her hand was an open box of Raisin Bran.

The problem was, that’s also exactly what was in the feline’s dishes on the floor.

Of course, as I am sure you already guessed, this deviation from the canonical list of the day was somehow my fault. Honestly, I never really understand the logic behind how I get blamed, but I’ve learned better than to object. I just take my beating, and then go cower in the corner with Satan.

It seems to be quite a bit safer there.

More to come…

Murv

Staring down the barrel of the unexpected flight delay, I began doing arithmetic in my head.

Now please understand, I didn’t embark upon this mental math exercise because I enjoy crunching numbers. Truth is, I’m not really a mathematics sort of
guy, hence the reason I became a writer. You see, they pretty much promised me they’d keep the math to a minimum if I tossed words for a living. Judging from the size of my royalty checks, they’ve been keeping that promise, but that’s a different story.

Actually, the math I was doing was the kind that involved food. You see, if we didn’t leave until 7:11, that would put us into Columbus at 8:15 or so. Wait for luggage, hoof it to the car, ride an hour to Newark, and by then it would be 9:30 or thereabouts. The 1/2 cup of raisin bran and rubber chicken sandwich I had consumed earlier in the day were already waning, so after adding, subtracting, multiplying, dividing, and generally estimating, my conclusion was none other than 7:11 + travel time + wait time + drive time =Murv’s Stomach Will Be Growling.

Easy enough to fix. I mean, after all, I now had all the time in the world to hurry up and wait. So, I checked out the area and a little before 6 PM I wandered over to the eating establishment situated immediately adjacent to my gate.

Now, I have to be a little nostalgic here for a moment. Back when I met E K, and we were both in the computer repair biz, my dear and lovely had been fortunate enough to be sent to IBM Certification Training. This was where they “learned you how to work on a PC.” Well, obviously we already knew how to do this, but getting the training meant you received a “Tech ID Number.” This authorization allowed you to file warranty claims, and also looked good on a resume. So, why am I bringing this up? Believe me, there’s a very good reason. You see, back then The Evil Redhead often waxed poetic and drooling about a restaurant she visited while in Atlanta for the training. The oasis of food was called Fuddruckers, and apparently this place served one of the best hamburgers she’d ever eaten, and that happens to be a pretty mean feat given that she’s not really a hamburger sort of gal. Problem is, there wasn’t a Fuddruckers in Saint Louis, so she could never take me to one in order for me to experience the “carniverous pleasures of the cow flesh” so to speak…

See where I am heading with this? Yeah, exactly…

I’m sure you have all surmised that the eatery next to my departure gate was none other than a Fuddruckers. Having a halfway decent memory, I flashed on my semi drooling wife as she lauded praise upon the distant establishment where she had consumed the grandest of ground, seared cow on a bun. Suddenly my world brightened. I may be stuck in Detroit waiting for a long delayed flight, but what the hell, I was going to have the king of all burgers and that would certainly make everything better.

I stood in the long, snakelike queue, my anticipation building as with each shuffling step I drew nearer to the counter. I perused the board hanging over the register and made my choice, changed my mind, made another choice, changed my mind again, and finally settled upon a burger and fry combo that boasted three kinds of cheese along with the beefy goodness. My order finally placed, I waited again as it was freshly cooked and assembled just for me. Violent twinges of the anticipation danced around in my stomach, ran down my leg, and climbed right up to the top of my head. I had to lean against the wall across from the pickup counter just to keep myself from doing something akin to the “happy happy excited pee-pee dance” dogs do when you arrive home late from work and they are dying to be let out. Finally, and not a moment too soon, my name was called. The Holy Grail of cheeseburgers was waiting for me. I needed only to pick it up and dress it from the “garden fresh” bar off to the side of the counter. Forcing myself not to dance across the room, I retrieved the beefy goodness on a bun and tossed a few maters and onions atop it. After a quick squirt of ketchup for my fries I ran gleefully back to my gate, parked myself in a corner, and prepared to be transported to dead cow nirvana.

One bite was all it took for me to decide my wife must have been on drugs during her trip to IBM Certification Training.

I quickly ran back through the restaurant’s enormously appetizing description of the burger in my head. Even after scrolling through the mental listing several times I was unable to recall having seen any mention of hockey pucks or toupee’s on the ingredient list. Lucky me… Unfortunately, the line leading up to the counter of the restaurant was now longer than it had been when I had first joined it, so I resigned myself to consuming the less than stellar cuisine. It took me around ten minutes to shave it since all I had at hand was a plastic fork. Once satisfied that all of the hair was gone – at least the hair I could see – I sawed it into small enough bites that I could swallow it without choking to death, seeing as how too much chewing was likely to result in a broken tooth.

One saving grace was that after a few bites it no longer mattered that the burger was devoid of any taste that remotely resembled seared cow, because I scalded my tongue with a molten french fry and my taste buds had retreated to an area deep inside my body somewhere near my pituitary gland. This was for the best given that burnt hockey puck is not on the top of my list where favorite flavors are concerned.

I now have a new name for Fuddruckers. I call them Hairy FuddPuckers And The Inedible Stone.

So, with my stomach now attempting to digest a furry brick, I sat back and waited. When our flight finally boarded I was ready for the odyssey to be done. A quick jaunt to Columbus and I would finally be able to relax. I plopped into my seat, buckled my seatbelt, and sat back to await takeoff. It was right about then I noticed that the interior of the airplane was inordinately warm.

Sixty seconds later the pilot came on the speaker to inform us that the auxiliary power unit was malfunctioning, we had no air conditioning, and that instead of sending someone to Sears for a DieHard battery, he had bribed some guys in yellow vests and earmuffs to give us a jump, just as soon as they could find where they stashed the cables.

I began to wonder if I was caught in one of those Groundhog Day time loops, but upon inspecting my surroundings it was obvious that I was not on the earlier DC-9, I was on a CRJ-700 regional jet.

Yes… It was happening again, on a different plane at a different airport.

This time, however, the guys took the pilot’s money and disappeared, probably to the local bar. Therefore, we spent an additional 35 sweltering and melty minutes sitting at the gate waiting for him to flag down another carload of yellow vests with jumper cables. At one point, trying to be helpful, I called out through the open door of the cockpit that if they wanted to put it in gear and hold in the clutch, I would get out and push.

Jason, our flight attendant, didn’t find my idea particularly amusing. I guess that explains why once we were airborne I didn’t get my complimentary cookie or peanuts…

More to come…

Murv

Next Installment: Fly The Friendly Skies?