In The Air Tonight

There was something in the air, all right. I don't know what it was but I don't know if I should try to bottle it or have it declared illegal.

All kind of silliness and giggling going on over the radio waves. I strongly suspect that there will be a new round of staff urine tests going on real soon.

They had me scheduled to work with Sgt Archer and Mr Peepers. I've never actually worked with Peepers, I've just encountered him a few times and have heard some stories that made me scratch my head. Someone told me he used to be some sort of airplane mechanic.

Another good reason to never fly in an airplane ever again.

I begged Lt Pagliacci to give me somebody who knew what they were doing out there, so he sent me Ham. I can work with Ham. He's nutty as a granola bar but he can be trusted and knows his way around the place like nobody's business.

And now that Sausage bid off utility, I think Ham is our senior utility officer.

A bit windy, but a good man to have around.

And that (mumble mumble) Archer was on Dog Team training this afternoon so he didn't come in. They sent us Sgt Smiley instead. Not a bad guy for a sergeant. Pleasant enough. He just practices that "I'm lost" thing so we do most of the work for him and he doesn't have to do all that much.

It works for him.

Right as mainline is starting we get a call that one of the wobbleheads is checking in and needs to go to the Hive. Heck. I'm the closest one, I'll get it. No big deal.

While I'm escorting they pull Goosey out to call in the rest of the houses and get them fed. By the time I get back from the Hive the last of them are leaving.

I said "Holy snap. Was I gone that long?" Goosey says "Nope. It was just a crappy meal so I got them in and out quick, that's all."

Man! How come that never works for me?

So Sgt Smiley is going up to Central after chow is over. I'm taking the cart back up to the shack so I can eat my dinner. It's a misty drizzling rain and the wind is blowing in all directions. The windshield on the cart is scratched up so that it's hard to see through it when it's dry, let alone covered with rain drops.

I lean around the windshield to see and my glasses are immediately spattered with rain.

Then "thump!" I hit something.

I thought I ran over one of those cats that's always hanging around the chow hall.

I look back and see one of the out of bounds poles laying on the ground. It's a 4x4 about four feet long painted black. In the dark and in the rain I didn't see it.

Sgt Smiley walks up and says "Hey, you hit that pole."

Gee, thanks, Sarge!

I load the pole up on the cart and take it up to central and do the paperwork and fill out a work order to get it fixed. And in the meantime I have to listen to Pagliacci and Gerber give me rations of snit for running it over. Then they make me load this four foot pole on my shoulder and take it over to the contraband room in 25 house so I can lock it up.

When I walk into 25 house with this thing on my shoulder half of the inmates scurry away and the other half start calling me "Postman" and "Walking Tall".

I knew it was going to be a long night. It was.

Coming back in from doing the Del Norte walk, Sgt Puddle calls me up into the Control Center and says he wants to introduce me to a new employee.

And there in the corner sits Vinnie wrapped in toilet paper with streamers coming off of his hat like some sort of Tim Burton bridesmaid's gown. He has christmas ornaments hanging from his earlobes and one from the center of his chest, pulling down the toilet paper wrapping and making him look like he has cleavage.

Ay-yi-yi!

I was just going to walk up to the chuck hole and say "There seems to be a bit of tomfoolery in the air tonight!"

But by that time it would have been a severe and ludicrous understatement.

I get back out on the yard in time to help with count, then get called for one more escort. One more wobblehead checking in from his cellie.

And off to the Hive I go with my new passenger, hopefully for the last time of the evening.

What was it the list said about today? Oh yeah. Festival Of Enormous Changes At The Last Minute and National Bicarbonate Of Soda Day.

I could really use a bicarbonate of soda right about now. I'll settle for some tums and tylenol instead.

And tomorrow is Unlucky Day. Joy.

I better stock up on the tums.

Should Have Kept My Mouth Shut

I really should have. It would have made my day so much nicer if I would have just said nothing.

There's probably a lot of people who say that about me.

Right at the beginning of my shift up in the Comm room, this guy comes up and wants the keys to the combination Evidence/Telephone Equipment room.

It's a restricted key, but he's on the list so it's okay. I give him the keys.

He comes back in a second and says "Hey, by the way. That door was already unlocked. Just wanted you to know."

Oh, crip-crappity, snip-snappity frappin' poop.

I call Sgt Puddle and he says "Oh snap. Call the Lieutenant."

I call the Lieutenant and he says "Oh snap. Call the captain."

I call the Captain (who happens to be Capt. Crane oh joy) and he says "Oh snap. I will need copious paperwork from you in the next five minutes. Write up everything you know in a memo and get it over to me just as fast as you can."

Yeah, right. Right smack in the middle of shift change.

And while I'm trying to deal with the mess of shift change he keeps calling every five minutes wanting updates and asking more questions.

Finally I said "Look. It's busy as hell up here. All I have for you so far is a piece of paper with your name and my name on it. If you want more than that it's going to have to wait. Or you can come up here and juggle keys and radios while I write."

He decided to wait. But not very patiently. Brother D called out sick and they sent me Goings, who was still sick but getting over it. We obviously never danced much together before because we kept getting in each others way. That sucked.

I get impatient and I just wanted to knock him out of my way a few times but he's bigger than me. Plus, he was trying to help. We just need more practice.

I finally get the paperwork done and run it over and deliver it right before the Captain left and everything is fine again.

Got out to do my two hours in the P-car and drive around doing nothing. That was nice and gave me a chance to get my brain clear again.

At one point I pulled up to the front and Miz Odd was out having a smoke. I asked her how her night was going and she said "It's been nice. There's not a single Captain here. Just two decent Lieutenants and one snaphead."

Well, she didn't really say "snaphead", but you get the picture.

But I really just should have kept my pie hole shut. It would have saved me alot of grief in the long run. Maybe someday I'll learn.

But I doubt it.

Wow. Checking the official list here..... tomorrow doesn't look too good.

Festival Of Enormous Changes At The Last Minute and National Bicarbonate Of Soda Day.

Hey, at least they put them both together. If there's many of the first, I'll be needing a bunch of the second!

There's No Place Like Home!

Well, yeah. Actually there 's places much better.

Much much better.

They sent me back down to the Hive today to work the floor and the place gave me a headache just as soon as I walked in the door.

Noisy, stinky and full of the exact same idiots that were there when I left almost six months ago. Some of them had gotten out and come back and some where exactly where they were when I left.

The Stork was down there pulling some nutty crap about how he was a three star general and how the CIA needed him to get back soon or there was going to be some serious trouble.

I told him to knock off the crap because I knew he wasn't crazy and how it was just a stupid act. And he's not crazy. Not like that. Yes, he has severe emotional problems and the mentality of a ten year old, but he's not crazy.

He tried to bluff his way out of it but he knew that I knew I wasn't buying his present line of B.S. and he toned it down for the rest of the evening.

Schmelvin, on the other hand, was pulling his same old carp and I wasn't buying it either. He wanted to talk to Sarge and said it was too important to tell me. I said "If you can't tell me, then I can't tell the Sarge. That's how it works here." So instead he launched into an hour long screaming tirade about how he could beat up any CO that dared to try opening his door and how he could kick the door off of it's hinges if he really wanted to.

On my way out of the wing I said "Go ahead. Kick that door loose. I'll be down here waiting if you get this far."

He never showed up.

Imagine that.

In a way it was kind of entertaining, but it was mostly just irritating.

I'm so glad I don't work down there regularly anymore. I miss working with LB and BG and Little B, but not bad enough to go back down there full time.

If they want to hang with me, they can come out to the yard.

Tomorrow, according to the national list of such things, is Pepper Pot Day.

I don't know about this one. Sounds like it would burn your lips.

It's No Wonder I Get Sick Alot

I was kind of excited when I came in today. Uncle T is off on vacation for two weeks and today I was scheduled to work with Sgt Miz P and St. Francis on B yard.

I figured it was going to be a fun night.

After all, Miz P and I go way back and I hadn't gotten a chance to work with her once since I left the Hive. I was really looking forward to it.

Come to find out that Miz P is sick with one of the versions of the flu going around. One is all head and chest like the one I had and the other affects the stomach. Often there's alot or ralphing and pooping involved.

I'm glad I didn't have that one. But it sounded like Sgt Miz P was coming down with it. And St Francis was just getting over that particular strain. He was still a bit iffy, but game as heck and ready to rumble if necessary. That's just how he is.

I tried my best to take as much off of both of them as I could and let them rest but neither one is much for just sitting around and resting. And when it comes right down to it there's some things I can't do that a sergeant can.

Cold as hell this evening. The weather geek said it was supposed to be 32 this afternoon but if anybody claimed it got over 20 I'd call them a liar. I believe it was 17 when I left the house at 2:00.

I layered up with long johns and my black turtle neck and my insulated bibs over my uniform and I was still cold. But I warmed up pretty quick when I had to go up 6 house and help count. Following KP around the wings and up and down the stairs had me sweating in no time. When we were done I carried my coat over my arm as I walked back to the shack, heat rising off me like a hot rock in a steam sauna.

Probably not the smartest thing to do, considering the temperature. But I was overly warm. Then I went and sat in a small shack with two sick people.

Aw, heck. It was worth it. I got to spend time with Sgt Miz P. She's my buddy.

So today was Fruitcake Day. Yeah. That's fitting.

Tomorrow is both Card Playing Day and National Chocolate Day. Chocoholics rejoice!

Sam Spade At Work

The snow was falling even faster now. Faster and bigger fatter flakes.

Way different from when I left for work. Then it was just lightly coming down in little balls that were neither snow nor sleet. It looked like those little balls they fill beanbag chairs with. I always referred to it as "sneet".

Well, it wasn't sneeting now. It was flat snowing. A big white fluffy blanket that wouldn't warm your bones no matter how thoroughly you wrapped up in it.

I pulled up the collar of my coat to keep any of those cold wet things from assaulting my neck. They were vicious like that. Communist swine. I knew this type of snowflake. It would lurk around wafting on the breeze waiting for an opening so it could dive down your neck or into your ear canal or whip past the edge of your glasses and land right in the center of your eye.

Yeah. I knew it's type.

The Admin building is a huge marble edifice built over a hundred years ago back when big rocks and the men who knew how to cut them were cheap. Nowadays you couldn't get one block for the price of the whole building.

It was my job to make sure it was secure.

Of course it was freaking secure. The place is built like a bank vault and it got locked up tight last night after the last secretary abandoned her desk for the long holiday weekend and nobody has been back in there since.

But I had to check it again anyway. It was my job.

My boots squeaked wetly on the aged tile floors. Who knew how long those tiles had been there or how many were layered beneath them. Heck, the place could have once had ten foot ceilings now reduced to eight with the layers upon layers of floor tile.

I started out on the third floor, checking doorknobs as I went. As I hit the stairs down to the second floor something caught my eye. It was a dead cockroach the size of a skateboard, laying on it's back, legs curled up.

At least, it looked dead. You could never tell with these things. Stepping on them did no good, as they were able to withstand weights of several hundred pounds per square inch. It would take someone the size of a Lieutenant or even a small Warden to crush one of those. I just wasn't carrying that much backup with me.

And I knew that if I tried to stomp it and it was only pretending to be dead, that vicious sucker would rip off my boot and I'd be lucky to be left with a partial foot to drive home with.

So I did the next best thing. Right out of the manual. I kicked that sucker down the stairs. It bounced and spun and flipped end over end like a two foot long paper football before coming to a stop on the landing below.

It was dead all right.

Or one hell of an actor. If I ever see antenna marks in the cement in front of Grumman's Chinese Theater in Hollywood, I will know who should have won the Oscar this year.

"And the winner for Best Dead Bug goes to....... the envelope please?"

That nasty bit of business out of the way, I continued with my task. The building was s ecure. Was there ever really anything in there worth stealing?

I doubt it. There was sure nothing there I wanted.

Oh sure. I'd strip all the woodwork out of the place and haul the whole thing off for the stones, but other than that....... no.

Once again I stepped out to face that evil snow again. It stared back at me, mockingly.

I suspected that the walk back was going to be no picnic.

I wrote the above while sitting in the Comm room watching the weather channel.

So you can guess what kind of night I had.

I could have done that one from home over my email.

Ah, well.

For some odd reason, tomorrow being Xmas, is also National Pumpkin Pie day. Shouldn't that be on Thanksgiving instead? I'm so confused!

Now He Tells Me!

It was just one of those things. One of those situations that I hadn't had to deal with before (up to this point anyway) and didn't know what to do.

I had never been on the yard when count was so screwed up that we had to send all the workers back to the houses before. I knew that we had to do the inner perimeter (IP) check as soon as the yard was clear. I remembered hearing that one the radio before.

What I didn't know was that some body was supposed to immediately start doing the Del Norte check as soon as it happens.

And tonight, being Thursday night, was my turn. I didn't know I was supposed to go do it. I was concentrating on figuring out how count was screwed up. And we found the problem.

After we had counted three times.

Hey.....

But policy states that the Del Norte check has to be done when we go into an emergency count. And the Captain insisted, as was his right, that it be done.

So I trotted off as quick as I could to get started on it.

And about halfway through realized that the whole camp would be waiting for me to finish the check before they could clear count.

Oh.

Snap.

They really should have sent somebody younger.

I dog-trotted around the camp just as fast as my legs would go, hitting the zones and moving on. It's a good thing all that ice melted or I would have broken something.

Sgt Puddle says I got done with my check right about the time all of the houses called in their count. It was a close one.

By the time I made it back out to the yard they were about halfway done with dinner. At that point I wasn't moving as fast as I had been before. And I had to sit down on the cart for about fifteen minutes and rest.

I was pooped!

And all of that because of some idiot who didn't listen to directions when they told him where to stand for count. He was so caught up in talking to his buddies from a different house that he went to stand with them. What would normally be a twenty minute count took well over an hour.

I didn't feel sorry for him at all when they locked him up. The jerk.

At least somebody else did the evening Del Norte walk so I didn't have to do it twice in one evening. That would have sucked severely.

Anyway.

Tomorrow, aside from being Xmas Eve, is also national Egg Nog Day. Who would have imagined it? What is a nog, anyway?

Sometimes I Feel Guilty

When I came in today I heard lots and lots of radio chatter. Not any of that excited "Oh snap" chatter, just alot of the "Come here... call me... do this... do that...." type of stuff. Lots of it.

Then I heard that they had a couple of crazies down in the Hive. Stupid little Schmelvin tried one of his fake suicide attempts. Another one went off of the deep end. They had to put a movement team on him. And the Stork was playing the "unresponsive" game every chance he got.

And I'll have to admit I giggled a little. Not because they were having trouble, but because it wasn't my responsibility anymore and I was happy about it.

Then I felt guilty about being happy about that.

And the silliness continued on through the night. Nothing major. But a whole pantload of code 16's for "unresponsive" (the stork) and "chest pains" (Schmelvin).

Meanwhile, I drove around in the P-car for two hours and responded to only one zone alarm the whole time.

But I did see a fox out in the field outside the fence. That was cool.

So I still do feel a little guilty that I'm out of the Hive and doing very little work for the same money Sometimes I think I should be back down there helping out.

Then I get one of those twinges in my elbow and say "Naaaaaah....."

It's a young man's game. I'll let them take it.

According to the official list, tomorrow is Roots Day. I have absolutely no idea what that means. Are they talking about the old teevee miniseries or what?

Heck, that was depressing enough the first go 'round. I'm not going there again, thank you.