I can't believe what is happening there! My uncle and his family (wife and two daughters) lost their house (but thank goodness they are all unharmed). The death toll and water level keeps rising. One of the main pumps is expected to fail and the lake where the water is being pumped will just let the water back in until they can fix the broken levees.
Everyone I know who has ever been to New Orleans has told me that it is a place that I really need to visit. It is supposed to be (or "have been") one of the most unique places to see in the entire US. Roger Ebert fell in love with the city and said it is one of his favorite places in the entire world (he also said that if you want to drink yourself to death, that's the place to do it).
I really did want to go and party there and every damn year my uncle begged me to go visit my cousins. Now it looks like it is too late. I still can't believe that this has happened (or "is happening"). What is everyone going to do? I keep hearing that if they rebuild (80% is under 20 feet of water or more), something like this might just happen all over again down the line.
This is simply a nightmare.
-Caul
Yeah man. Isn't it mind boggling? Once more the arrogance of humanity gets sucker punched by Mother Nature.
I can't stop watching the news reports. And it makes me nervous. I live three blocks from the Sacramento River levee. This area used to flood every year, now held back by aging damns and aging levees.
Never say "It can't happen here"
Hey jrl remember the flood in winter where the levee broke, off the delta, that was too close to home.
This situation is dire, and even my family in tennesee experience flooding due to the storm. The only thing I know is that big momma is pissed.......
People get pissed.
Big momma just is....
lw
the "we can't beat em, join em" mentality runs rampant still. Notice once again the many pay for the mistakes of a few who have forgotten they belong to all.
I just read a story about a couple of local Iowans who couldn't believe the great airfare they found to New Orleans the other day. SO good they couldn't pass it up, making plans to see all of the sites. Dumb fooks flew in as tourists on saturday and less than 24 hours later became refugees at the superdome. We know this only because they were spotted by local family on cnn while waiting in the massive line to get into the refugee camp.
Now, that superdome is sounding like hell on earth.
lw
---- :shock: --- Sorry about those peeps flying into a disaster, but to my perverted dense of irony, I find that funny as hell :D I can just imagine at the reservation headquarters: There's Jimmy, poring intently over the latest satellite images... "Quick Joe, dump 200 seats for half price to Indonesia, Oh wait, hear's another one, a continental catastrophe... Dump all the remaining seats right now before it hits CNN :wink: --- (As Do King would say: Only in AmeriKKKa)------------- sal
Well, this proves once again that we are always an inch away from total chaos. It just keeps getting uglier.
My uncle's company is telling him that if he can get to Texas, they will offer him an immediate position there. His wife is dellusional to some extent and will not believe that their house can't be saved and wants to "wait it out" in her sister's ranch in Louisiana. He is begging her to go with him to Texas or to move in with my parents here in Los Angeles and wait till he can negotiate a possible transfer to a California office (which he says is very possible). My mother also is telling her to do the same, but she seems to be very insistent in her belief that the property is salvagable to some extent and that the sooner they can see it, the more they can do to save it. My uncle has told my mother that no matter what he MUST get to Texas asap with or without his wife and two daughters.
I heard there are still over 100,000 people (alive at least) trapped in the newly formed hell that was once a beautiful and historic city where (at least arguably) jazz originated. The rescue forces can only evacuate about 10,000 people at a time, and one rescue team had to cancel halfway through a shipment because SHOTS WERE FIRED on the helicopter by a random CIVILIAN... It is supposedly things along the lines of "reason, tolerance, and mental restraint" which human beings place as ideals which allow us to believe we are more than mere savages... You know what though? If I could get my hands on that dude, I would go apeshit on him; tear the fucker apart with my bare hands.
The looters piss me off too. Ransacking areas for food and supplies is bad enough. People that are looting valuables are absolutely disgusting. But now I heard that crowds of people rushed a Walmart to get to the firearms. God almighty that is pure insanity.
-caul
I read of cops who were allowing people ot loot a shoe store on Canal St as long as they were stealing shoes that fit them. Now, I'm curious as to how the ultimate decision was really made. Did the cops really check shoe size against those on the feets? Were allowances made for growing children? Some kids feet can grow pretty quickly. Did they get out the foot measuring devices for the close calls between personally taking advantage of circumstances surrounding a natural disaster in a material fashion vs. regular thievery?
lw
I personally don't see anything wrong with looting food, beverages, diapers or other essentials to survive...even alcohol when uncontaminated water is scarce
or how about the guys slogging through raw sewage with 27 inch TVs with no place to plug them in. Just the glee on the faces of the kids with six pairs of shoes around their necks.
What a piece of work is man...........
In a scene of utter chao such as must be in 'da Big Easy, I would agree with Diss that looting for necessary items to continue to live is morally OK... I'd also go so far as to suggest that guns-n-ammmo be grabbed for protection, as well as light and heating supplies... Don't forget a good shortwave radio as well................ Welcome to AmeriKKKa the Apocolyptic--------------- sal
I agree with Foamy:
http://www.illwillpress.com/kat.html (http://www.illwillpress.com/kat.html)
Also with Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour:
"The truth is, a terrible tragedy like this brings out the best in most people, brings out the worst in some people... We're trying to deal with looters as ruthlessly as we can get our hands on them."
It's reasonable to loot firearms for protection? The police have already been pleading with people to give any firearms and ammunition in their possesion to the authorities because they are insanely low and the situation is becoming more and more dangerous. I agree that shipping food and aid in is a slow process, but looting food supplies is misguided. More often then not, these efforts only serve to complicate the rescue strategies already in effect, as many of these people likely end up getting themselves injured, sick, or stranded as the situation grows more dire.
you may be right Caul, but if my kids are thirsty in a situation like that...I may just be leading the charge to 'liberate' some clean water from the local convenience store....hell its all just going to sit on the shelves anyway, or someone else will take it. I am a hunting enthusiast, gun owner and target shooter, so I may just take ammunition as well...no gang of looters is going to rape my old lady or take my stuff. My goal in a civil emergency or natural disaster would be to do what I can to help as many as I can, I will be the guy handing out Evian to the old ladies that I procured from wherever I got it, and God help anyone that I see victimizing needlessly or committing acts of senseless violence such as the rapes, murders, and outright savagery that seems to be occurring in New Orleans as the scene degenerates into some kind of 'free for all'.
i don` know what to say here,i wonder if this is going to get very,very bad. There`s a marker in situations that gets passed,an` is evident only in retrospect,if then. that`s because,in simplistic sense it takes so much time for enough whatever, to get in the pipline to help,make a difference,...X- amount of food,Y- amount of water,Z- number of police/medics to protect the helpless .I`m starting to wonder how many will end up dead in their attics. I wonder how far the deterioration of 'law' and ethics is going to proceed.
It may be too early yet,but I really don` know what i am seeing from Bush.Not much... Should the word"Iraq' be a better motivator for him then the word 'New Orleans"? With a lot of frenetic gestering and growling,indications of intent were- goin`- to -kick- your- ass- find- those- weapons-get- it -done -yesterday, from all his aids/ advisers /puppetmen. I jus don` see the big jump in w/ two feet in happening here,to provide relief and protection to these people. And it sounds like for all the world the U.S. has lost a city. My imagination?...or was it mabe jus` not a very important city., inhabitied by PPL. we don` care about(very poor black). Now,Those oil platforms/industry sounds significant,enough for worry.Bush has talked about that.
Of course he has flown over the devastation,mouthed things about it...
I hope the worst is happening now, and that the curve will start back up,because we all know now that it is bad there,and we all even knew in advance it was coming That`s all it should take for this country,....right?
You know,Bush is a trip.It`s Hard to call a man evil when it`s so apparrant it`s a form of perceptual blindness. At best it makes him uncomfortable, because he can`t get the milage he can(could) out of the war or soothe significantly his sinking standing.But, he does know it is 'important',and I`m sure he feels... something to do w/ compassionatte conservativism,that`s it...right? So, he has dumped the organizing an` cheerleading on Clinton an his Dad,two previous Presidents. Wouldn`t want his own attention bothered by the whole thing,now would he??Got that war already like a noose around his private parts,yanking him here and there. Kind of sad,really...He`ll probable get wise,somebody worth their salt will get in his ear.
For the sake of the people there,i sure hope so.
Because it could get very bad.
"like a noose around his private parts,yanking him here and there."
I would say thats been an accurate description of his behavior from day one of this administration.
Thought I would share this because it actually cheered me up some (I know I have been real doom 'n gloom about all this).
(//http://www.vanguardsquad.com/soulstrutish/vanzetti/Find-v-Loot.jpg)
Got a good chuckle out of me... :lol:
-caul who never got to visit the Big Izzy
whites find, blacks loot...its just totally mystifying to me why people are so intrinsically fucked up. Almost like insects in their hive mentality. I am directing this small tirade towards the media by the way, since words in a forum can be interpreted lots of ways. Thanks news sources for trying to define my reality for me, but I think I can take care of it from here, fuck off please.
And to Caulfield, been a long time, how have you been? I miss your wise stories in mIRC, may we type together again someday.
I dunno, I would be not hold it against anyone liberating some foodstuffs for survival. Survival of the stickyest fingerz.
Stealing tha plasma tv iz a mirror of Man's short-sightedness. Rather comical. Me thinkz a diet rich in plasma causez cavitiez.
I fear that east of tha Big Easy - tha deathz will be much higher(from tha initial surge).
The gubmint o-fficalie that said..."blah, blah, blah...hurricane kat-A-rina. Fuck all! He doesn't even know tha name of the bitch water twister.
And later on..."blah, blah, blah...we in Washington know what 90 d-gree weather iz like." I'll bet that if we could turn off all tha sweet air-conditioned air on "Tha Hill" - thingz would get done alot sooner in Tha Big Easy.
Liar, lyin' fuck-speak.
I 'member a coupla weekz before tha bitch water twister hit - tha newz vendor jockeyz wuz a sayin' that all tha fat catz in Washington had gone on "vacation" for tha summer due to tha heat.
Yet, tha clock-punchin' - liar, lyin', fuck-speaker, "...knowz about 90 d-gree weather iz like."
Thiz iz a cluster fuck.
And on many levelz.
I have to question tha rationale of building a port city...BELOW SEA LEVEL!
But, I also believe in turnin' them lemmonz inta a fine $30 a jug wine. Once all soulz iz evacuated(not tha alien spaceship method) - bust all tha leveez. Make tha Big Easy...The Big Easy Venice. Thatz rite. Tha canalz of New, New O'leanz. Hire tha outta worked inta paddlin' them g-gon-gondilere boatz thru them flooded skreetz.
Instead of, "o-soula me-o" quaftin' thru the canalz, it'll be, "An' she walked that walk - how, how, how - HEEEY-HEYAH!"
Me unfathomable sadness iz only overpowered by me hope that thiz iz tha begining of tha end. Tha thin thread of hope that I see iz that tha peepz awake frum they baby aslumberin' sleep and see tha doltz that "run" thiz cuntry are runnin' it alwrite...runnin' it rite inta tha chest deep waterz of revolution. Juss like our Constitution sez we can.
Juss like tha G...wantin' ta pump all that water outta of a billion dollar idear.
The Superdome. Tha place I furst caught tha Stonez. Tattoo You.
There can be no excuse that Uncle Jed would buy - that they are tryin' ta sell right now. Peepz droppin' like so many chattle.
I say fire tha whole friggin' bunch on tha Hill. What a bunch of cluster fuckerz. Thang iz, they are so good at it...that have been alayin' tha pipe ta us so long...we don't feel tha ass-burn until yearz later. And they have snuk away to retirement at HALF FRIGGIN' SALARY FOR LIFE!
Doez your job offer half friggin' salary for life?
At least Gulliani had tha ballz ta walk down tha rubbled skreetz of tha Big Apple while tha dust wuz still abillowin'.
I see no leaderz in tha Big Flooded Easy.
Not one.
Fear not o-misguided Left. Tha Democrookz just got handed electionz for tha next 20 yearz. Unless they put some total dolt-puppit on tha master'z kneez.
Lordz of tha fliez.
Tell uz more liez.
Tha chief fuck speaker forgot one simple caviat...it'z not tha heat - it'z tha humiditee.
Tha humiditee in Tha Big Flooded Easy iz about chest deep. Tha waterz are risin' on tha Hill. Depth...nose high. Little Napoleanz should be good at that - nostrilz in tha air.
Oh yeah, tell us another bedtimed storee...ya know, like the "single bullet theoree."
From tha water proofed bunker,
Fin
(edit - meant ta say, '...east of tha Big Easy.'
I just gotta ask, finbar, are you the same finbar from cryptozoology websites, and who loves ferrets?
I mish ya too denty. Jush got back from a bar ackshully. (but keep dat to yershelf) If'n jah warna know why'n I'm suh mad... Well s'like dis see... Dere was dis wun sity see. And everwun kept telling me of how nice it was, how I should see it, how yew-neeq it werz. And now, just like DAT, iz gun. No mure.
En evan if'n dey rebildit eventooly. It'sa not gonna be da same meat-a-ball.
Iz 2AM heer. Bettah gessum slip.
I still canna beleave dat a whole damm sity be warshed avay.
Quote from: "dissident"I just gotta ask, finbar, are you the same finbar from cryptozoology websites, and who loves ferrets?
Aaarru?
I don't get it. Someone axed me tha same thang at tha defunked SPF.
No, I do not post on no cryptozoology websitez. Please post a link fer me gigglez(or PM).
Me have posted on other sites about axin' fer recipeez fer Bigfeetz stew an' such.
I gotz a steamer trunk fulla Bigfeetz meatz rite now. Anybodee gotz a good recipee?
Oh yeah, anybodee knowz iff'n h'itz legal to shootz a Bigfeetz?
Ebery time I goez down ta tha harwarez store and ax about a liscence fer ahuntin' Bigfeetz - they just laff an' laff at Fin.
Well, I'm tha one that gotz a steamer trunk fulla Bigfeetz meatz.
Tha one that fellz that Bigfeetz beef-critter last, laffz last.
No, I don't like no ferretz. Too many small bonez. An' they tastez like chickun.
I fear this batch of Bigfeetz iz about ta turn. I felled him last Tuezday.
Gotz ta run...gotta go see iff'n they gotz them new liscencez in yet.
Fin
LOL I grew up in a pet shop. The only animals who have managed to terrorize me to any extent was a pair of kinkajoos when I was 10 and a frigging ferret of my dad's when I was an adult. I stepped out of his shower my first day visiting and that ferret was waiting at the bathroom door. He jumped onot my foot and proceeded to bite the fuck out of my toe, dwawing a steadily pumping stream of blood. I let out a roar and flung the little cretin across the room with a kicking motion. His forward motion was halted by the wall. Then the damnable satan spawn shook its head and scrambled back across the room for round two..... I kickballed him in the head as he dove for an exposed ankle, just wanting enough time to collect my wits. In the end, I'm guessing my dad stepped in before survival became an issue.
I still like the little critters. I'm just not as surprised when even the most tame decide to take a little nip-o-lw..
lw
Ha ha , reminds me of beastmaster.
DAR is god.
I was on a tour with a keyboard player that loved ferrets and as soon as we hit Idaho, where they are legal, he bought first one then another.
Smart dude, we had 5 guys and would get three rooms, who wanted to room with two ferrets and a drunk? Hence he had a his own room and we bunked.
Nasty beasts. We get to Idaho Falls, we all lived in a band house. So we got to know the ferrets up close and personal. They CAN draw blood, stink to high heaven and Art would just let them run loose in the house. Stole my shoe one time and had to search the place to find it.
We were leaving our hotel in Redding CA and we ran into this bass player we knew, a black dude from Philly. He said "why you got giant rats in a box?"
http://www.cryptozoology.com/ (http://www.cryptozoology.com/)
The doppelganger finbar left that site a while ago though.
QuoteWe were leaving our hotel in Redding CA and we ran into this bass player we knew, a black dude from Philly. He said "why you got giant rats in a box?"
Animal Stories I
First girl I dated in high school was named Rae: we were both 13. She was adopted, "orphaned" from a South American native people, shopped around for barren white people in the 1950s. White infants are always hard to come by.
Her adoptive father had died several years before I met Rae. Her mother was a gin skeleton, all sucked up dry to the bone by gin and twists of lime: pale, stick-thin and fading; her daughter was dark, darting, fine-boned as a sparrow. They bounced around their little 2 bedroom ranch like black and white doves. I was in love with an exotic woman; I couldn't believe my luck.
I only visited her house twice. The first time, I had dinner with Rae and her mother. The food was like cardboard; Rae was radiant.
I had noticed a slightly acrid odor all evening, and when we moved to the TV room, I found out why. Behind the bi-fold doors lurked the two biggest, most trapeze-muscled, unfixed Siamese tomcats I've ever met. They turned in unison when I walked throught the door, and they hackled and hissed like choreographed demons.
It went downhill from there. At one point, I sat in an easy chair, one cat on the lamp table to my right, the other on the left chair arm, both glaring at me, like, "We know what you're thinking--we are the Guardians of the princess--touch her and die." Periodically, one of them would hiss or snarl.
Rae and her mother were vastly amused; my first shadow on Venus.
A week later we went to the matinee at the Circle Theater..."How the West Was Won," maybe, or "Dr. Zhivago." We went out for hot dogs, fries and shakes. I squirted ketchup all over my shirt. I was excruciatingly awkward.
A week later, I was again invited to her home. We ate something tasteless in near silence and then went to the TV room. Rae's mother left us alone.
"Well, the thing is, you're a messy eater and my cats don't like you."
Then she got up, opened the door, and let the cats in. They trotted over to my chair and leapt into position. Rae, her mother, and the cats sat with me till my ride came.
I have often thought of Rae since that day, and I have often wondered how things would've worked out without those cats, each time wondering how things might've worked out if we met at that particular time I was remembering her instead of when we did... When she invited me over the first time, she told me she liked me because I was quiet and kind. In another year, I would've been more coordinated...
Funny, what little bumps in the road turn the wheel this way and that, the early turns especially making so much difference, closing off these roads, opening those. I hope Rae is happy, and I hope those cats are burning in hell.
EDIT: Stay tuned for "space kills a ferret!"
Diss,
I checked tha site. Thanx. That wuz not the real Finbarâ,,¢. I don't post on no sitez about makin' friendz with no beef-critter Bigfeetz. They h'ain't no petz - they'z meatz.
I once knewed a fellar in tha village that tried to make a pet outta baby Bigfeetz. Yup, sure enough, they'z cute az a bikini stripper when they'z young and cuddly-like.
Well, Leige luved that walkin' hair carpet until tha day he died. That iz, until tha day that 800 poundz of missing link hit pubertee. There iz no limitz ta whut a horny nine feetz critter will do ta get ta them matin' groundz.
See, ol' Leige kept tha beast chained to tha still. He figured it wuz one of them, "two birdz with one stone" type dealz. Leige getz a pet none have ever had before, and protection for hiz still from tha McCoyz in tha next holler.
Tha night Leige last fired tha still and wuz a'waitin' for sum squeezin's ta drip-drop out...tha monster went - literaly apey-shit wild.
When he yanked tha chain frum tha radiator/condenser - them squeezin's hit that flame and Leige went all crispy critter on us.
Iff'n ya'll ever seed a Bigfeetz with a singed and scarred ass...give us a ring. They iz a few fellarz and kinfolkz that pray a word with they long lost pet. Not ta mention h'it'z tha BigFeetz Festivall in our mountain village next month.
Most in tha village have been crippled by theze dangerouz...and quite tastee critterz.
Up on tha hill, we iz baffled that tha lowlanderz alwayz think Bigfeetz critterz and them space alienz iz alwayz agonna be all friendly like.
I am still not up ta aspeakin' about them intergalactic reprobatez.
Fin
Quote from: "dissident"whites find, blacks loot...its just totally mystifying to me why people are so intrinsically fucked up.
Such language games are common from all areas of the politiical rainbow. For example, this headline comes from Today's Salon:
QuoteRight-wingers point to blacks looting and see a Hobbesian war of all against all. Liberals see a failure of civilization to help the poorest among us.
Note that it's not "right-winger vs. left-wingers," or "liberals vs. conservative." Salon (a good ezine but with a distinct bias) uses a perjorative term for the right side, a neutral term for the left.
Shame shit, different day. See Orwell for discussion.
space: I'm eagerly awaiting that next installment, bro.
lw
I bet the terrorist types have big ole hard ons watching our obvious arrogant unpreparedness.
ya,there has been some noise that way...Private Katrina,Allah`s blessing,a bit of that.
What would one expect,but they got their own ingrained problems. Such is the nature of bigoted religion of all faiths,that they covet 'God'as a weapon of violence. To me,that is a very plain indication of of how narrow and sick a society , that they either come from,or would like to impose...Something rather fasciastic in tone.
Our way,or the 'worst' will occur.
God said.
To tell you about the ferret, first I have to talk about the rats.
Way, Way back:
I grew up on a flood plain. Our rats weren't just a species, they were a whole effin' phylum. It changed your life to see one of these guys trotting across the road, glaring red-eyed up at you as you drove home from the drive-in (cheap entertainment for a family of six kids). There was the city dump rat clan and the stockyard rat clan, both too big and kinda lumpy in a disturbing way from what they ate, I guess; the creek bank rat clan (smaller, more decent sort of rat); and the sewer rat clan centered down at the sewage plant, who took shit from everybody and nobody, rats with serious attitude... We lived near all those places, so our neighborhood was sorta the crossroad of rat life. Babies got bitten in their cribs at night (and worse); if old people died alone, there wasn't much left by the time they were found. A boy came of age in that place by hunting rats, not deer: slingshots first, pellet guns, .22s. Poison had stopped working many rat generations before, and traps were a joke. They chewed right through wood-frame houses; cats didn't mess with those rats: your best bet to keep 'em away from the house was a good rattin' dog (Dino was top-notch), who would grab 'em by the neck and shake until it snapped. When cornered, they had a disconcerting habit of running right up your leg. We all hated the rats, yet at the same time had a grudging respect for them, 'cause they were a lot like us. Still, you had to stand your ground, or they would take over.
Way Back:
In the early 1970s, after my combat engineer battalion rotated home from far, far eastern asia, I wound up assigned to the United Nations Command in Seoul. This was considered excellent duty, as by then the city was booming, with nearly 10 million people, a rampant consumerist society, a magnificently in-our-favor currency differential, and those three things most wanted in a colonial outpost: good cheap food and booze, young girls, and a thriving black market. Less than a generation before, the city had been leveled by the Korean War; many people in those war days survived by eating rats. So the Seoul rats were the equal of any: in addition to their general down-and-out toughness, they had been winnowed by artillery bombardment and hordes of starving humans hunting their stringy asses for bare survival.
I moved into an apartment near the post, alongside the river. Both the ground floor and my second floor apartment were built into the hillside. Spacious, great view, central steam heat...and infested with rats. The day I moved in, we got everything settled, ate Chinese carryout (yup, it's everywhere), and hit the sack. I woke up in the morning to a furious thrashing and squealing from the kitchen: two rats were in the sink fighting over the empty carryout cartons. Big, plump, sleek brown rats: they ignored me at first, and when I tossed something at them they leapt from the sink, ran right at me, feinted left and then ducked right down one of the holes cut in the floor for radiator piping.
Well, I knew rats so I knew better than to waste my time with poison bait and traps. I got a big box of coarse steel wool, some powdered lye, a bunch of empty tin cans and some nails. I stuffed every access point I could find (heat pipes, plumbing pipes, holes chewed through the walls) with steel wool dusted liberally with the lye, then flattened out the tin cans to nail down over the holes. It took a while--for a few weeks I still tiptoed around the place, and made lots of noise before I came in or got out of bed so they would have time to clear out. I went down to the river and collected a bucket full of nice round river stones, not quite baseball sized, to keep by the sofa, so I could peg 'em at the rats that would run along the baseboards then snigger at me from under the TV. Eventually, though, I sealed 'em all out: you could hear 'em squealing when they tried to chew their way back in and hit that lye--powerful deterrent to a gnawing rat. The landlord lived downstairs, and he pounded on my door one night, furious, because his apartment was full of rats: they couldn't get in my place, so they chewed their way into his.
Back When:
Jimmie and I grew up together on that flood plain. When I came back from Asia, he was still living in the old neighborhood in a grand, shambling old Victorian. I came to get reacquainted, and we sat up late burning down a few. I asked him if he didn't have trouble with rats in the old place, and he answered, "Yeah, at first, but then I got Jack, and he keeps 'em cleared out pretty good." I looked around again, as I had when I came in, 'cause Jimmie always had pets, usually multiple dogs and cats, but I didn't see anybody. "Yeah, Jack's shy," he said, "but you'll see him tomorrow when he's lookin' to eat."
Jimmie headed off to bed, and I streched out on the couch, watching late-nite TV, still a real treat after being in Asia so long. I drifted off to the white noise of monster movies and the gurgling rock garden Jimmie kept on the coffee table.
In the wee hours, something squealed. I came to instant combat alertness. I glanced over at the TV and by that gray, off-air static light I saw something slinky and brown glide under the TV. My hand found one of the water fountain rocks on the coffee table, right where I used to keep my bucket of 'em in Seoul. I sat up slowly, cocked my arm back, and gave a little whistling hiss like I had learned to do to make 'em sit up and turn: I saw a pair of beady eyes and bared teeth, and I let fly. My aim was true. Thinking Jack didn't have as good a handle on the rats as Jimmie thought, I drifted back to sleep.
Well, you know by now. By the cold light of morning I saw that dead critter under the TV was no kinda rat I'd ever seen before--I had never heard of keeping ferrets up to that point, and only learned about them as pets when I stood up with Jack dangling from my hand, and Jimmie walked in, dropped his coffee and screamed, "Jack! Oh man, you killed Jack! You killed my ferret, asshole!"
I told Jimmie--also an Asian vet--that he knew better than to put a man to bed in a room with an unknown animal species, and that the damned thing looked too much like a rat to live with people, anyway, was he turning on his own kind? He allowed as how I had a point about the unknown animal in the night thing. That day we buried Jack with full honors and drank ourselves into oblivion at the arbitrariness of it all--we were all victims and victimizers, none of us pure or whole--and eventually Jimmie forgave me. He never got another ferret, though, and he put the Japanese stone fountain away whenever I came to visit.
So that's how Uncle Spacey killed Jack the ferret. I'm glad we never got properly introduced, or I'd've felt a lot worse about it.
Great story, spacey. And one hell of a shot to boot. I could see owning a ferret under similar conditions. But then its more of a symbiotic relationship.(The way it should be, imo.)
My cousin owned a ferret for awhile, too. At least it didn't bite too hard. Damn thing managed to get away a couple of times, but his black mutt always managed to sniff out its trail. Never failed.
To be completely honest, rats are the only animals under the sun that have given me the heebe-jeebes since I was little. I must confess that I refused to take care of my bosses rat collection at the pet shop. (He had a passle in round cages in the basement of the shop.) They creeped me out. And I've owned snakes, alligators, gerbils, hamsters, etc.
lw
:!: :D ----- Fine fine tale----- Really excellent Sir Space:-- Mucho Thanks-------- sal
Yeah yah know, my dad, whom I've always thought of as a stand up guy once told me he had an old irrational fear of rats which I often thought was the oddest thing because I've never seen fear in him. How growing up in garden city idaho as a kid, his parents owned a grocery store called the penn market (short for pennsalvania, where my great grandfather immigrated to from poland) and how he used to have to stand guard over the root cellar with random instruments of effectiveness, killing rats after the stores..... and it just terrified him.
Good story spacey.
There isn't much that REALLY scares me, either. I have no explaination for the rat-phobia. Nor have I ever admitted this to anyone before mentioning to it earlier at the old spf.
One explaination might be the fact that the first dead animal I ever came across was a rat in a field when I was 3 or 4 years old. (I can still remember that walk with my dad.) But it didn't realluy seem to bother me at the time. I remember being terrified at the thought of watching Willard or was Ben the first rat movie? That shite hella scared me. The only other viable explaination I can come up is that it was a past life issue.....
lw