We return now to our current diversion, The Jefferson Hillbillies.
You remember them, yes? The family of lanky-framed, cranial-ridged miscreants that moved in just four houses down?
They’ve combined long-distance running with the five-fingered discount.
They’ve offered to relieve me of any spare change, which apparently is now in the five-dollar range. Unless you don't have five? Because three would work, too.
They’ve shown us how to break eggs and still not make an omelet.
Today’s installment?
The Hillbillies Turn to Entrepreneur – Entrepra – Entrepreunuri – Owning Their Own Business!
When last we saw Boris, the Number One Son of a family of square-headed, pop-eyed sons, he was enjoying his role as Neighborhood Vandal from the hood of a neighbor’s car.
Boris, Boris, Boris. How will I miss you if you won’t go away?
The next time I saw him, a week later, I was approaching the little gas station/purveyors of deep-fried foods and horribly over-priced “convenience” items at the end of our block. And while it is convenient to be able to buy, say, a burrito, at 11:00 at night within walking distance, I don’t recommend it. On top of said burrito often being, shall we say, past its prime, the smell is such that it will make its home in your pores and cause passersby to sniff the air nervously when you go by.
So I was about to go into our little store for a burrito – no! wait! Fresca – when who do I come across but Boris.
“Psst.” Boris appears to be leaking air from the side of his mouth.
“Me?”
“You wanna buy some green?” Boris’s pop-eyes scan the parking lot, spin clockwise, then counter clockwise, and finally settle on my chest.
I frown. “Some what?”
He sneers and goes back to scrutinizing the parking lot. “Yeah.” He grins, an unpleasant expression, and suddenly I can see what he will look like as a much older man. “You wouldn’t, would ya?”
It hits me, what he’s selling. “Green”? Is that what we’re calling it these days? I don’t know what bothers me more, the fact that he’s selling pot in front of my little neighborhood store or that he thinks I don’t know what he’s talking about.
Kids.
I push past him.
“What he doing, that boy?” The clerk is speaking to me, staring out the glass door at Boris.
“He’s selling pot.”
The clerk laughs, a mirthless bark, and says something under his breath in a language for which I have no reference point. He reaches into his pocket, opens his cell phone.
“I call my cousin. He is detective. Police. I am seek of that boy.”
And me? I’m getting sick of that boy, too.