“Hey!” Bubba hollered.  “Let’s go to the titty bar!”

     Bud and John Fact and Spider were raring to go.  Spence demurred, explaining that this was his night to host the Gay Knitting Club at his dad’s Homo Hair Salon, or something equally suspect. I, being a lover of democracy (and large-breasted Texas women), sided with the majority.

     “Let’s hit it!”

     We jumped into the old F-250 and be-bopped on over to the Crystal Triangle, which is not exactly a place the Pope would visit on his way through the States, har-de-har-har.

     Electricians could get away with it, though.

     “You know,” Bubba drawled into his beer bottle, “I never met a dancin’ girl I didn’t like.”

     “Do tell,” I encouraged, swerving to miss a car stopped for a red light.

     John Fact was between us in the front seat.  Bud and Spider were in the back seat.  They were being awful quiet.

     I looked back to make sure Spider was okay.  He was.  He and Bud were just a little disconcerted by my driving.  Them and half the damn city of Dallas.

     I skidded around a stop sign and stuck it into low, giving that big dog 460 all she’d drink.  Just like skipping a rock.

     “Not that I trust ’em,” Bubba amended.

     We blew past a Dallas police car.

     Woooooooo-eeeeeeeee! went the siren.

     I kept on a-boogie-in’.  The siren faded.

     “Don’t get us killed, man!” Spider was all a-tremble.

     “Don’t kill my buzz, man!” I snapped back, “I’m trying to concentrate!”  I tossed my empty bottle (gee, it was full just a minute ago) at a flashing yellow school zone sign, nailing it right in the center.

     Score!

     The Crystal Triangle specialized in everything a self-respecting southern gent might get a hankering for.  Why, they had beer and whiskey, they had quarter pool tables, they had frozen pizzas they’d heat up in the microwave and sell to you for $7.50, and best of all, they had some of the most easy (to get along with) girls in town.

     “Hey, Angie!” Bubba yelled out as we entered the place.  That old coot, he knew all the dancers.

     Soon we were seated at a dark, humid table.

     “What can I do for y’all tonight?” Angie, our perky hostess, asked. 

     It was a loaded question.

     I gently depressed the trigger.  “Southern Comfort Black, no ice.”

     Everybody ordered up, and soon we were sloshing around in a murky sea of alcohol-bloated brain cells.  I’m reminded now of a tree surgeon buddy of mine who told me, “Best way to see life is through the bottom of a beer bottle.  Except you gotta watch out for people who want to smash that bottle right into your face!”

     Well, the onliest thing that got smashed that night was us.

     And the left front fender of my truck.

     I did okay driving Bud and Bubba and John Fact back to their respective vehicles, which were still parked at the job.  Spider didn’t have a car, though, so I got the happy chore of carting him to his house.  Yippee.

     Good old Spider lived in East Dallas, just off ye olde I-75.  His was the kind of neighborhood where you could buy a handjob from a dude in a dress, a prohibited firearm and a shot of heroin on the same street corner.  Not exactly cool city, if you get my drift.

     So there I was, wasted, blasting down some dirty narrow street in the middle of Gomorrah.  It wasn’t my fault I was drunk.  Bubba bought the drinks!

     Anyway, this swarthy cat that looked like a pus-filled refugee from a dying planet comes a-hobblin’ out into the middle of the road, dead ahead!

     I didn’t splatter the jerk.  Doing jail time is not my forte.  More importantly, I had just washed my truck.

     I spun the wheel hard to the left, slamming on the brakes (no ABS here, folks).  I skidded and slid and then skidded some more, and then crash!

     Pardon me, Mister Tree!

     Fuck.  I got out.  It was bad.  About five thousand dollars worth of bad, it looked to me, and this is from a man who knows his way around a damn body shop, now.

     “Fuck!” I raised my hands and hollered up to the sky.  “Fuuuuuck!”

     Spider didn’t help a bit.  “That was more fun than Six Flags!“

     I put my face right up to his.  Our noses were almost touching.

     “Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck!“

     That shut him up.

     A crowd was gathering.

     “Hey, man!  That’s my tree, man!” A midget Mexican-looking guy was waving his arms around in my face.  “That’s my tree, man!  Get you fuckin’ truck off my tree!  I’m gonna call the cops!  I’m gonna-“

     The magic word.

     I punched him in the mouth.  I have a good punch.  I took Punch-Throwing 101 at Conroe High for five years.

     Blood and teeth and all that groovy good shit start pumping out of his mouth.

     It was time to Split the Scene, Jelly Bean. When I relayed the ignominious encounter to Spence the next day, he produced a Colorado fat boy and lit up, choking before handing it to me. “I can’t believe you’re my fucking boss,” he wheezed.

2026 R.M. Reliable Electric