Rick never was much of a drinker. I had problems getting him to finish a beer and was always forced to drink way more than my share of whatever was on hand. Even old cask-strength single-barrel didn't interest him much, no matter how I spun it.
In college, though, he did have roommates who partied hard on Friday evenings. Rick would join the party but retired early, only to get up at 6 am and run through the apartment in his underwear singing the theme song to
The Banana Splits at the top of his lungs.
TRA LA LA, TRA LA LA, LA
ONE BANANA, TWO BANANA, THREE BANANA, FOUR
ALL BANANAS MAKE A SPLIT, SO DO MANY MORE
TRA LA LA, TRA LA LA, LA
FOUR BANANA, THREE BANANA, TWO BANANA, ONE
ALL BANANAS PLAYING IN THE BRIGHT WARM SUN
FLIPPING LIKE A PANCAKE, POPPING LIKE A CORK
FLEAGLE BINGO DROOPER AND SNORK
TRA LA LA, TRA LA LA, LA
TRA LA LA, TRA LA LA, LA
TRA LA LA, TRA LA LA, LA
TRA LA LA, TRA LA LA, LA
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I was about 18 and Rick was about 23. We both figured that we needed a couple of single-speed bikes with rod brakes, the kind that were all over Mexico and used as utility bikes. We figured that all we had to do was go to San Diego, walk into Tijuana, wander around TJ asking "Donde esta a Mercado de Bicicleta", wave a few greenbacks around, and Bob's yer uncle.
And so, we did. And we didn't see nary a one of those bicycles that are everywhere in Mexico nor could we find a bicycle store. It was hot, and so were we, after a couple of hours of this nonsense. We decided to find a bar, have a couple of beers, and then head back home.
And so, we did. We found a quiet bar, a table, and asked the nice lady to bring us two beers. She came back with two beers and two ladies. We knew what to do with the beers and went about doing so, but the ladies were a problem. We didn't want to make a scene and definitely didn't want any Sweet Cream Ladies Forward Marching going on and tried to convey our appreciative disinterest. They were persistent so I just got another beer, kicked back in my chair on the two hind legs, and kept a smile on my face while shaking my head "no, no, gracias!"
One of them plaintively asked Rick "But why not, senor?" Not missing a beat, Rick pointed at me and lisped "Because he's my boyfriend." As the ladies' eyes got big and they gasped, I fell straight backward out of my chair. I glanced over at the barkeep and he had that steely look like Clint Eastwood gets and I could tell he was wondering if he should bring the shotgun out.
I wasn't sure what Rick's girlfriend would have said, but I knew mine wouldn't have thought too kindly of me being locked up in the Tijuana jail for being in the middle of a bar fight in the middle of the day in the middle of the week.
"We gotta go now, Rick. I kinda feel like sprinting to the border."
And so, we did.
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Rick came up to visit me when I was at school from time to time. The first time he drove up in his Fiat 850 Spyder. Pretty cool car, but it was, ya know, a Fiat. Nimble and slow.
I mentioned that the sports car club was putting on an autocross and had set up a course in the big Ag parking lot. Perhaps we should oughta go on down and take a look at it and maybe come back the next day to watch the autocrossers autocross.
Now, back then, folks figured other folks would use good sense and not go where they shouldn't oughta go, so there were no locks on anything or barricades and such like that. Then along came Rick and I and their hopes and dreams of people using good sense were dashed.
Rick got it in his head that he'd like to take the nimble but slow Fiat out on the course and see what it would do. OK, I was game, so we walked back to the car, jumped in, and trespassed. Well, not really in our minds, as it was a public parking lot at a State Polytechnic University, so in a sense it was our lot, right?
Rick pulled up near the starting line and flipped the Fiat around and ran the course in reverse. Made a pretty good time, too.
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We went out plinking one time in the foothills above the college. Rick had a brand-new VW Rabbit that he'd driven up. At one point in our misadventure, we decided that a spot at the bottom of a hill was better than the one we were at right at the top of the hill. Rick drove the Rabbit down that hill but it wasn't even a jeep trail, it was just sort of a dead grass kind of a hill.
After farting around for an hour or so we thought we ought to head back to town because, even though the Denny's didn't ever close, the sun would eventually go down so, yeah. We better head back.
It turned out that the Rabbit had an unnaturally tall gear in reverse and would not go up that hill. The hill was steep enough that we dared not try to turn around for fear of rolling the Rabbit. Rick started slipping the clutch and that sorta made it go up the hill in reverse, but the Michelin X's didn't have a lot of off-road grip and they mostly just spun. I, a former linebacker standing six-foot-two-eyes-of-blue and 220 pounds if I was wearing Levi's, a Levi jacket, had a pair of Dan Post on, with a Zippo and a pack of smokes pocketed, jumped up on the bumper and grabbed the back of the hood. And, just like that, we ran backward back up the hill.
The stench of burning clutch was awful and the car was filled with it for a couple of weeks. It was at this point that the mantra "Ya ain't stuck if ya doesn't have to go and git help" was born. We were destined to use that mantra quite a number of times in the forthcoming years, mostly with two-wheel drive things but most often with me at the wheel and Rick holding an entrenchment tool and eating dirt…
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For a few years, Rick and I would go out for Dove on the season opener. It bears mentioning that I'm a pretty fair hand with a rifle or a pistol, but I suck at shotgunning. Still, there was a measure of fun in being hot and sticky. And we learned that with a block of ice, some rock salt, and a JC Higgins cooler you can make beer slushies.
One year, late in the day, we were visited by a game warden by the name of Patti. Patti was petite and blonde. Patti was from the beach, where she reveled in the surf, sun, and sand. Unfortunately for her, duty had called her out to the desert because there was a shortage of warden personnel and a surplus of dove-shooting personnel. This was her first time doing dove duty and, she swore, her last. Patti was not happy because it was too damn hot, too damn humid, and too damn stupid.
She was a trooper, though, and determined to do her job. Rick had limited with 10 and I had a half dozen or so and was just trying to grab a couple more if I didn't run out of shells. Patti allowed as that was all good, but would we please present our doves to her inspection so she could say she did her damn stupid, hot, and sticky job?
Rick put his backpack on the tailgate and I put my vest on the tailgate and Patti went to work. Here's what ensued:
Patti: OK guys, I need you to verify my counts, so Butter Boy Who Can't Shoot, what's your count?
Me: Uh, I count six, ma'am.
Patti: You can't shoot, but you can count. OK, genius, your turn.
Rick: Uh, OK… eight, nine, ten…….uh, eleven.
Patti: I believe what you were trying to tell me earlier was that you went and picked up your buddy-who-can't-shoot's seventh and mistakenly put it in your bag, and you were just about to go home. Do I have that right?
Rick: Uh, yeah, yeah, soundsgoodthankyou, but we're going to stay until he gets a few more.
Patti: No, genius, you're going to put that there dove in his pile, pack up your stuff, and get off of my beat.
Rick: But, Patti…
Me: Rick, we gotta go now. We gotta go to Bob's Big Boy in Blythe and get some pie and coffee. Right now.
And that's what we did.
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Sometimes after dove shooting, we'd go home but sometimes we'd camp out a night and shoot at some more doves, or cans, the next day. One of the places we'd camp, before discovering better digs, was up on the bluffs above the fields and the river. Really, it was a bit of a dump with quite a few past treasures littering the place, but if you didn't look at that stuff it was pretty nice.
We had a younger guy with us; I think he'd recently graduated from high school. I think he worked as a trap boy at the Redlands club. Somehow the conversation had turned to 9mm pistols and the guy had adamantly held that 'you cain't hit nothing with a 9' and Rick had taken umbrage with that. His position was that even though the round was coming out of a short barrel and both the internal and external ballistics were horrid, a man-sized target shouldn't be taunting a shooter at 100 yards. Especially if he was shooing the renowned 9mm Parabellum.
The discussion came to a bit of a head at the dump. A fair distance into the dump was an old football helmet painted up like Captain America in
Easy Rider. Rick turned to me and asked if I could see Captain America and if I'd volunteer to shoot him. With the younger guy chuckling to himself, I said I would. I drew my 39, took a bit of aim, squeezed the trigger, and THWACK!, hit Captain America square on. Captain America went rolling down the hill. The guy had the most dumbfounded look on his face, while I holstered the 39, turned on my heel, and announced that dove tacos would be ready in 20.
Rick and I both knew that the shot had been pure dumb luck and that I wasn't going to stick around to talk about it or, heaven forbid, try to duplicate it so he kept on talking with his best snake oil salesman's pitch about how deadly and dangerous the 9mm is, even at great distances. And I think he reminded the young man of that shot for years to come, just to be a contrarian. That young man later became one hell of a pistol shooter and a firearms instructor…
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Later in life, Rick got to where he couldn't smell too good and he also got to liking cats. Cats are something I can't abide by ever since I ran over a bloated-up dead one while parking my truck. But he liked them.
We used to spend some time in the New Year out in the desert, camping, shooting, peeing on bushes, and acting like men. I usually got there a day or so early and got my camp set up at our usual site. Rick would arrive on his appointed day somewhere between 4 pm and 11:59 pm. On this occasion, he arrived early and got his truck unpacked, his tent up, his Coleman kit out, and the coolers stowed in the shade. Next up was to inflate his air mattress and spread his sleeping bag, then settle in with a cup of joe and tell lies.
Rick had at least three sleeping bags. He had two old REI down bags that were almost identical except for temperature rating. One was a summer bag and one was a winter bag. On a car-camping trip to Whitney Portal he mistakenly took the summer bag and damn near froze to death. After the trip, he went and bought what was affectionately referred to as Bertha. I don't know what brand it was, but it might have been a Slumberjack. It was as big as a 55-gallon drum in its stuff sack and took up an entire passenger seat. He'd normally bring it to the desert in January, but this time he brought the REI winter bag because it hadn't been used in a very long time.
He unpacked that thing and rolled it out and, as much as I don't like to use foul language in perpetual print, the smell of that thing would have knocked a buzzard off of a s h i t wagon. It seems his cat had found it and liked it as a place to pee. A lot. Rick couldn't smell it, but it was strong 20 feet away.
I was laughing so hard that tears were running down my cheeks and soon Rick was too. He got it stuffed into a trash bag and stowed it in the bed of the truck. You almost couldn't smell it unless you were close on and downwind of it.
Fortunately, we both carried truck blankets and he was plenty warm and comfortable for our stay.
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Rick had a thing about rattlesnakes. If they got in his way they were dead and then we had to eat them. They taste like chicken but don't clean them under warm water. They wiggle even when skinned and gutted. Rick could get them dead, gutted, skinned, floured, and into the frying pan fast enough to where they would wiggle in the pan.
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Normally Rick and I would ride together to go dove shooting and which truck we took depended on whose truck was either in good shape or needed some abuse. One year, though, we took AllGone and he drove his Doodge pick-em-up. The best thing about it was the clapped-out 318 and the closest thing to maintenance it had seen was when Earl Scheib painted it BSB.
It was on the way back that things got interesting. AllGone was driving, Rick was shotgun, and I was slobbering in the back. I was having a dream that I was getting my head banged against the window. When I woke up, I found that I was getting my head banged against the window. There was some awful thumping going on and I asked what the dealio was and why we were driving through a freshly turned field.
Rick replied that he thought a U-joint was going out. After some discussion, we reckoned that we ought to stop and have a look-see, as forward progress had slowed to a jogging pace. We tumbled out of the Doodge and crawled under it. Sure enough, it looked like a U-bolt on the U-joint had come U-ndone and there was only one nut on it, and it was loose. The bearing cap was not there.
We huddled up and Rick suggested we go on a scavenger hunt along I-10 to see what we could find. Rick came back with a hunk of garden hose and a beer can. I found some hemp twine and was wondering if I could light it. AllGone had some mangled lamp cord.
Rick reasoned that we could use the beer can and some garden hose to make a bearing, strip the insulation off of the lamp cord and wrap it around things good and tight, and then wind the hemp around everything for good measure. That was fine with me because I couldn't get the stuff lit anyway. We made the repair.
Off we went, driving on the shoulder of I-10 at about 15mph. Along came a CHP officer, to whom we explained our deed of derring-do. He was underwhelmed and unimpressed and instructed us to take the next exit and get the hell off of his highway. I think he just wanted us out of his jurisdiction in into the Riverside County sheriff's.
Allgone put new u-joints in the Doodge and we took it out again the following year. Too soon old, too late smart.
~finis~
