Will That Be Cash or 'Cuffs?

By Yvonne Blackwood

A hilarious story with a bizarre cast of characters that appear and disappear like Extraterrestrials, and their ingenious methods of stealing in a large supermarket chain, and the personal conflicts and challenges for those who work to keep the shelves stocked.

You'll laugh at one moment then empathize the next when you meet Mrs. Johnson, the little old lady who wants to be "soft and smooth"—and will stop at nothing to do so. Or Mrs. Euphima Clarke who is tall as she is wide with a voice to match. You'll meet Wilbert Wiley, a modern day Don Juan who is obsessed with every female he sees. They all come together in the supermarket--their neighbourhood meeting place.

Adding to the fun and interwoven within the fabric of the story is the coming of age of Bobby Blackwood, a six-foot-five college student who works part-time as a security guard to help pay his college expenses.

Here's a fun book that makes a great gift for those who'll think differently on their next shopping trip to a supermarket.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Yvonne Blackwood
• Release date: Jan 31, 2017
• ISBN: 9781370670949

Yvonne Blackwood

Yvonne Blackwood is an African-Canadian author of six books and award-winning short-story writer. She has published articles in several publications, written columns for newspapers, and enjoyed a rewarding career with the Royal Bank of Canada before retiring. Blackwood attended the University of Technology and earned a BA in English from York University. She is a Fellow of The Institute of Canadian Bankers and an alumnus of the Humber College School of Writers.

Book preview

OTHER BOOKS BY YVONNE BLACKWOOD

Into Africa: A Personal Journey

Into Africa: The Return

TEA WEBSITE

www.healthytealovers.com

BLOG WEBSITE

www.blackwoodyvonne.com

BOOK WEBSITE

yvonneblackwood.vpweb.ca/Books.html

SMASHWORDS

www.smashwords.com/books/view/173510

Blackwood has caught life and put it in a book. Although often amusing and charming, she does not overlook the melancholia inherent in the human situation.

~ Todd Holmes, Lawyer

Will That Be Cash Or ’Cuffs?

Yvonne Blackwood

White Knight Publications

Toronto, Canada

Copyright © 2005 by Yvonne Blackwood

All rights reserved. The use of any part of this publication reproduced, transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, or stored in a retrieval system, without the prior written consent of The Publisher – or, in the case of photocopying or other reprographic copying, a license from the Canadian Copyright Licensing Agency – is an infringement of the copyright law.

Published in 2005 by

White Knight Publications, a division of Bill Belfontaine Ltd.

Suite 103, One Benvenuto Place, Toronto Ontario Canada M4V 2L1

T. 416-925-6458 F. 416-925-4165 • e-mail [e-mail]

First printing: May 2005

National Library of Canada Cataloguing in Publication

Conscious women – conscious lives / Darlene Montgomery, editor. ISBN 0-9734186-1-3 (bk. 1).-ISBN 0-9736705-0-9 (bk. 2)

1. Self-help techniques. 2. Women.

I. Montgomery, Darlene, 1958-

BF632.C65 2004 158.1 C2004-900381-X

Cover Art: ©FirstLight Images

Cover and Text Design: Karen Petherick, Intuitive Design International Ltd.

E-book Formatting: Maureen Cutajar, www.gopublished.com

Edited by Penny Hozy

DEDICATED TO

This book is dedicated to my son Robert Blackwood.

I enjoyed our sessions together. You did a great job in sharing your stories; you were dramatic.

I wish you all the best for the future.

"Stolen sweets are always sweeter;

Stolen kisses much completer;

Stolen looks are nice in chapels;

Stolen, stolen be your apples."

~ Thomas Randolph

CONTENTS

Prologue

Tough Love

Holmes of Hogtown

How’s it going, Misses?

Hop-a-long Carlos

Grumpy Old Man

They call it Africa

I’ll Take You Out!

What the Hell, Bitch!

Cultures

Wheelchair Bandit

You Love Shrimps, Eh?

Nuts, Nuts & Paranoia

Angel

He, She, He

Can’t We Just Get Along?

Minty Fresh Breath

Lost Cell

Cash Or No Cash

Hotel Aristocrat

The Suspect

Inside Job

The Beat Goes On

About the Author

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

My heartfelt thanks to:

My dear friends, too numerous to list here; Many patrons of my first book, Into Africa, A Personal Journey, who have constantly inquired about when my next book would be published. You have kept me sharp and fresh and always looking for ideas; My son Robert for giving me the opportunity to articulate your experiences in this form; Deloris Wood and Fitzroy Wood, Leonie Tomlinson and Pat Armstrong for reading a few of the early chapters and providing valuable feed-back; Karen Petherick for your fabulous cover and book design; My publisher Bill Belfontaine – you were wonderful as usual. Finally, my cousin, Yvonne Komlenovich, for your burning interest. You are always my best critic.

PROLOGUE

Will That Be Cash or ’Cuffs?

People of all ages, races and creeds have done stealing for centuries. Under Islam’s penal law it is a major crime and a thief can have a hand cut off as a maximum punishment under certain circumstances. In Western culture a thief can receive anywhere from a slap on the wrist to several years in prison. In more recent times the term white-collar crime has been coined for corporate thefts where presidents, CEOs, and executives of corporations steal millions of dollars and receive little sentence if any at all. The recent Enron and Nortel scandals have brought these kinds of theft to the forefront.

A petty thief will steal candy from a convenience store or rob a gas station, netting two hundred dollars at the end of the ordeal. But no matter what the case may be, there seems to be something adventurous, almost romantic about stealing.

In the movie Trading Places, the Duke brothers set out to prove that a poor, homeless, black man from a broken home who steals under false pretenses, if given the right opportunity, could become a hard-working, honest member of society. They even proved that he could make them millions by teaching him about pork bellies. On the opposite side, they showed that a boy, born and raised in wealth, when stripped of his credit cards and all the other luxuries, would resort to stealing.

The movie Oceans Eleven tells the story of a well-planned, well executed heist of a casino, by a group of men. The Thomas Crown Affair showed a wealthy businessman who owned a large corporation, a private jet, and all the trimmings, plan, orchestrate and execute a major bank robbery. These are movies, but as we’ve seen so many times, art tends to imitate life versus life imitating art.

Authors and filmmakers usually focus on grand plans and schemes to steal large sums of money, art, or jewellery. But what about local, everyday, ordinary citizens? What about kids under twelve, teenagers, middle-class citizens, and little old ladies? Do they plan and scheme? What do they steal? How do they steal, and where does this seemingly uncontrollable desire to disobey one of the Ten Commandments come from? Is it a learned behaviour? Is it hereditary, or is it done out of necessity?

In a cable company’s recent commercial, a boy, about nine years old, entered a store and stole a chocolate bar. He was caught and a cop took him home. Later we see the perturbed father quizzing the boy. Did your friends put you up to this? No, the son replied. Then where on earth did you learn to steal? With his head held down, the boy replied, But Dad, you steal cable signals!

• • •

My twenty-four year old son, Robbie, still lives at home and, while attending college, worked part-time as a security guard. He’s a quiet fellow, not one for saying much, so when he’s in the mood to talk, I listen.

One evening he came home excited to share a few anecdotes with me about some of his working experiences. At the time, all I really wanted was to watch the television sitcom Frazier. Since this desire to talk is a rare occurrence, I clicked the mute button and listened. Soon he and I were cracking up and I began to ask questions. For several months, Robbie would return home yelling as he came through the door, Mom, I have a new one for you. We would sit in the family room and while I scribbled on my note pad and taped with a portable tape recorder, he would dramatize the incidences of the days. It was the most fun I had had with him since his early teens. I discovered that despite his usual serious demeanor, he could be quite funny.

As I began to put the pieces together, the book, Coffee, Tea or Me, flooded into my head. Remembering the 60s’ bestseller, I concluded that while my son’s stories weren’t about a glamorous industry, if written vividly from his perspective, the anecdotes would make a great book.

The stories told here are creative non-fiction based on incidences that by my son experienced, and while I had to paint a picture to bring the characters to life, the stories are true. The names and some places have been changed to protect the good, the bad and the funny. Step into an aisle and come shop with us!

TOUGH LOVE

Three years ago, I knew nothing about the shenanigans that go on behind the grocery counters of neighbourhood supermarkets. Now that I know, I realize there’s nothing more interesting and intriguing than real life. The things people say, the extremes they will go to in order to steal, and their bizarre behaviour continue to surprise, amuse and disgust me with their drama.

My foray into the grocery industry not only took me into the internal workings of the food business, it took me on an emotional roller coaster ride that pitched me backward, forward, and upside down. I didn’t know it before, but I’m now convinced that reality is stranger than fiction. Who would dare fabricate the stories and characters I’ve come across?

But it was a journey, and every journey has a beginning and an end. Mine has ended and a new expedition is about to begin. How did I arrive at this point? What has brought me to such a conclusion, and to this decision-making moment of my life? Looking back, the road was circuitous, but I remember clearly how it all started.

I’m six feet five, two hundred pounds and a hunk. Well, so I’ve heard a couple of chicks say behind my back. And what’s up with women always hitting on me – some young and some not so young? I wear my hair cut close to the scalp and most of the time I’m clean-shaven. When out and about I dress in baggy pants. Yes, sometimes they fall below the cheeks, the same way my peers wear them, so I wear boxers and basketball shorts underneath. The layers help to cover the gap. I complete my outfits with oversize sweats, some with hoods, and on my feet are clean, well-cared-for size fourteen Tims. In keeping with being cool in the 2000s, I strut my stuff wearing a seriously intimidating look. The screw-face is merely a façade. I’ve never been involved in a street fight nor do I plan to be in the future. It’s just the drill. I do smile occasionally – how could I not? Some things are just too damn funny, and I’ve been told a few times that I have a Colgate smile. Oh, by the way, I’m black.

I graduated from high school all right, but it was a struggle. I was never a bright student. You’d have to search my school reports with a microscope to find a B+. Truth be known, I had to repeat the second grade. Despite this, my mother and father had great hopes that I would go on to university, or at least college, immediately after high school. But our dreams never meshed. After graduation, I did a jump shot onto a slow boat to adult life and lost four years. I say lost four years because I can’t definitely account for my time during that period – it just flew.

It isn’t surprising, therefore, that my parents are not thrilled with my life. Mom reminds me constantly that, Your father and I left our beautiful Jamaica, a third-world country, to immigrate to Canada for a better life for us and our children. We don’t expect our son who is born and raised here to be less educated than we are and to earn less than we do. No siree, that was certainly not our intention. My response has always been, I’m not like you and Dad. I’m happy the way I am.

Now that I’ve touched down, I’m slowly plodding through the college I chose and the program I selected. But my parents still feel strongly that I forfeited the privilege of their paying my full tuition fees, and all the other college expenses, because of my four-year sojourn. I was told this in no uncertain terms, and whether for good or bad, it will remain indelibly in my head.

I live with Mom in Newham, a little town fifty kilometres north of downtown Toronto. The town was originally settled by Germans in the late 1700s, but to me, it looks like, a typical town in England. The main street is lined on both sides with quaint buildings, mainly two-stories, some with wrap-around verandahs. All are painted in pastel shades except one where some tacky person painted it a bright blue with a mural depicting a baker and his family baking bread the old-fashioned way. If the idea was to attract attention, the goal has been achieved because it stands out like a priest at a disco. Most of the windows in the buildings have small-paned glass and the eavestroughs and verandahs are trimmed with decorative mouldings that give the illusion of rich lace. Many of the buildings are designated historical and cannot be torn down, nor can the exterior be changed. In between all this preserved history a few modern buildings have crept in, but they’re not conspicuous enough to affect the English-style aura.

Our house is on a street among neat rows of houses a few blocks from Main Street. Mom loves it there. As she puts it, It’s away from the hustle and bustle but you’re still fairly close to everything. For me it’s okay, except getting around is a challenge. Since I don’t have my own wheels I rely on public transit. But Newham’s bus service before and after rush hour, and on weekends, the times that I need it most, sucks. It isn’t part of the big city system, which means I have to pay two fares to get downtown. Mom is generous, however, and lends me her car when I work the late shift, and weekends if she isn’t zipping around town.

One Saturday afternoon my mother was in the kitchen