Running with My Pants Down

By JIM CUBA

Running with my pants down is a perfect metaphor for the life of one Logan Hunter. Emotionally scarred by the faith forced on him by the traditions of his wildly dysfunctional Catholic-centric family, Logan sets out to blaze his own trail. After a young marriage that everyone knew was doomed to failure, he moves on at a breakneck pace to drink in all that life has to offer, literally and figuratively.

His life becomes ruled by the three Bs: business, bed-hopping, and booze.

Somewhere along the way, he meets Misty, the sex kitten; Kat, the young, unpredictable one; Liz, the cougar with a voracious appetite for younger men; Champagne Washington, the sultry nightclub singer; Connie and Amanda, the gorgeous, sophisticated, and carnally experimental women who give him a night hell never forget; The Wild ThingsDelta Sue, Kitten, and Lola; and the always-intoxicating Spanish beauty, Carmen. Could there be more?

In an ironic twist of fate, Logans best friend, Eddie, starts down an unexpected, life-altering path that begins to mirror Logans. Neither could predict just how a couple of chance meetings would change the game for each of them.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Aug 12, 2011
• ISBN: 9781462021741

JIM CUBA

First-time author Jim Cuba is an honors graduate of Washington University in St. Louis, the city of his birth and where he has lived most of his life. He and his wife, Donna, live in West Palm Beach, Florida, with their two dogs.

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Contents

Dedication

Acknowledgements

In Memorium

A wake-up call

Please allow me to

introduce myself

The family that plays together…

The name game

Brotherly love

Do you believe in miracles?

God, help me

Pit stop

The lure and manure of corporate America

Somewhere over the rainbow

I had a dream

It just seemed right at the time

Play Misty for me

Cinco… oh, my, oh

The morning after the night before

’Til death do us part?

Now I get it

Road trip

Doing the bunny hop

Oy vey

Beware of snakes

Kat scratch fever

Still itching from the scratch

Monday, Monday

KAT NIP

Good evening, officer

I will never, ever drink again

Game, set, match

That’s my boy

Once a snake…

Journey to the dark side

Turn your head and cough

Sorry, I don’t speak Spanish

A four letter word

The return of the snake

A blast from the past

Welcome to the dating game

Kickin’ it Old School

Back in the saddle again

You’ve got mail

Let’s get this party started

Party time… Act II

It’s crazy

Twists and turns

Sodom and Gomorrah

Oh, not again

Three’s Company

You did WHAT?

I told you so

Surprise!

A taste of the bubbly

The best laid plans…

Here I go again

Wimps and wussies

Struck by lightning

A promise is a promise

Promise II… the sequel

Dicker shock

A bitter pill to swallow

You are cordially invited

The big first step

Hot sake

Light those candles

Coming full circle

About The Author

Dedication

To Donna, for your omnipresent love, expressed in ways I could never have imagined.

Acknowledgements

Gail Edmunds, for your many years of friendship and the inspiration to take this journey.

Linda Murphy, Cara East and Chris Rasmussen for your time and much appreciated critical analysis of my work.

Charles White, for bringing my hard drive back from the dead and restoring my sanity.

Karen Garcia, for your kindness, thoughtfulness and professionalism. I could not have completed this project without your help.

Ferd Frank of Ferdworks.com, for your creative genius in crafting my cover.

Reuben and Maureen Reid; for your insightful contributions and very special bond of friendship.

The fantastic members of the iUniverse team for your patient hand-holding during the many phases of the publishing process.

In Memorium

Nobbie and Brother Paul, who both left the party way too soon.

1

A wake-up call

I jerked. My eyes flew open. It was one of those moments… you know… you’ve probably been there at times yourself. Disoriented, like when you’ve dozed off on a flight or in the waiting room of a dentist’s office and then are awakened with a lurch. Where am I? I’ve had it happen on my own sofa at home, lulled to sleep on a Saturday afternoon by some inane program like a soccer match on T.V. and then… BOOM. I snap awake and for a brief time I have no idea where I am or how I got there.

This time it’s even more disorienting. I’m in a bed… it’s not mine. In and of itself, that’s not an unusual occurrence for me at this stage of my life. I’m lying on the right side of the bed, under the covers, resting on my right hip and shoulder, legs outstretched. I’m staring past a decent looking nightstand at a blank wall a few feet away. Still no clue.

There is someone or something in bed with me… behind me… resting against my body. Slowly… ever so slowly, I scoot farther to my right, perilously close to the edge of the bed and then I quietly rotate to my left one hundred-eighty degrees, like a six foot-two inch, one hundred-ninety pound, blue-eyed, curly-haired, highly confused rolling pin. The anticipation of what I was about to discover is mind-bending.

Wow, it’s a woman and three positive things immediately race through my mind: she’s great looking, she’s not underage and she appears to be breathing. I quietly lift the covers and peer underneath. Holy areola; we’re both naked and she has one kick-ass body. No tan lines. Tattoo-free. Wash board abs. Nice belly ring. I just hope when she bought those gargantuan, yet very nicely done boobs, she didn’t have to pay by the pound. But hey, good for me, I guess. I wonder who originally coined the term Fun Bags. A word-smith, to be sure… worthy of a Pulitzer Prize for… word-smithing. But I digress.

I lowered the covers and scanned the room for clues. Hotel room… nice… tastefully decorated, no indication of what brand. Shafts of morning light streaked through the partially closed drapes piercing the darkness of the room. She stirs but settles quickly back into a restful sleep, making noises through her mouth and nose that resembled the snort of a wild boar. Hmmm, reality suddenly supplanting fantasy.

Clothing is scattered all about the room: skinny jeans, high-heeled sandals, a cropped-off tank top. No wonder I ended up here; but when and how?

A bottle that once held a vintage Pinot Noir is on its side, one used glass on the nightstand, another on the floor. I quietly slipped out of bed and moved about the room. A purse is haphazardly dumped onto a small desk in the corner. I crept toward it. There’s a room service receipt on the desk for the wine… seventy-five dollars. Big spender.

A women’s wallet is hanging half-way out of the purse and I quietly extract it. I undo the snap closure and flip it open. Staring back at me, one above the other, are two I.D.s. with particularly unflattering photos of the same person; the girl in the bed. One is a Texas driver’s license with the name Delta Sue Johnson, twenty-eight, Dallas address, five-eight, blonde / blue, 129 pounds. I had to wonder what she’d weigh without the magnanimous boob job. Well I guess she had a tradition to uphold; you know… everything’s bigger in Texas.

The other is a United Airlines employee I.D., . . . flight attendant. I snap the wallet closed and replace it. Some answers, still many more questions.

My head doesn’t hurt very much so nobody slipped me a Rufie. The last thing I clearly remember is meeting a friend at the Cardinals game, and afterward heading to The Broadway Oyster Bar for some mussels steamed in garlic and white wine. By the way, I also remembered almost getting into it with a couple of loud, obnoxious, piss-stained pecker heads whose breath smelled like a combination of roasted peanuts, stale beer and pot. Oh, and the Cards beat the Cubs three-zip on a one-hitter thrown by some six foot-seven Arkansas plowboy just up from Triple-A. But, once again, I digress.

I remember having three or four beers at the game and several scotches at the bar… wait a minute. I sort of remember talking to a couple of ladies at the bar. Yeah, my friend and I sent them a drink and they joined us. The rest is pretty foggy. This is certainly not my first rodeo, but… will I ever frickin’ learn? My recent track record says no-can-do… more like, yes-can-do-but-never-will-do.

I walked into the bathroom to take a whiz. Oh sweet mother of God, there’s a pair of women’s lacey pink thong underwear wrapped around my head. I didn’t even feel it up there. Turning on the cold water to a slow, quiet trickle, I splashed some on my face. It felt really good but I still had no clearer recollection of the details of this escapade. I breathed into my hand. Whoa; my breath could knock a buzzard off a shit wagon. Mussels in garlic and wine, beer and scotch, more wine in the room. Oh, and I almost forgot about the hot dog at the game, loaded to the gills with onions, mustard, relish and sour kraut. Mystery solved. My mouth tasted like I just ate the ass-end out of a skunk, but why no cranium-thumping hangover? I guess I’m just getting used to playing hurt. It’s the rule rather than the exception these days.

Returning to the bedroom, I checked my former bedmate; still out like a light. Quietly, I began collecting my clothes and sliding into them. My underwear was on the lamp shade, one sock was under the bed, the other hanging from the ceiling fan. My jeans were crumpled on the chair in the corner, wallet and change strewn on the floor below them. My shirt was perched on the corner of the flat screen T.V. Opening the desk drawer, I found some letterhead and a pen. Marriott Pavilion Hotel… decent place… another part of the puzzle solved.

I snatched a piece of the paper and scribbled a note:

Dear Delta Sue,

Thanks for a great night; you were magnificent. I’m leaving my business card for you. Whenever you pass this way again, I’d really like to see you. Hopefully, next time we’ll actually be able to have a real, official, grown-up date.

I have an early appointment and didn’t want to disturb your sleep. By the way, it’s cute the way little bubbles come out of your nose when you snore.

Be safe in you journeys. Call when you can.

Logan

That ought to do it. I wrestled one of my business cards out of my wallet and added it to the note, propping them up against the purse. Then, I checked the room for any other of my personal possessions; none in sight. My exit was like a cat burglar.

Now what? I have absolutely no idea where I left my car.

Rummaging through my pockets I found a restaurant receipt for a hundred and sixty-six dollars. That must have been some big-ass bowl of mussels or else I bought the entire bar a round of drinks. No cell phone. I hope I didn’t leave it in her room. Shit. Hold on… what’s this? . . . a valet claim check. Apparently I’d valet parked my car somewhere at one-thirty-six this morning. You sure couldn’t prove it by me.

I hustled down to the lobby and headed toward the registration desk, looking for someone who might be able to help. A bellman looked at the ticket and acknowledged it belonged to the Marriott. He summoned a valet guy who went after my car. Man, this could have really been ugly. I was still clueless about how I got here.

Returning with my car, he laid three things on me: my cell phone; that he claimed was on the driver’s side floor, a bra; claiming it was hanging from the rear view mirror and he thought it best to remove it, lest I be embarrassed. Wow, I didn’t even know Victoria’s Secret made an E cup. It had so many hooks it could have stumped Houdini… maybe even turned him gay. The other thing he gave me was an overnight parking tab that resembled the National Debt. Hotels are such goddamn a rip-off.

The valet kid was an arrogant prick. I paid the tab, cut his tip in half, and let him keep the bra as a souvenir. He can make up his own stories. Hell, if things get bad, he could always live in one cup and rent out the other.

I started to climb aboard my Range Rover and then stopped. It’s not often I get a chance to be downtown in the early hours of the day. Hell, often? I can’t remember ever doing it. I let my senses take in the sights, the sounds and the smells. It was quite astounding, really, and not necessarily all in a good way. As if by the pull of a magnetic field, my collective senses drew my gaze to the east. A St. Louis morning and everything it has to offer… Everything.

2

Please allow me to

introduce myself

The sunrise formed the perfect backdrop for the Gateway to the West. The magnificent Jefferson National Expansion Memorial, better known as the Gateway Arch, glistened in the morning light; a monument to the Louisiana Purchase and a symbol of St. Louis being the gateway to Western expansion. This is an architectural masterpiece of a design that engineers said could never be built. Architect Aero Saarinen knew better. Unfortunately he died before its completion in 1964.

Across the big muddy Mississippi River to the East, is the western boundary of the State of Illinois. Just to the South of the arch on the east side of the river is the little corrupt town of Sauget where the Monsanto chemical plant belches a noxious, foul smelling, ozone destroying plume into the morning sky. Air pollution at its most egregious and no one is doing one damn thing about it. Somebody’s palm is getting greased. Money always speaks louder than good, common sense.

St. Louis is an enigma of sorts. It’s a large city with a small town feel. The people are typically Midwest friendly, the city is predominantly Roman Catholic. The influence of the church spreads its tentacles far and wide, virtually controlling everything from the politics to the landscape.

Perhaps it’s time we get to know each other a little better. My name is Logan Hunter. Actually, that isn’t entirely true but we’ll get to that. I’m roguishly handsome, functionally irresponsible, charmingly irresistible and irritatingly smart-assed, all in an irreverently devil-may-care kind of way… at least that’s a collection of what I’ve been told by more than one person, on more than one occasion. I guess at least some of it must be true. Who am I to judge the unbiased observations of others who probably know me better than I know myself? I know this for sure; at my core, I’m restless and easily bored. On top of that I’m tragically flawed… but I’m diligently working on that one. As you might expect, that diverse cluster of symptoms can be extremely problematic, as I continue to be reminded on a daily basis by life itself.

St. Louis is my city, at least for now. I was born and raised here; spent most of my life here and it’s the city where my entire family still resides. For some reason, we didn’t wander far from our roots. In time, that may very well change, at least that’s a long-range part of my game plan. Living in the tropics and sailing the waters of the Caribbean is where I’ll eventually end up if all goes as calculated.

Now, you may think that I have an unusual first name; Logan. It is, I suppose, but it’s actually more complicated than that, but again, we’ll address that in time.

The short version is that Logan is the surname of a distant relative; an aunt somewhere down the line, I’m told. She ran a brothel in New Orleans and had a reputation for being a tough old broad and anything but a lady. I’m certain that naming me Logan was designed to piss off somebody in the family, but I never got the whole story. Mum has always been the word. My sense is that had I met Aunt Molly Logan, she would have been my favorite relative… ever. She must have been a pisser and I can relate to that. There’s a lot to be said for the gene pool.

Being raised Catholic, I come from a large family; five children who lived, two miscarriages and one still birth. It’s a pretty typical Midwest family, I guess; save for some undiagnosed mental illness that always seemed obvious to me.

There was no practice or even a thought of birth control other than something called the rhythm method. Apparently my parents had very little of it; the right kind of rhythm that is. Each pregnancy was considered a gift from God. Well, rain is also a gift from God but when you get too much of it it’s time to wear your rubbers, don’t you think?

Blinded by their faith, my parents just lived and breathed the doctrine and continued breeding like gerbils. After all, it’s the Catholic way, the guilt-free way, the only way, according to the church. You have ’em, don’t worry about how you are going to feed and clothe ’em, and don’t forget our ten percent cut from your paycheck every week. Yeah, that pretty much sums it up. I’ll get into that in much more detail as we move along on our little journey.

My dad worked as a construction foreman, toiling long and hard to keep his growing family afloat. He’s a big, ham-fisted guy with no tolerance for misbehaving boys. He had a fuse shorter than Robin Williams’ attention span. Corporal discipline was the rule rather than the exception. We loved him. We feared him. Trust me on both counts.

He was a good dad, overall. He provided as best he could, was generally quiet, dead-bone honest and faithful to my mother. He’s the kind of man you would meet and five minutes later, you knew could trust him with the farm. In that regard, especially, he set a good, solid example for his expansive brood.

My mother, on the other hand, is completely off the chain. She is gregarious, to be sure. She’s also kind, more than a little ditzy and constantly in motion. We should’ve had a stage in our house because she was always performing. Hell, at my high school graduation party, she popped in wearing only a grass skirt and a coconut bra, bare feet and a plastic hibiscus flower stuck in her hair and started dancing with all of my friends… male and female. I almost died of embarrassment. My friends thought she was the coolest mom they’d ever seen. There’s no accounting for taste. It was then I realized that I needed to get some new friends.

Mom, on the other hand, has a million friends and keeps track of each one of them by the number of greeting cards she receives each year on her birthday. She has a heart of gold but is apparently hard of hearing. A conversation with her requires a lot of listening and very little talking on one’s part. If she has something on her mind, you had better be ready to hear it. You have little choice. I haven’t talked to my Mom in a couple of months. I didn’t want to interrupt her.

To her credit, it was always mom who would fight to have our dad-issued, highly reactive and overly severe punishments reduced to time served. Sometimes it actually worked. Dad never told us what the punishment would be before we did the crime. I guess he liked to improvise.

Let’s see, Logan, you didn’t cut the grass on time, so let’s spin the wheel and I will render one of my inappropriate, over the top punishments that I’ve just pulled out of my ass. What are the choices this week, Johnny Olsen? Wow, life in prison without parole, the amputation of one limb, an arranged marriage to a Russian trans-sexual, having his appendix removed with a shoe horn or thirty days in solitary confinement with an insurance salesman. Okay, Johnny, give it a spin and let’s render young Logan, here, his fate.

You think for a single moment that I’m kidding? Want to trade childhoods?

Besides mom and dad, the family consisted of my surviving siblings, two boys and two girls. The whole breeding and birthing process took nearly twenty years to complete. Did I mention we were Catholic? I love my siblings but if given the choice, I would have opted to be an only child; at least back then. I had to share a basement bedroom with my two brothers. It was a living hell. You will understand why in short order. Through it all, we remain close. There is a deep, unspoken bond among us. We have each other’s back and we usually don’t attempt to stick a knife in it.

Trying to control a large gaggle of growing kids was a real chore. Fear and intimidation often came into play. I remember one time when things were particularly chaotic at the dinner table my dad pounded his fist on the table and said Okay, the economy is in the crapper so we’re going to have to let one of you go. We all sat in frozen silence, then my brother Brutus got up from the table and started packing his bags. You’ll understand why in a minute.

Being the first born in a large family carries an enormous responsibility. It hangs around your neck like a dead albatross. I always felt the need to set a positive example for those who were born after me. No one ever forced that on me, it was a self-inflicted mantle, the enormous weight of which I carried all by my lonesome.

I really tried to set the bar high. The operative word here is tried. My grades were always pretty good. I took part in many school activities, from sports of various kinds; ultimately settling on tennis, to student government, to participating in school plays, a particularly good choice, as it turned out. People-pleasing came natural to me. I really never gave my parents any cause for concern. A lot of good it did me. I often received class-action disciplinary treatment that should have been limited solely to my uncontrollable, wild-dog brothers.

I didn’t date very much in high school. It wasn’t that I was shy or anything like that. There just always seemed to be a shortage of both cash and girls I wanted to see. It was a small school with a very limited talent pool. Factor in the reality that I was a bit slow to grow physically and you can kind of get a more realistic look at the entire picture. I didn’t ride a significant growth-spurt to over six feet in height until late in my senior year. I added two more inches in college. Hey, fine wine and great tasting cheese doesn’t mature in a day either.

When I did date, I usually went out with girls from other schools. It was less complicated that way. It kept me from getting ground-up in the rumor mill. A high school as small as mine is like a small town; everybody knows your business.

I’m certainly catching up on the dating scene now… oh, mamma, am I ever. Last night with Delta Sue is just a small example of that little factoid. You will meet a whole bevy of these lovely ladies as we explore some of my many misadventures. Hey, you just might want to go empty your bladder, grab a sandwich and something cold to drink. This promises to be quite an adventurous ride. Oh, and you might want to grab a First Aid kit, too. Turns out that after all these years and against the advice of so many well-intentioned people… like the title says, it’s like I’m running with my pants down all of the time and that’s never a good formula for success. You don’t go very far, very fast and the likelihood that you’ll crash and burn is a foregone conclusion. Don’t believe me? Well, take a deep breath, buckle your seatbelt and keep your hands inside the car. Now hold on tight and you’ll see exactly what I’m talking about.

Okay, I guess it’s time for the disclaimer: In case I failed to mention it to you already; this is not a children’s book. No, seriously… I wouldn’t lie about a thing like that. What you’ll get here are big chunks of my somewhat sordid, sexually exploitive and diversely adventuresome life, served up with a voiceover.

If you’re looking for lighter, tamer, more wholesome reading, The Little Train That Could probably still can. If it’s not still in print, try your local library… or George W. Bush. I know he has a copy.

To be fair… and I am… this novel is probably on Bill Clinton’s nightstand. Not so much for its literary value but because his name appears in it a couple of times… and it has more than a few juicy parts. I understand he tends to like that sort of thing.

3

The family that plays together…

There are times throughout the year when I am forced… OOPS! . . . or should I say… I have the privilege and pleasure to gather with my entire family for a day or evening of fun. It’s usually tied to some made up, mass marketing crap like Second Cousin Once Removed Day, designed to keep Hallmark cards and the retail department store chains in business. Sometimes a relative’s birthday prompts the party or maybe it’s a biggie, like Christmas. No matter the occasion, it’s a time for good food, plenty of drink and the opportunity to tease the shit out of each other; a Hunter family tradition.

I remember one time the party was held at Easter. Having been raised Catholic and long since abandoned the church and its hypocritical, bullshit doctrines in favor of becoming an Agnostic with Buddhist leanings, I was a little rusty on the details of this particular ecumenical celebration. I was compelled to ask some probing questions and to stir the pot a bit with a big-ass spoon, just for the hell of it:

Somebody correct me if I’m wrong here, I began. Isn’t this the fiction-fantasy-fable-fairytale where a thirty-three year old, unmarried, unemployed Jewish carpenter and part-time prophet named Jesus H. Christ supposedly dies a hideous death on a Friday then lays in a cave for a couple of days with twelve members of his posse guarding the hood because he was such a mensch? Then on Sunday, like a David Copperfield illusion, he comes back to life, rolls away the stone that blocks the cave’s entrance and steps out into the light; not unlike Wayne Newton coming onstage in Vegas. Oh, I almost forgot this part: if he sees his shadow, there will be six more weeks of winter? If this is anything more than trumped-up folklore, he was quite a guy; almost… well… ‘supernatural’, comes to mind. Wow, they sure don’t make Jews like Jesus anymore.

Oh baby, I knew I was in deep shit the moment I said it when I heard my second cousin, Roman Catholic nun, Sister Mary Catherine, gasp and aspirate on the coconut from a piece of the lamb-shaped cake she had been devouring. I sprang to my feet and hit her with the Heimlich maneuver, while one of my brother’s friends, Sonny, gave her a little mouth-to-mouth. She sputtered and then blew chunks of coconut across the room. It looked like it was snowing. Hmm, snowing in April… it must be a miracle. That should start somebody’s beatification.

When she gathered herself and her respiration began to normalize, she insisted on leaving… immediately.

Where are you going, I pleaded. The evening is still young.

To Church, so that I can pray to God to have mercy on your sacrilegious soul.

"Well excuse me for mocking the unproven mythology that defines your faith. The church doesn’t seem to have any problem pushing its version of the story on the weak minded but I guess no one else is entitled to their own take on the story. And by the way, my version has as much logic and relevance as any, if you just take the time to study it in contrast to your far-fetched accounting of the improbable events of that weekend two thousand years ago.

The Devil has poisoned your mind, Logan and I’m not going to sit here and listen to this. You need divine intervention.

Can’t you pray for me from here; you haven’t even finished your hunk of lamb cake and if I’m not mistaken, Sonny, here, has kind of taken quite a shine to you?

On her way out, Sonny tried to score her phone number. She rebuffed him out of hand. After all, she is married to God and that’s some pretty heavy competition. Seriously, she even wears a wedding ring. I’d like to be a fly on the wall during one of those conjugal visits. When she starts screaming Oh God, Oh, God . . . she would literally mean it.

Sonny seemed disappointed but said he wouldn’t give up on her. That must have been some mouth-to-mouth. I told him that it was okay with me if he made a run at Sister Mary Catherine, as long as he didn’t get into the habit. He didn’t get the joke… not the sharpest knife in the drawer, that boy.

To give you a little background on the good Sister; she was quite the wild child in her youth. Marrying God was her perceived pathway to redemption. She’s still pretty hot looking, as nuns go; at least looking through the eyes of the perpetually hormone-driven Sonny.

Well, as you might have guessed, that abruptly ended the happy scraping of plastic forks against paper plates. For some odd reason, that was the last Easter Sunday party held by my family. At least it was the last one to which I received an invitation. Go figure? I was excommunicated by my own family for a slight lapse in memory regarding the facts of the fictional case. Hell, the Catholic Church itself wouldn’t have done that to me, especially if I were still giving them ten percent of my gross income as they had been demanding since I was the age of five. I guess if I ever did get invited back for Easter, you can bet big money that I won’t be sitting at the big people’s table.

Today, however, is not Easter; it’s the Fourth of July… or more accurately, Independence Day. To my recollection, this is not a religious holiday, although I know many who kneel and worship before the God of pyrotechnics. Another clue that it wasn’t a religious holiday is the mere fact that I was invited in the first place. I will use that as a barometer going forward.

The location this day: my Brother Brutus’ place in the country. Brutus and his wife Trixie bought about 30 acres, a small house and a mule shortly after their marriage some years ago. Oh, I’m just kidding about the mule. It was their first place and I suspect it will be their last. Brutus is resistant to change. Trixie, a truly good woman in her own right, is along for the ride. It can be a nail biter, if you know Brutus, and you will in short order."

They added on to the place, constantly making improvements; most notably the lipstick red spa tub, toilet and bidet that look like they came out of Aunt Molly’s bordello. They must have been on sale. Why in the hell else would anybody… ?

Moving on; Brutus is, if nothing else, a workaholic and pretty handy with a set of tools. Why he chose to live so far from civilization is beyond my ability to reason. He and Trixie seem to have settled into a good, quiet life away from the noise of the city. It seemed a decent environment in which to raise their son, Mitch, in the hope that he would not follow the path his father took as a young boy. Well, the apple rarely falls far from the tree. We’re all rooting for Mitch. The odds are stacked against him, though. Only time will tell.

Their spread is the perfect spot for family gatherings. Horseshoe pits, a volleyball net, and a large field just made for a good game of Indian Ball makes for a day of fun for all who happen to stop by. Oldies rock music blasts from the huge stereo speakers on the deck… something from Frampton Comes Alive at the moment. All that’s missing is a mote full of alligators and some dancing girls. Pass me a cell phone and I might just be able to fill in those gaps.

I had arrived early with my date-du-jour, Rhonda, a keg of Michelob Light and a three-bean salad. My family is surprised that I’m not with Misty, my semi-long-term on-again-off-again girlfriend. They all really like her. Misty and I are still on a sabbatical in one of our off-again phases. How long that will last is anybody’s guess. Ions if she keeps twisting the let’s get married knife into my spleen without filling in some of her memory lapses. There’s a whole lot more to that saga and I will give you all of the gory details a bit later, as well. I promise you, it’s worth the wait.

The smell of barbeque hit my olfactory system like a bullet train the moment I opened the car door. Brutus must have gotten up before dawn and grilled a hundred pounds of baby back ribs. I figured on 25 to 30 people at the party, so there will be plenty of meat to go around and some to take home at the end of the day. Brutus, at his core, is a good man.

Not unlike St. Louis itself, my brother Brutus is also an enigma. In his younger days he was known in the neighborhood as the Hammer. He never met a face that he didn’t want to punch; Man, woman or child. Hell, Brutus is the kind of guy who would cold-cock the Pope for wearing white after Labor Day. Actually, I’d be tempted to punch him out myself for harboring pedophiles, but that’s a topic for another day.

Brutus got into fights on any day that ended in a Y and always seemed to be in trouble for doing a whole laundry list of incredibly stupid, impulsive things. A chair in the Principal’s office had his name engraved on it and the Principal had my parents on speed-dial. In addition, he was building a nice rap sheet with the County Police, most notably for burning down the woods behind my parent’s house with the help of my other brother, Raul. (More details on the adventures of these two later in the broadcast).

Thing is, Brutus has a heart of gold. He would literally give you the shirt off his back; generally after he ripped the shirt off of yours.

He’s also a collector, of sorts. He still has every car, boat and motorcycle that he ever owned stored in a building on his land. That makes for a great time when the party is at his place because we can play with his toys to our hearts content. It also puts a twist in Trixie’s knickers. Hell, she is not even allowed to replace their ancient, broken-down sofa that they originally bought at the Goodwill store when they first got married, and he has eighteen motor vehicles and a goat stored in the barn. I am serious about the goat.

Between the dirt bikes, all-terrain vehicles, a dune buggy and something that looks like it could take you into outer space, partying at Brutus and Trixie’s is a blast. Today will be no exception. I did notice that Trixie’s drinking a bit more than usual, however.

The deal is, everyone who comes to the party brings something to eat, assigned by category. Bread, vegetable dishes, appetizers, dips, Beer, soft drinks, you get the picture. It’s all pot luck. Brutus and Trixie provide the meat, the place and the toys. I mention all of this to set the stage for something menacing that was sure to happen by days-end.

You see, I have a sister named Destiny, the older of the two girls. She is invited to the party, as she always is. Destiny is… well… a piece of work. Now, Destiny is a nice looking girl, fairly bright, but with less than zero common sense. She also should have been born with a mattress strapped to her back and hinges on her heels because she was affectionately known in High School as the U.S. Open. Simply put, she has spent more time on her back looking at ceilings than Michelangelo. Her senior year, she was voted Most Likely to Conceive.

I would just like to have the jack she’s most likely spent on any number of abortions. Whoops, my bad once again. Catholics don’t get abortions; they just secretly have conveniently scheduled miscarriages. It’s another one of those mandatory guilt trips that comes with membership in the Church. And anyway, I’m just speculating about any actual abortions here. How’s that for a back-pedal? Maybe I’ll get to sit at the big peoples table after all.

I will tell you this, when she was born, my dad took one look at her in the hospital and immediately went home to install a brass pole in her room. It was prophetic. He was a man of vision and as time passed, she did not disappoint. It was, after all, her… well… . Destiny.

By the age of nineteen Destiny had already crashed her car five times, three were total losses, all of them her fault. Fortunately there were no fatalities. In addition, she ran up about forty thousand dollars in credit card debt. Her favorite saying: I was so confused that I just had to buy those outfits in every color. On top of that, she provided major financial support for a whole string of loser boyfriends. That practice continues to this day.

I have never seen her attend one of these family soirées with the same guy. Today will be no exception. They all seem to have one thing in common; they are as dumb as a bag of hammers. She likes the bad boys with ripped muscles, plenty of tattoos, little ambition and fewer brains. My guess is they are all swinging some serious pipe. Why else would she waste her life with this pack of serial reprobates? To her credit, she hasn’t strayed far on the color wheel, with the one exception being that Pakistani cab driver. I guess she didn’t want to send our parents to an early grave.

It’s not that my parents are prejudiced. However, they’re definitely traditionalists; believing each should stay with their own kind. Not as stringent in their beliefs as it was when Italians only married Italians, Irish only Irish and Jews only Jews, etc., but stringent, none the less. Perhaps inflexible is a more appropriate term when it comes to such matters. Whatever.

Destiny’s charge today is to show up, bring dessert and who ever happens to be sleeping over. A simple task on the surface but we all know she will find a way to screw it up. On top of that, she will be late. She always is. Oh, not just a little late, but irritatingly super-late. You would think that by now, at the age of twenty-six, she would have become less self-involved and more responsible and considerate; but no. She lives in her own little Idaho.

Brutus and Trixie asked that everyone arrive by noon. We will eat at one and have the rest of the day to play, followed by an extensive fireworks display at dark. Brutus likes to blow things up. He always did. It’s on his rap sheet. This sounded like a plan and the kids are all stoked.

At two thirty, Destiny and her latest in-bread, ex-con boyfriend, Dwayne, strolled in empty handed as if they were right on-time, arriving on the Red Carpet. My dad, who eats by the clock, was visibly shaken, hypoglycemic, and the growl emanating from his gullet sounded like a bear just coming out of hibernation. Without introducing himself or as much as a hello, Dwayne went right for the beer. It wasn’t his first of the day, nor will it be his last.

The kids had been complaining all day that they were hungry so they were fed early and sent out to play. You guessed it, without dessert.

My mom, who I have explained is never at a loss for words, had smoke coming out of her nostrils. Where on earth have you been? You were supposed to be here two and a half hours ago. We’re all starving. We thought you had an accident. Don’t you have a cell phone? What have I done to deserve this? Why don’t you love me?

Now, are you ready for Destiny’s Mack-daddy of all excuses? It seems that Dwayne got his mullet caught in the tilt-a-whirl at work again yesterday. This time he got fired. He came home with a monster headache, drank a case of Pabst Blue Ribbon, ate some beef jerky and a bag of deep-fried pork rinds and fell asleep watching wrestling on T.V. He woke up at noon today with shit for breath; a perfect match for his brains, gas pains, diarrhea and a killer hangover. On top of that, he couldn’t find his car.

Seems the repo man had towed it from in front of Destiny’s apartment while he slept in his drunken stupor, because Dwayne was six months behind in his payments on the barely running, rusted out Pontiac Trans Am with an eagle painted on the hood. He claims he spent the car payment money on a NASCAR tattoo because he just had to have it to complete the set. Now he shows up here wearing a wife-beater tee shirt, torn jeans with grease stains all over them and no shoes. He didn’t even attempt to tame the mullet, or what was left of it.

I pulled Destiny aside and asked if she was forgetting something. Did you leave the dessert in the car? She said no, it’s right here. She reached into her purse and extracted a small package containing two Hostess Ding-Dongs.

What the hell is that? I huffed.

It’s dessert.

That is dessert?

Yes, one for Dwayne and one for me.

Destiny, what about dessert for the rest of the people at the party?

Well, Trixie said bring dessert. She didn’t say to bring it for everybody.

Ding-Dongs… how absolutely perfect. You keep dating one Ding-Dong after another and old Dwayne, there, probably had more than his share of Ding-Dongs showed up his ass the last time he was in prison.

Shut the fuck up. Like your life is so perfect.

Destiny, enlighten me? What exactly do you see in this guy? I mean, you’ve dated some really pathetic, low-life losers in your life but they’re like Ghandi compared to this ass-wipe.

Well, if you really have to know, he makes me happy in bed

Oh sweet mother of God, just as I suspected. Look, kid, I have an idea. I reached into my wallet. Here’s fifty bucks. Why don’t you go out and buy yourself a nice trusty dildo; any size, any shape, any color. It can be battery operated, plug-in, solar powered, nuclear powered… I don’t care. Then, take it home and use it as often as you like, for as long as you like. When you’re finished, laying all orgasmed-out in a pool of your own sweat, pheromones, and any other natural juices that you might have produced and emitted, hold it up and take a good, long look at it. Unlike the other pricks that make you happy in bed, that one will not have an unemployed asshole attached to the other end of it.

She grabbed the fifty, but ten-to-one she uses the money to buy Dwayne some pot or some more porn for his collection. Then it hit me. I just realized where I had seen Dwayne before… On Cops. You know, bad boy, bad boy, what you gonna do… Man, I just wish Destiny could at least get him to brush his TOOTH. I would bet the farm that his parents are brother and sister. Based on the looks of Dwayne, that family tree has very few branches.

They didn’t stay long. It was probably a good thing, too. When they were leaving, Dwayne grabbed a Granny Smith out of the bowl on the kitchen table. Then he said to Destiny, hey bitch, get your ass over here and help me start this apple. I had to physically restrain Brutus.

On the way home, Destiny flashed the fifty and told Dwayne about the deal I had proposed. He grabbed the money and said baby, I’m the only dildo you’re ever gonna’ need.

They did roll by the adult store, though. Dwayne wanted to see what was new on the kiddy porn rack. As they walked by the incest section, Dwayne stopped cold in his tracks and began to get all misty-eyed. I guess it had been awhile since he had seen his family. I’ll take this one, he called to the clerk. I’m gonna send it back home and get it autographed, if any of ’em has learned to read and write. If not, they can just put an X on it with a Sharpee.

When he paid and got ready to leave, he couldn’t find Destiny. She was wide-eyed, mouth agape, lost in a trance-like state standing in the middle of the dildo section. So many choices, so little time, she thought.

Come on, bitch. Get your ass in the car, yelled Dwayne. There’s a monster truck and tractor pull on cable in ten minutes and we still gotta stop for beer. Hell, if you behave yourself, I’ll even let you give me a hummer in the car on the way home.

I guess Destiny’s search for the perfect mechanical lover will have to wait for another day. Too bad though, the dildo she currently has still has an ass hole attached to it.

4

The name game

Okay, before we get too far along the path here, I better get this out of the way. My siblings and I all have names. But of course we do. Thing is, we are never, ever called by them. Now think about that for a moment.

I’m being totally serious here. Allow me to expand on this bizarre mystery with very few clues. For some strange and unknown reason we were each given a name at birth; the one that appears on our birth certificate. That’s normal, right? But that’s where normal takes a hike in the realm of logic. We are each called by an entirely different name and never, ever are called by our given birth name; not even when our parents are really pissed at us.

Since you won’t be able to tell the players without a program, I’ll try to lay it out for you in its simplest form. Study hard; there’ll be a pop quiz at the end of the lesson.

Okay, let’s get started. My brother Brutus, second in birth order, is actually named Matthew. Like I said, he has never been called anything but Brutus. My best guess is that he’s called that after a character in the Popeye cartoons. You know, Brutus the bully. It’s only a guess, but it would make perfect sense.

My other brother is Raul. Raul was given the name Luke at birth. Why call him Raul? This is only a hunch, mind you, but if I were a betting man, I might put some serious dough on it. Raul looks suspiciously like Raul Martinez, the guy who used to deliver the dry cleaning to our home. Seriously… a dead ringer… right down to the Zapata mustache and his fondness for refried beans.

Destiny, the older of the two daughters, was given the name Mary, as in The Virgin Mary. I pretty much understand this one. It would be some sort of blasphemy to actually call her Mary. No chance for a virgin birth with this tainted meat.

Amber, the youngest, was christened Sara. Why Sara? Breakfast food. Nobody doesn’t like Sara Lee. My mom loves that crap. And, yes, Sara’s middle name is Lee. Why Amber? It was the material used in the pipe stems of my mother’s favorite grandfather. Is that a good reason to give your kid that moniker? Like I said, mom is more than a little loopy sometimes. She also could benefit from the aforementioned therapy; not Amber… mom.

Now for the crown jewel in this episodic cluster-fuck: yours truly. Everybody has always called me Logan and I have already noted the reference to the New Orleans Madame; my distant Aunt Molly Logan. But here’s the capper. On my legal documents I am actually named J. Logan Hunter III. Now you’re probably asking yourself the following questions: Who were the other two J. Logan Hunters? Well… there weren’t any. I’m the first and only. What does the J stand for? Not a damn thing. I always figured it was for John or another name from the bible that began with a J. No… it’s just the letter J. Don’t ask me… I’ve been confused since I could reason and nobody is talking.

My best guess is that some serious negotiating took place in regard to this debacle; a lot of give and take over the dinner table or more likely, in the bedroom. I suspect one parent wanted biblical names; either to honor tradition or to avoid pissing-off somebody like God himself or worse yet, my Aunt Esther. The other wanted different names… fun names… symbolic names or