One Night, While out Drinking with the Fat Swede

CHAPTER 1

A Farang in the Land of Smiles

N OW THIS BOOK could have been called One Night I Was Out Drinking With _______ (insert name) or One Night I Was Thinking About Drinking. As you will see, this book isn’t supposed to be about me; it’s about the characters who I’ve encountered over the years. Since I am one of those characters I probably appear too often.

Everything that was written in the ensuing pages is the absolute, 100 percent truth. That is unless it never happened. Then, of course, it wouldn’t be true. Some whose names appear in this book may have a different memory of events. If so, then they should write their own book to set the record straight. A word of caution: the second liar never stands a chance.

The title? Well that came about one day in Patong Beach, Thailand, while I was having drinks with Mr. D. Brook at the Irish Times Bar and Restaurant. Now this is a fine establishment, run by the father and son team of Ronnie and Tommy Corley. Daughter Sarah is the stereotypical Irish Colleen. Her sparkling eyes and drop-dead gorgeous figure add much needed beauty to this pair of Irish barmen. She sparkles, dazzles and could steal the coldest heart in a nanosecond. It was claimed that Engelbert Humperdinck’s brother drinks in the Irish Times. So I went for a closer look. It was just a guy with thick glasses having a horrible hair day. Hmmm. Maybe it was Humperdinck’s brother.

During my visit the previous year we were in the Irish Times, Mr. Brook and I, spending so much time at the bar, after a liquid drive from the airport, that I hurt my back to the point I could hardly walk. This caused a considerable problem as the hotel - a half star, barely - requiring a walk of about 20 stairs while schlepping two heavy suitcases. Two bags that the two India Indian ladies at the reception desk didn’t feel compelled to help me with. They were probably waiting for a call back to India so they could go to work answering 800 number phone calls from America about a printer that didn’t work.

Hello, my name is Sandy. How may I help you? And how are you today?

The back problem had me almost incapacitated by the next morning. While brushing the few real teeth I still retain, I happened to be leaning on the wash basin. The basin came loose from the wall and crashed to the floor. I followed the basin in its path. In addition, water was running freely from the now exposed pipes.

Hobbling down the same 20 stairs that I had to walk up the night before, I explained the situation to the Indian lady who controlled the front desk, which in fact was a desk and not a counter. I explained what had happened, including the fact that water was running rather freely into my room.

Oh, you have problem. Is bad problem for you. Today holiday, for no one work.

I pointed out correctly that while I had a problem the hotel might have a bigger problem. I then took great pains to explain that not only was the wash basin on the floor spurting water like a sperm whale hooked on Viagra, but my back wasn’t any better and I was surly going to die soon.

The national holiday referred to was Thailand’s New Years, called Songkram, which occurs on April 14th. The Thais celebrate by throwing water, dancing in the streets, getting drunk on cheap whisky and doing something they call dancing. Oh, yes, they also kill themselves on the highways during the celebration, driving worse than usual, which is hard to believe. It’s a Thai thing which thins the herd.

Can’t you do something? I pleaded with tears running down my face in an attempt to mimic the late Jackie Gleason’s Poor Soul. As a speech and drama major in college I was quite convincing as the Poor Helpless Soul, not like your usual stupid, loudmouth farang, which I am. Incidentally, a farang is a foreigner in Land of Smiles, which is another name for Thailand.

I can call maintenance man. He will come, maybe. I can give you pill for make feel better.

After hobbling upstairs I quickly took the pill with a dose of bottled water, since I also had a large helping of thirst going on. As an aside here in Thailand, Don’t drink the water is not a suggestion but an order. Never knew that Montezuma visited Thailand, which you all know used to be Siam.

The maintenance man was a nice young Thai who spoke good English. He stopped the flow of water, then explained, I’ll have to get another sink but not today. Everything closed for Songkram, but I look for you. Shortly after he closed the door I was out like a flasher’s reproductive organ, sleeping the sleep of the dead, or the drunk, or better yet the dead drunk after taking the pill. I awoke to find a gentle hand on my shoulder.

Wake up, mister, you sleep, stating the oblivious.

It was the young maintenance man. I have got you a new sink, is all hooked up but don’t lean on it till putty dries.

Thank you so much. You told me all the stores were closed. Did you find a store open?

No. I took sink from the room with Indians on next floor. They never wash, so no problem. No problem being the two most popular words in Thailand.

CHAPTER 2

Irish Times

B ACK TO BEERS at the Irish Times with Mr. Brook. I had just started a tale with the words, Mr. Brook, - I always call him Mr. Brook as a sign of respect - the other night I was having a drink with the Fat Swede. He interrupted me with the suggestion, That would be a great title for a book. In fact you should do a book.

I explained that with my ability, limited as it is, I didn’t have the patience or, to be honest, the ability to do an entire book. I was pretty much limited to doing columns on boxing and darts for various newspapers and websites around the world. I proved that point in spades a short time later after sending Mr. Brook the first 14,000 words of this effort. When I heard nothing from Mr. Brook for months, I decided to take the bull by the horn - which I had some experience with, as I played rodeo for 11 years as a steer wrestler - to inquire why I received no comments from my self-proclaimed co-author, editor, and dare I say, agent.

The answer, although roughly not translated from the English (he is English and they speak a strange form of American) was, I have no fulk’in idea what you’re on about. In American, that means take a hike.

To expound, it also means I was correct. I couldn’t write a book. In one fell swoop, which came out as one swell poop after too many beers, my budding career as an author was finished. And so I lost a co-author, editor and agent. Although when this book becomes a best seller, thanks to editor Herb and wife Fran, and is then made into a movie with Andy Garcia or Alain Delon playing the part of Houston Hartwell Reed II, Mr. Brook will probably want some of the royalties. His wife, lovingly referred to as She, Who Will Be Listened To, will demand royalties. That’s his problem. So he can deal with it.

CHAPTER 3

A Great Book … and Famous People, Kind of

I T HAS BEEN said that inside every American there’s the Great American Novel just crying to be released. But not by Me, which some will recognize as a great song by George and Ira Gershwin. It starts with, They’re writing songs of love. I suspect with me it’s more like, They’re writing books of fame but not for me. I have set out in these pages to disprove that theory with all the skill possessed and retained from Communications 120 and 121, taught by Mr. Ted Reed (no relation) at Diablo Valley College in Concord, California.

Having flunked English twice at another institution, Oregon State University - then a college - Mr. Reed and DVC were my last hope to pass English, which was then a requirement when attending California colleges and universities. Not sure about the situation today, with English possibly being a second language at schools in California. So this is it. It may or may not be a preposition. (I have since learned it is really a pronoun.) I understand that you are not supposed to end a sentence with a preposition. The problem was I had little idea what a preposition was, is or will ever be. In addition, my spelling posed a problem.

I said to me, I’ll hire people to do my spelling. Nice in theory, but not in practice. That’s especially true when you’re so broke the only thing you can put on a bar is your elbows. To this day my spelling is not good, which is being charitable. I constantly get e-mails that say, You ever hear of spell-check?

Of course I’ve heard of spell-check, you moron. Consider this: Suppose I don’t know how to spell the word. Spell-check comes into the picture and gives me four choices. It means that because I didn’t know how to spell the word to start with, I’d have to guess, with only a 25 percent chance of being right. Lighten up, it’s the body of work that counts.

Mr. Ted Reed came through with flying colors, although I did attend every class for two semesters, never leaving my seat empty. I’m sure in hindsight, by this time he has probably figured out that while he was a great teacher the seat next to mine was more important to perfect attendance. It was occupied by a lovely young lady named Katherine Juliet Ross, who we called KJ. Movie fans will know her as the award winning actress Kathy Ross of The Graduate and Sundance Kid movie fame. Stunningly lovely sweetheart.

During the start of the second semester, when teacher Reed (in junior college they’re called teachers) saw me sitting next to Katherine, he remarked, Ms. Ross, I see your middle initial is J, and I’ve heard students call you KJ. Sitting next to Mr. Reed, being KG might serve you better.

Some years later, KJ was making a movie in San Francisco with Lee Marvin. As I was leaving my early evening or late afternoon beverage stop I noticed a large number of people kind of standing around.

What’s going on?

Kathy Ross is making a movie.

I know her. We were friends in college. Okay, it was junior college. Quit being so damned picky.

I decided to wait around. Surely she would see her old pal Howie Reed and invite him onto the set. I stood there for 20 minutes or so. Anyone who has ever taken part in early drinking knows that 20 minutes will make you feel like you’re stranded in the Sahara with a camel and a flat tire.

Finally, Ms. Ross walked by. She turned when I said KJ. I got the brook trout look. But nary a hi or a hello, or even a wave. Just nothing. That’s the look someone gets in their eyes when, as Gertrude Stein once wrote of Oakland, There is no there…there. Old Gertie also wrote, A rose is a rose.

Upon further review, including Katherine Ross’ bio in Wikipedia, she somehow managed to ignore the time she spent at Diablo Valley College or East Contra Costa Jr. College as it was known then. Maybe sitting next to me for a year in Mr. Reed’s class was a shame she wanted to put into the closet. Heck, I didn’t even mention her getting locked in the school library over night with her football playing boyfriend. That is very hurtful. Oh, the shame of it all.

To Mr. Reed’s credit as an academician and teacher, he was going to petition the college when I got my AA degree in English to disown themselves from that honor. It was Mr. Reed’s belief that giving me an AA in English was like putting lipstick on a pig. (I wrote this before Sarah Palin made it famous.) Not to mention a major flaw in the California junior college system that was bigger than the San Andreas Fault. He probably went ballistic when I also got a BA and almost a MA from the Harvard of the West, San Jose State University - then a college. I did seem to have the talent to turn colleges into universities by leaving. Coincidence? I think not.

Mr. Reed, the teacher, was treading on dangerous ground when one Thanksgiving morning he called me at home, wondering if I had football betting cards. That was back in the days when football betting cards were illegal. To obtain them, one usually had to go to the same person who also had those movies featuring guys in black socks and fake mustaches, delivered in a brown paper bag. My guy was the local bread truck driver.

I assured him that I had football cards, but they had to be turned in the following day. Mr. Reed dropped by the 24-acre homestead. In the process of picking up the cards he was induced by my mom, Irene Maude Reed, to taste some of my dad’s homemade wine. Ten of the acres were in wine grapes. Dad was absent hunting ducks. When Irene Maude wanted something she got it.

After an extended period of one more glass and some Italian cookies - cookies and wine, courtesy of Gusto Milano, who worked the fields - Mr. Reed, the teacher, wobbled down the pathway on his way to Thanksgiving dinner. There’s just the slight chance that I passed English thanks to Irene Maude Reed, my dad’s homemade wine, Italian cookies and the football betting cards. (As a side note, the wine could also be utilized to remove varnish from any and all surfaces long before TV infomercials. You know, Order in the next 10 minutes and we’ll send you two for the price of one.)

The wine, stored in gallon jugs, could be stolen from the basement in the farmhouse of the Rancho de Reed. So it was then hidden in the sawdust of high-jump pits at Diablo Valley College. My pal Roger, a tennis player, and I would meet after my baseball practice and his tennis practice. We would indulge in wine-tasting as part of our wind-down time. No crackers and cheese but one must learn to