The Testicles of Tut

Everyone is sick of it. So am I. My astrologer friend has a sudden inspiration. Taurus moon. Hanging on to relationships long after they’re over. I finally get her on the phone. Just talk to me once a week, okay? She’s okay with that. She missed me. She’ll make it okay with her boyfriend. Sure, I’d be happy to talk to him.

I have just landed on the moon. Very few people have done that.

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Ram.. I took the liberty to edit out what appeared to be a huge amount of white space ( I couldn’t find a reply button it was so far down..) from this. Hoping it’s as you wanted it posted.
xo

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Perfect. Thanks. I wonder if my computer is part of the problem?

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It’s the perfect spot. It took him years to find. I go exactly where he tells me and set up my tent in the light. I get a powerful and expensive flashlight just in case. I don’t want to get lost in the woods. I come back in the dark and park my car some distance down the highway where the kayaks go out. I’m not comfortable with this, but he assures me it’s the best policy and it’s safe. You do not want your car parked where you have a tent. It’s a long walk back to the purple fire hydrant with a large and heavy bag. I plunge confindently into the brush. I know exactly where I’m going. It is only a matter of minutes before I am lost. Really lost. I have a reasonably good idea from what direction the sounds of the highway come, but I can never be certain with only one good ear. Sound has no dimension. I am fighting through brambles and thorns. What if I have to spend the night here? The ground is too uneven and overgrown to sleep on. I have a cell phone. I could call emergency. Not acceptable. I keep struggling. Endlessly. Finally I get out. I am scratched, bruised, drenched in sweat and winded. My clothes are a mess. It is a long drive to my usual sleeping spot. The next day I am so sore I can hardly move. I go back and get my tent. No problem.

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I plunge confindently into the brush. I know exactly where I’m going.
It is only a matter of minutes before I am lost. Really lost.
LOL.

And then I’m on the edge of my seat and stay there, all the way until ”No problem”
What a relief!

The next day I am so sore I can hardly move. I go back and get my tent.

I love the way this entire piece is written, love the controversy in the parts I highlighted. I hear a male voice, slightly hoarse, telling the whole story, which in and of itself, could be a movie. Enough in it for a short film, anyway.

And so “I” had to go be ballsy and get all beat & scratched up… only to wear the marks like badges of honor. Tut, Tut… Best of all we now have here a great film script. Perfect for HBO.

Love,
Nell ;-)

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I have a sudden inspiration. Ray has explained to me how he uses his crystal pendant to divine the answers to his questions. It isn’t the pendant. It’s the way he uses it. He told me that someone had once sarcastically suggested he use a vacuum cleaner on a cord, so he did. I ask him if there was anything I could have done to save my marriage. He considers this seriously for a moment and then graciously obliges. This is the final judgment. I brace myself for an unforgiveably damning affirmative. I can take it. I’d rather know. I look away as he starts to move the pendant but cannot forbear to sneak a look. Already it is turning reassuringly in the clockwise direction. No. There was nothing I could have done. You’re the best, I tell him. He laughs. He knows that one comes from t

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confirmation or just a path to more new questions.

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It’s just a friendship, I suppose, and an odd one, as befits two very odd fellows, neither of whom have girlfriends, are both more or less homeless and not troubled by it, each a dedicated spiritual practitioner, and both of whom, past or present, have seriously entertained grandiose schemes of planetary reformation. I fall into the former category. I don’t see myself changing anything now. Ray is decidedly of the latter. Planets do not begin to encompass the range of his ambitions. The interesting thing about it is that he really is on to something. His cosmic energy discs work. I know what they’ve done for me, and grateful does not begin to describe how I feel. But I am not a disciple. I tell him when I think he’s delusional, and frequently I think he is. I admit that there is much about his inner world that I am unqualified to evaluate. He’s a shaman. I’m not. I mentioned to him the similarity of our relationship to the fictional one described by Carlos Castaneda. The difference is that this is real.

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It’s a story told in three photos on plastic in my wallet. My hair is closely cropped from having shaved my head. This is our second attempt on the island. I have informed her that we are three thousand dollars in debt. She doesn’t understand. Often she doesn’t understand anything I say to her. It’s a fluke how we got back here. I have a job doing tire repair I got through someone I met on the beach in California. I look very angry. The job lasts a few weeks. Then 9/11 happens. I get work as a security guard for a while and then as a shipper at an art gallery. I am trying to establish her as an artist. She doesn’t care about art anymore.
 
 
 
The second photo is taken eight years later. We have just divorced and removed her name from our joint bank account. I have encouraged her to keep the credit card until she no longer needs it. Her family won’t be of much help. I am smiling at her but I look insane. With my bald head and hair below my shoulders, I could be one of the Three Stooges on acid. I uncannily resemble her former husband.
 
 
 
The third photo was taken a few months ago. I have just recovered from one of the worst illnesses I ever had. I nearly coughed myself to death from a lower lung infection. I look good.

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So simple, so powerful.  A whole journey in three paragraphs.  Very nice.

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Thanks, Jody. There have been other photos. No need to complicate things. It’s bad enough already.

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The Testicles of Tut and the Three Stooges on acid.  Why (I ask) is this man not published?  I would buy whatever paper these little treasures came out in every single day just to read them.  I guess I’m lucky I can come here and read them and not search for the paper.  xo

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ditto, Ayla. I keep thinking there HAS to be a way to get this work ‘out there’. I keep hoping a publisher might stumble across the threads… or…? I know we are so lucky to have it here, but wouldn’t it be great to see them ‘published’? 

anyway, this is, as always, just great work. Juxtapositions of these kinds of sentences, for example:

I nearly coughed myself to death from a lower lung infection. I look good.

Never too many words. Never too much explaining. No superfluous adverbs. No sentimentality. No arrogance and yet clearly the voice of someone who thinks with a kind of intelligent, hard edged machismo, in the best sense.


S.

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I love you both.



I have supper with one of the artists at the gallery. He asks me why I wanted my wife to be an artist. What could I say? Because I wasn’t? He is going on a small retreat by invitation tomorrow, hosted by a couple I have never heard of, whom he describes as enlightened teachers. He writes their name for me on a card. He knows all the teachers. He used to give Ekhart Tolle food and rent money in Vancouver. His wife is an Amma devotee. He isn’t. She is the one teacher around whom he feels nothing. Around others he feels bliss. She yelled at him once for filming a wedding ceremony for which he had received permission. Perhaps She was irritated by his obtuseness. She has human qualities, after all. I myself have experienced Her anger. And more. To me She is not just a teacher. She’s God.

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He’s my friend, so I have to be diplomatic. Still, the claims he makes are so outlandish, I cannot in good conscience let them go. He has singlehandedly raised Earth’s level of intelligence by a few categories. There aren’t that many more than a few categories in the scale. He has kept the Sun from going nova. I delicately suggest the effect of such claims on people not so sympathetic to his intentions as I. He gets rather testy about this. People have assured him that the rays of the sun are markedly more benign. Have I not noticed the diminishing craziness in the world? I stand firm. He must realize that he and I in comparison to greater beings are no more than ants. 



He’s going to loan me one of his StarGate lights. I need more healing.

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He showed up at the door once, drenched in sweat, asking for a glass of water. He was a gentleman. My mother had him sit in the garden. He loved the garden. He asked if he could come back and work in the garden. Years later, in another town, in another province, my mother was able to connect him as the father of the woman she was driving with in a car. I remember a nice man at the front door and my mother telling me that he had a drinking problem. That there was something wrong with him. He had a screw loose. I used to think about that. Such a nice man.

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We drive up to the Dragon’s Den, a herb store and healing center in Makawao, to show the discs. I am excited that Matthew Hammond will be there, a gifted intuitive healer, who once prescribed a tea for me that got rid of a horrible rash. He of all people should pick up on the discs right away. He’s busy with clients and not much interested. He briefly holds a disc in his hand, pronounces the energy as nice, and directs us to the metaphysical store across the street. The lady there has a tattooed and beaded face, her arms also tattooed, with a prominent but randomly located Eye of Horus. She is apparently interested and talks at length with Ray. A New Age hippie marches in and right up to me as if to engage me in an altercation. I ignore him and he drifts away. I am reminded of a similar incident in which I simply ignored the person berating me. Ray is to return for a demonstration in a couple of days. We head down to Mana Foods in Paia where I run into some people I know. The lady from the Amma satsang is there with her little boy who told her that he really hadn’t wanted to come back to this world. One of the artists from the gallery is there. She’s a dish. A real knockout. She hugs me. Ray and I head over to Baldwin Beach to eat. We sit in the car watching the girls on the sand. I express the disgust I feel for myself. I’m fifty-five, not fifteen, and lecherous as a stoat. Ray is sympathetic. I want to know how he goes into his deep meditative states. He’s not even a yogi. He’s an extraterrestrial. You have to talk to God, he says. He recommends that I reverse my Cosmic Cosnciousness and Central Sun discs to the clearing mode and keep the Life Energy disc on charging. I do this immediately. The next day all the arthritic pain is gone from my hips and I don’t feel the least bit lecherous. Well, maybe a little. 

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There are so many things here that grab me.  Brilliant.  And poignant (…is there with her little boy who told her that he really hadnd’t wanted to come back to this world) and so fricking funny!!!  Stoat.  Extraterrestrial.  Lecherous …maybe a little.

<giggles>

Love

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I am blown away by this Ramsses… it feels like watching a waterfall, each water drop leaping over each other. beautiful.

I agree with Sandra and Ayla, there must be a way to get these stories published. Reading you makes me want to listen deeply.

thank you
xo

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Such a full little piece chris. your economy of words continue to blow me away.  I am with ayla and leigh ann, if you are interested in getting this stuff out there, i am certain there is a demand for forceful, creative reflection like this.

Peace,
michael- a leacherous 47 year old man

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Thanks, my friends. I’ve sent it off to the local paper. We’ll see what happens.
 
Edited:
 
We drive up to the Dragon’s Den, a herb store and healing center in Makawao, to show Ray’s discs. I am excited that Matthew Hammond will be there, a gifted intuitive healer, who once prescribed a tea for me that got rid of a horrible rash under my armpits. He of all people should pick up on the discs right away. He’s busy with clients and not much interested. He briefly holds a disc in his hand, pronounces the energy as nice, and directs us to the metaphysical store across the street. The lady there has a tattooed and beaded face, her arms also tattooed, with a prominent but randomly located Eye of Horus. She is apparently interested and talks at length with Ray. A New Age hippie marches in and right up to me as if to engage me in an altercation. I ignore him and he drifts away. I am reminded of a similar incident in which I simply ignored the person berating me. Ray is to return for a demonstration in a couple of days. We head down to Mana Foods in Paia where I run into some people I know. The lady from the Amma satsang is there with her little boy who told her that he really hadn’t wanted to come back to this world. One of the artists from the gallery is there. She’s a dish. A real knockout. She hugs me. Ray and I head over to Baldwin Beach to eat. We sit in the car watching the girls on the sand. I express the disgust I feel for myself. I’m fifty-five, not fifteen, and lecherous as a stoat. Ray is sympathetic. You have to talk to God, he says. He recommends that I reverse my Cosmic Consciousness and Central Sun discs to the clearing mode and keep the Life Energy disc on charging. I do this immediately. The next day all the arthritic pain is gone from my hips and I don’t feel the least bit lecherous. Well, maybe a little. I want to know how he goes into his deep meditative states. He’s not even a yogi. He’s an extraterrestrial. And he’s my friend, so I have to be diplomatic. Still, the claims he makes are so outlandish, I cannot in good conscience let them go. He has singlehandedly raised Earth’s level of intelligence by a few categories. There aren’t that many more than a few categories in the scale. He has kept the Sun from going nova. I delicately suggest the effect of such claims on people not so sympathetic to his intentions as I. He gets rather testy about this. People have assured him that the rays of the sun are markedly more benign. Have I not noticed the diminishing craziness in the world? I stand firm. He must realize that he and I in the grand scheme of things and in comparison to greater beings are nothing more than ants. He lets it go. He knows better.
 

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If the paper doesn't take this, well I don't know. If I published a magazine that dealt with such subjects I'd sign you on as a monthly columnist immediately.

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He has a Romeo and Juliet experience that lasts for six weeks on Maui. She leaves him. A year later he spends all his money and follows her to Germany. He knocks on her door. You can’t come in, she says. My mother is here.
 
He marries a woman who is virtually deaf. They have a beautiful relationship. 
 
You have to be as cold as a stone.

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The parrot always hated me. I feed it my granola. We could be friends. I don’t care.

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The pattern is always changing. I won’t drive down that road anymore to the beach. I sleep at the top, away from the highway, with one door open in the tall grass, so I can stick my legs out. Yes, they can kill me if they want, but I might kill them. I have a fish bat by my side and I am not afraid. Not at all. I like it there. The wind blows all night. It is desolate and quiet. Hardly any traffic. Now that the sun rises earlier, I bathe in the ocean again. I walk down this morning gingerly in my bare feet on gravel which some dedicated locals must have dumped into the potholes. There is much improvement in some places, none in others. I have the beach to myself. I strip and enter the rocky water without aversion to the temperature. It amazes me after a lifetime of hot showers how quickly I adapted to it. I look back on how forgetful I used to be. Where was my mind? I change into clean clothes and hasten into town. It’s late but maybe I can meditate before work. Halfway there I remember my shampoo. I left it on a rock. I am not going back. I imagine that big full bottle decomposing in the ocean. I have time. I go back. It is not on the rock. The tide has washed it in. There are not so many myna birds on the road now. We’ve already met.

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Did I have any turpentine for his brushes? I was sure I did. I might have mixed it with a few other cans. Would this be alright? I unscrew the cap. The solution is clear. He sniffs it and looks inside. Perfect. He jokingly mimes inebriation from the fumes. It triggers a memory. I wanted my wife to mix sacred ash in her paints for sacred paintings. He’s all for it. And a devout Christian. Incredible. It’s in the glove compartment of my car, the small box I got from the Hollywood temple so long ago for the rose petals from my Kriya initiation. Over the years many more rose petals had packed it to capacity. The names of the gurus had been scrawled on it in a drunken fervor. In the ensuing disillusionment the mouldy, hardened petals had been burned and the names scraped off, along with the remaining floral inlays. Other things had been stored instead. Sacred stones. Stinking gold crowns from teeth broken off so low they could never be fixed. That little accident I had working for the Guru. Marijuana. The lid broken a few times from being dropped, smoking that marijuana, and glued back together. The box rubbed smooth. Amma’s ash. Someone, I forget who, had given me sacred ash from Sai Baba, miraculously manifested or not, I don’t know. The box is full. I dig around for the sole remaining object, an Eye of Horus from my wife. Curiously, I had just this morning removed the disc from the gold chain she had given me, putting all three discs together on their purple string. I now put the Eye of Horus on the naked chain and bring the ash to Roman. He is painting a couple of glasses of red wine, with a bottle and a rose. He will call it Sacred Wine. Would I compose something? 
 
With this sacred wine we live forever,
Where neither time nor separation reach,
In the Highest Heaven eternal friends,
Drinking that Bliss of Love that has no end.
 
He’s thrilled. He wants to keep the verse I have written out for him, and asks me to sign it. I will write it on the back of the painting in gold. He pours a little wine. I take one sip. Later I will drink more.

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He’s the highest priced artist in the gallery. A big sale is about to be closed. The client asks him if he is working on other pieces. Is Raggedy Anne’s crotch cotton?  Silence. Ugly silence. Kids in the room. Kids get led out. The consultants hate him. He does this all the time. He’s the guy who knows every enlightened being on the planet. He told me he adores me. He’s not gay. Neither am I. He needs a friend.

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If only I could be as indifferent to people as I am to the animosity of the parrot. It’s Friday night. The musician is playing and the gallery is packed. A consultant dashes back to the break room for a quick, ravenous bite to eat and offers me the packet of small oyster crackers that comes with the meal. Did he think the parrot would like them? Absolutely. People are standing around the cage. A lady tells of being bitten on her extended tongue by a parrot held upside down to kiss her. I pass a cracker through the bars. The parrot takes it and flings it away. Showtime. Everyone is on stage, especially the parrot. I mechanically pass him every single cracker in the bag as he flings each one away, and then gather them up from the floor and the tray at the bottom of the cage, careful to exclude the ones touched by his droppings. I am about to put them in his bowl when one of the consultants he loves offers to do it for me. The next morning all the crackers are eaten.

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It creeps up on you like little pussycat feet. One or two to ease the pain of hard labor. Two to get you through the night cramped on the back seat of your car. Then you notice your memory and focus has gone again. Tobacco is better, without the deliberately addictive carcinogenic additives. Two the first day. Now you’re smoking like a chimney. But not drinking. No worries. It’s only the honeymoon. Marvellous how it cuts the depression without dulling the mind.
 
An early trial smoking in the chicken barn at boarding school where the air was so close and foul you did not want to breathe. No one could smell the smoke. If you were cool, you smoked. It was not a happy place. Only billed to be. The school the boys built! Literally. Here were the photos of them doing the building construction. Tuition dirt cheap because they sold meat door-to-door in Winnipeg. Rough canoe trips along the old fur trade routes. Midnight marathon snowshoe runs in the arctic cold. A committed Christian staff earning one dollar a day! The toughest boy’s school in North America! A hotshot redneck journalist founder. Brochures like magazines depicting the glory of it all. One of the featured heroes asked me if I was hard up yet. What did that mean? You’ll know, he said. Oh, I get it. Fuck, ya! The journalist’s wife a lifelong chainsmoker.

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More fond memories crowd in upon me of boarding school. Some are born to badness, some can only aspire to it. He was never a friend, no one was. He had not commented on my reluctance to inhale. If you don’t know, you can’t be told. He stuck fire crackers up the pigs’ asses and lit them. I just happened to be there. I was in no way approving of the cruelty. But I laughed. A teacher’s wife was watching from a window. I was evil, I learned. I should have considered this carefully. But of course, I couldn’t. It was enough to have escaped from my father. I was later to learn that it was the opinion of the headmaster’s wife, evidently another ardent secret window watcher, that I dyed my blond hair blonder. I could not have been more amazed at this than the fact that she even knew who I was. I seldom saw her and had never spoken to her. On more than one occasion I was characterized as all evil personified. My problem was  insufficient self-knowledge. There was something I knew that was very threatening, but even I didn’t know what it was. Years later, returning as a very lost staff member on a canoe trip, I lost my too blond hair overnight. The horror will chase you down until you understand.

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Hi, Judith.
Hi. What brings you here?
Your shamanic friends, Hank and Jill, highly recommend you.
Any specific problems?
I don’t know. I respect their advice. I’m not exactly brimming with joy.
Really?
I haven’t reached that state of enlightenment.
I may not have either. I may still be able to help you.
I’m open.
Why are you unhappy?
Because I’m not enlightened?
You don’t have to tell me anything you don’t want to.
I don’t know what to tell you.
Are you angry?
Sure.
Do you want to talk about that?
It’s there.
Yes.
I try not to get consumed by it.
But you are still angry.
Are you?
If I were, I wouldn’t be here. Tell me about yourself.
My story.
Entertain me. What grabs you?
Sanatana Dharma.
Good.
My drama.
And you are here to get some help with that.
How can you help?
Neither of us will know until you open up to me.
I don’t know what to tell you. I’m content with my spiritual path now. But I am in pain.
What gives you pain?
This is difficult. I’ve talked about it, written about it. What else is there to say?
Okay. What do you not want to tell me?
Can we talk about something else?
By all means.
What makes you so happy?
Ah.

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Loved this.

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Maybe that’s the way it will be. I’m not used to having this kind of conversation with cops. I don’t like shooting my friends. Take a vacation.
 
You take a vacation. Before you have it forced on you.
 
Just a little more business that needs to be taken care of. Then I’ll be gone.
 
Not if I can help it.
 
Fine. I’ll shoot between your ears. There’s nothing there.
 
There’s a pair of eyes watching you. I don’t like shooting my friends either. Go now, before it’s too late.
 
I’ll think about that.
 
You won’t. That’s your problem.
 
You’d be surprised. I’ll work around you.
 
I’ll be there.
 
I’ll bring a six-pack.
 
I’ll bring a six-shooter.
 
One for each can?
 
One for each can.
 
We’ll kill them together.
 
One of us will.
 
 

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and then this… after the other 'conversation'. Wow. Makes me think of more like this - seemingly unrelated conversation snippets. No other description. Just this. Wonderful. Could, in fact, make for an extraordinary piece of theatre.

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It's a riff on the exchange between Pacino and De Niro in Heat, a movie that affected me on many different levels. I think about that scene a lot. It's poetry.

I am talking with Roman about another artist in the gallery whose father ran a bordello in Argentina. His women are gorgeous. What does this say about beauty? Roman tells me he knew a couple of gorgeous girls here on Maui who are now prostitutes in Las Vegas. Two or three thousand dollars a night. I suppose they got disgusted with men sliding up to them on their own drool. Fuck 'em. Take their money. And then that's it. What else are they going to do with their lives? Their clientele. Drug lords. I mention the photos I was looking at of two convicted hit men for the drug cartels, teens, evil-looking, one with eyes tatooed on his eye lids, the other with diabolical markings on his face. The mark of Satan, Roman says. He admires the paintings with the eye of an artist. The amazing tonal subtlety in what appears to be a limited color range. Who would think of using such colors to depict light on skin? I point out an error in perspective. He agrees. It hardly matters. It's the work of a master. Roman is a master himself and puts on no airs about it. I am a fervent admirer, charmed and disarmed by his childlike enthusiasm for his own work. Mostly he does florals. His painting of a tiger took me by surprise. What was this? A few days later I got it and burst out laughing. It's called Majestic Wanderer. I wrote something and he inscribed it on the back of the painting:

This gentle tiger is my soul, dear friends,
An immortal majestic wanderer,
Resting forever in Elysian fields,
His gaze upon that which cannot be named.

He told me he didn't know what the piece was about until he had finished it. He had a bunch of kids visiting from Poland and asked them to come up with names for his paintings. Each would submit a name and they would vote on it. It took about ten seconds for an eleven-year-old girl to come up with Majestic Wanderer. Of course everyone voted for it. The name is written in her childlike hand on the back. I don't think even Roman knew it was a self-portrait.

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I read hardly anything but Amma, but another teacher of mine, a distinct fascination, has recommended a new book by a friend, so I go to the bookstore. One glance and I dismiss it. Is there anything else here to justify my trip? I look around for Vanity Fair. Sold out. I graze at the tables. A whole table devoted to my beloved India. If only I could find that biography of Vivekananda I once began at Amma’s ashram. Novels of a famous author whose name keeps cropping up. Verbiage. Ah. Holy Cow: An Indian Adventure by Sarah Macdonald. I’ve looked at this before. There is a flippant and amusing chapter on her visit to Amma’s ashram. I am strongly reminded that I never want to go back. Still, Sarah Macdonald got the message. Amma is divine. Oddly, she also missed it. She’s not interested.

 

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He’s Thiaooubian, literally from another planet, calls Earth Tiamat, and sincerely believes he has raised the consciousness of the planet from a category one to five. Nine is the highest, impossible at the present level of human evolution. A cataclymic renewal is immanent. When his mission is over, he will return to his mother ship. I ask him what he foresees for me. More healing in this life, and greater happiness in the next. I tell him I want moksha, liberation. Do I mean permanent freedom from the body? Yes. Do I have any idea what I’m asking for? He doesn’t actually express those words. He doesn’t want to hurt my feelings. He thinks I’m as crazy as I think he is. We get along fine. I’m convinced he’s a genius. His cosmic energy discs have saved my life. He believes the moon landing was a hoax, the Illuminati control the world and that there is a diabolical conspiracy through a shadow government and the military to control ignorant minds by whatever wickedness at their disposal, whether it be pollutants deliberately dispersed in the exhaust fumes of jets, chemicals and poisons in food and drugs, destructive broadcast frequencies, psychic manipulation through radio and television, or the possession and control through surgery and bionics of homeless people using technologies appropriated from extraterrestrials. We agree that this is not a fun world to live in. We both have a mission.

Re: The Testicles of Tut

I’m over it, although I still dream about it. Angelina Jolie lies down beside me and I put my arm around her. I look across the room at Brad Pitt and go right over and reassure him.  My friend tells me he resisted temptation in the jacuzzi last night. His wife is away. We’re driving up the volcano to check out the campground and hiking trail he has raved about. He has needed to get away for a long time. He can’t do it when his wife is around. If I’m talking to my ex again I should know about this place. We talk about women and God. He’s believes that sex is the ultimate experience. I try to explain that Divine Consciousness is beyond that. He’s a nature freak and a devoted Christian with no objection to other religions. You’ll come down from the volcano looking like Moses coming down from the mountain, he tells me. I ask him to bring some pot. I haven’t done it for a while and this will be a rare opportunity. The shift is rapid. I am a great angelic being with a broken heart and a broken head. I call my ex and tell her I love her. I am fascinated by his conversation. He’s had so many women. He asks me to show him my palm. You’re an old soul, he says, showing me his own smooth one. I’m a young one. It’s foggy, rainy and cold at the top. He’s already drunk a lot of beers and will have many more by the time I take him home. On the way back, he insists on picking up a hitchhiker. He’s frantic. She’s gorgeous, dude! Stop! Are you going to leave her in the rain? She’s a gift from God! She is a young girl dressed up like heavy metal groupie and nervous about getting in. He talks nonstop, occasionally trying to engage her in conversation. She is young, not interested, courteous and polite. She makes a few calls on her cell phone. He raves about her after we drop her off. If only he wasn’t single. I’ll skip the jacuzzi, thanks, even if that hot playmate in the G-string does show up. My ex does not return my call.

Re: The Testicles of Tut

I was going to lecture him about drinking like a pig and hitting on a teenager, but the next day he’s fit as a fiddle, had a great time, looks like he spent the day meditating on God, and has a $100,000 commission in the works. What did I tell you, he says. You come down from the mountain looking like Moses.

Re: The Testicles of Tut

I’m sure we’ll be seeing more of each other, she said. Really? I must have given her a measuring look. Her handshake was like water. Sure, she knocked me out. How did she know? But how could we be seeing more of each other unless I chased her down? As far as I know, she’s not coming back. I could find out who she is and invite her out. If I were that shameless. Or had that conviction. I had no idea when I took her up to the roof that she was smitten with me. But here’s the thing. I’m trying to get back together again with my ex. It’s a heart connection. Not sexual. Not that I’m knocking the sexual. Not at all. It’s what I wanted. It’s why my wife left me. We didn’t have it. We had something else. I can do without the sexual now. I could do with it, too. But I am not going to chase it down.

Re: The Testicles of Tut

Bring it down on the hill over there. We're out of range and this conversation never happened. I've brought you here because we all know what's going on. The pigs are making a killing. New toys and big profits. We'll be lucky to get out alive or without serious injury. I'll do my best to prevent that. We'll have the safest reconnaissance missions I can get. There are a few people who might get in our way. I won't notice if they're missing. Understood? Any questions? Good. Let's get the hell out of here.