It had been a long hot summer, and the area was dry. Today was another hot day, hot enough to call for a total fire ban, and Alan was worried when he caught a faint whiff of smoke. Walking out to the veranda he did a quick check but couldn't see any smoke, and a quick patrol around the house still failed to reveal any. He was about to go back inside when a...
Come on guys and girls, let’s have a show of hands. When you were in college did you pick your friends based on how they looked? Were there people who you’d talk to in class or when passing each other in the dorm but who you wouldn’t want to be seen with socially because you were concerned about what you thought your friends would say? It’s okay, you can adm...
The faces surrounding me at the table mirror my own. Sullen, frustrated, fearful. The economy has worsened, everyone have either lost their jobs or had their hours cut so drastically that they might as well have. My granddaughter is ill and needs very expensive medications. My kids and their families have moved in with me because I have the largest house...
I went to an Eric Clapton/Muddy Waters concert in 1979 (Ticket price $7.50, including tax and no "transaction fee"). My roommate Alan and I got to the "festival seating" venue, where there are no seats on the floor and it's every-man-for-himself, very early--we were the very first people there--to get up real close to the stage and secure our spot front and...
I had been strolling along the corridors of the train, looking for the bar car to kill some time on this ungodly three day ride through Europe. We had only been 3 hrs. into the trip and already I was bored and I had no interest in writing my stories, I was too tense and needed to unwind, and then she appeared, this vision of loveliness before me. She sat wo...
There are times when societies loose any sense of direction and purpose, where people are dissatisfied, but are afraid, unwilling or incapable to look forward for solutions. Unfortunately that is the quagmire in which Australia is caught in the closing stages of the Twentieth Century. In attempting to find a tomorrow, we see some minority groups, riding hap...
Saleena ran a brush through her rich black hair and looked at herself in the mirror of her dressing table. She was about to go to El Ricky's to audition for a job as a nude dancer. She loved to dance and Miguel loved to see her naked, so she figured it was a natural. She looked at the picture of Miguel she had taped to the mirror. He was small, only 5'6" and...
Skip Newcombe was waiting when his wife came home from work. All day long he'd told himself that when she came home, just for once, they'd sit and talk like a normal couple in their mid-twenties. He'd make her a cup of coffee. They'd talk about their day and relax. He'd be good, he'd be in control. He knew exactly when to expect to hear the sound of her key...
Diane smiled as she greeted another of her guests. She repeated the mantra of the evening, "Hello, thanks for coming, so nice to see you," over and over that it had lost almost all of its true intent. But, it was her eighteenth birthday and this was her big party. Well, big wasn't exactly the word for it. Her parents had promised Diane a big birthday party a...
Her Day began, much as Vaughan's had. Adriana was awakened with a phone call from the Vice President in her room. He had to laugh to himself at that. Sage was noticeably Latina and very much what he had come to warmly think of as Chica. The VP, Harvard Ph.D., VERY CAUCASIAN with a frosty tight One Per Cent asshole. She was a slender WASP of a woman in her la...