Can You Hear Me Now? (Cigar Smoke 1-10-08)

Well, I hope you had a nice Christmas and a happy and healthy and sane New Years Eve, and boy, those were some bowl games, huh? Yes, I am the Chamber of Commerce.

I had a great Christmas. Only 90 percent of my gift recipients asked me why I didn’t get them what they had put on their Amazon wish lists. And so far, the new year has pretty much started out like I thought it would. I was driving over to Victory Park the other day and traffic was stopped on Altadena Drive because some little pipsqueak dog was in the middle of the street. People were actually trying to help a dog.

Maybe humanity was turning a corner. Then I went into the park and a teenage boy started yelling at me. I was just walking along with my own non-pipsqueak dog, and this kid says something, which apparently was not really what he said. So I say, “Sure, it’s OK to go over there.” He screams back at me, “I know it’s OK to go over there!” I remarked that maybe I hadn’t understood what he had said. He remarked something I didn’t like even though I couldn’t understand it. Then, just when I was returning to hating humanity, this other teenage guy comes along and says, “Hi there. How are you?” Just cheerful and friendly. I thought it was John Boy Walton. Hey, Happy New Year.

So I am now trying to leave the holidays behind. And, in that frame of mind, something that happened a couple of years ago just popped into my head. I was over in Las Vegas with a buddy of mine, Vic Vieira. We were there to see what they call Frozen Fury. This is an annual pre-season hockey game between the LA Kings and the Colorado Avalanche. This is pretty much the highlight of our cultural year.

So we get ensconced in our MGM Grand hotel room, and I tell Vic what ensconced means, and then we go out and have this great steak dinner at some semi-high-end Mexican/Brazilian kind of restaurant that didn’t know what a taco was — but damn they had good steaks. Smothered them in chipotle sauce or something. We sopped up that sauce with our tortillas and waddled out of the place. Life was good.

Then we said to each other, “Other than this stupid hockey game, why the hell are we here?” One of us mentioned the gambling and the drinking and the hot, naked women but the other one quickly mentioned that we always lose at blackjack, drink till we throw up at the bouncer’s feet, and that the last hot, naked woman who had shown any hint of being interested in us was 46 years ago.

So we decided to go check out a timeshare that Vic’s son had wisely purchased for 17 times its real value. We were thinking that maybe the next time we came to Vegas that maybe we could stay there. We were pretty sure that’s where all the hot, naked women and loose slots were. Or was it where the loose women and the hot, naked slots were?

The next morning we went to some coffeehouse dive where we were sure there were hot, naked loose flapjacks and had two lumberjack breakfasts compacted into our bowels. Four pancakes, four eggs, four sausages, four bacon strips, wrapped in four pieces of French toast. In gravy. Naked gravy.

So, after getting our daily nutrition requirements fulfilled, we headed out to find the timeshare. Easier said than done. Vic had some vague-ass idea of where the timeshare resort was, and we drove all over the outskirts of Vegas looking for that sumbitch. I inquired if he might have an address for it. He said he thought it had a four and a six in it. I said, “No Vic, you’re thinking of your IQ.”

Well, it seems that finding this timeshare and finding naked, hot women had an over/under number of 73 years. Things were not looking good, so we called Vic’s son, Jim. At least Jim gave us a phone number for the resort.

So Vic gets on the phone and actually gets in touch with the timeshare people to give us directions. Now you would think that we would be able to use these directions and actually go find the place, wouldn’t you? You would be wrong.

The problem is I forgot to tell you a couple of particularly relevant points that you need to know to know both Vic and me a little better. Yes, we are basically pretty much perfect people. Except that we each have a flaw. Vic is hard of hearing. He is not deafer than a post. But he doesn’t hear as well as, say, a tree stump. And I — I hate to say it — also have a little flaw. I have a little stuttering problem. (Kind of like Dean Martin had a little drinking problem. Kind of like Britney Spears has a little maturity problem.) But I don’t stutter all the time. Only when I talk.

So Vic is on the phone with the timeshare lady trying to get directions and I’m standing next to him listening to him get more and more frustrated. With all the highway noise, and me helpfully stuttering in his ear, he cannot hear her. I know he’s frustrated when his ears turn red and spittle runs down his jowls and he beats his forehead into the phone booth wall embedding hair follicles in the wood. He’s yelling into the phone, his spittle covering the dry spittle of former phone users. He wants to hand me the phone. But he doesn’t.

Finally, he can’t stand it any longer. He is exasperated, completely and fully exasperated. He can’t hear the woman give him the directions. He thinks I am useless. Finally, he loudly proclaims into the phone, “Well, who do you want to talk to, lady? The one who can’t hear or the one who can’t talk?”

Yes, we finally found the place. And we found the naked women. And we won a lot of money gambling. And we bought a boat. Named it “Pinocchio.”