I was at my desk in the cobb house working on my theory about the Bird Sightings column in the paper hiding secret terrorist messages. Someone claimed to have spotted nine snow geese at Plum Island and a Eurasian Widgeon. Come on folks, there is something fishy going on here!
Who knows what a Barrow's goldeneye looks like? Loons, grebes, goshawks, fox sparrows, catbirds, kittiwakes and for chissakes - harlequin ducks! Don't try to tell me this verbiage is not some kind of arcane code for: Let's crash Air France flight 222 into the QMII - or something sinister like that. I was trying to work out the anagram when Lardass barreled through the door, bringing with him a blast of sub-freezing air and the aroma of shit that clings to his work uniform. He ignored my annoyed look.
"Hey, the new phonebooks are here!" he announced with inordinate enthusiasm. It was always a busy day when the phone company delivered their newest issue to homes in the community. It was inevitably followed by a glut of old phone books in the dumpsters. What is more useless than last year's yellow pages?
"It's freaking crazy out there," he declared. "Some moron just dropped off a truckload of Ice at the take and leave. Ice! Why the fuck would you bring ice to the dump?"
"You should have stopped him. We don't need any more ice." I frowned sternly.
"Perhaps there was a minor bribe involved..." He feigned a look of mock incredulity. The word bribe got my attention. When I looked up, Lardass was slowly teasing a $20 bill out of his front pocket.
"Dude." I smiled approvingly "Let's go get some lunch at Tien Fu."