The Skeeter Daddle Diaries

The Commissioners up at the Port of Mabana were holding their semi-annual meeting and high stakes poker game the other night when Melvin, the self-named Porta-Potty President, introduced into the minutes the ticklish subject of tsunami debris. “The entire west side of the South End is going to be Ground Zero for all manner of invasive species and radioactive garbage and foreign junk,” he warned ominiously. “And it’s the Port’s job to anticipate this.”

Willy, the Port’s #2 man, raised $5 and his Rolling Rock, looked around the table with his best poker face — the one that broadcast to everyone he was bluffing on a loser hand — and said maybe they could get some grant money for beach clean-up, whereupon Rick, real estate agent of the year in 2011 for Windy Rear Realty’s worst sales year, opened his cards to look  a pair of jacks straight in the eyes and asked, “Who’s going to give us this money, Willy? The Feds are broke, the state’s selling its liquor stores, the county has us cleaning up its parks? And in a minute, you’re going to be broke too. I’ll see your 5 and raise you 10.”

Melvin groaned but his two pair held him in and he reluctantly pushed 15 bucks into the pot for a look at Rick’s hand, figuring both boys were bluffing. “Be a good way to promote the Port,” he motioned, tinkling the ice in his scotch. “The Port,” Willy grumbled, tossing his cards with no little disgust, “is nothing but old pilings, Mel.”

“Half of Japan is on the way headed right at us,” Melvin repeated as he raked in the pot while Rick shook his head woefully, ready to call it a night and wrap up the meeting before his losses became personal. He hadn’t sold a property in two months. And that one looked like it would flip any day. “Stop your worrying,” he muttered. “The beach will look like a Goodwill for awhile, only cheaper. Be a beachcomber’s paradise. The only downside is sales at the Last Chance Thrift will plummet for awhile. Not our problem.”

Willy brightened a bit and gestured with his beer bottle. “How about this: we hide a blown glass ball or two down by the Port, advertise the hell out of it, and they’ll clean up that beach like it was a resort hotel in Waikiki.” He killed the Rolling Rock in a grand gulp and moved to adjourn. Melvin seconded and Rick pushed away from the table. Outside in the rainy driveway, starting up his battered Toyota Camry, he could almost hear the waves churning housewares and broken furniture, appliances and broken boats. Mostly he wished he hadn’t bluffed on that last hand.

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This entry was posted on Saturday, June 23rd, 2012 at 4:08 pm and is filed under rantings and ravings. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.