I woke JZ up by phone at 7:00 AM and it took four hours for us to meet up at 9:00 AM, type of thing. Hey, we’re bachelors. Meanwhile, Alaine and I made coffee and headed into the shop, where I was quickly employed unfolding plastic bags by the hundreds. (The take-out bags, they come in a compressed bag and need to be "fluffed" before use.) JP was nowhere to be found, so Alaine lent me the Chrysler and I went looking for parts. The scooter problem was a little more complicated than the battery. There was a little pin gone in the starter, the brand new starter.
The unit is under warranty, but the shop is 27 miles away. So we loaded it on JZs old truck and drove to Jimbos. Why Jimbos? Because my place is 3 miles from the mechanic, Jimbos is 11 blocks. But all that was late in the evening. We spent the day catching up on things, mostly at Quizno’s. There is always work to do there. They keep my duties really light because I’ll never convince them I’m able to handle medium for short stretches. Remember, when I got out of Mt. Sinai, that is the first place I headed back in 2003. JZ still insists he is not musical. Yeah, if he’d let me teach him, today we’d be on stage and getting more than the next 50 guys.
I spent the afternoon unfolding plastic bags. Challenging work for an MBA, don’t you think? Those take-out bags come in a compressed bale and have to be peeled apart before use. Ah, and you thought the staff just grabbed one off the rack for your sandwich. No, no, Pollyanna, there is somebody like me gets them ready one by one.
Eventually we wound up at his dad’s house, where by coincidence half the family showed up. It was like a reunion. With the wives and kids, we’re talking some 17 people. They are basketball fans, a game I don’t really understand, partly because it is strictly a spectator sport unless you are abnormally tall and lanky. Anyway, they all went for dinner, JZ and I loaded up the carcass of the scooter and took I-95 back north. This is the first time he’s seen my new place. I had taken my battery to Sears to test it. Scooters do not come with a battery. When you buy, they charge one up for you. The guy who owns that [battery] shop used to live nearby me in Venezuela. We’d never met but we knew the same towns and such, like El Tigre and Puerto Pirutu. His father owned an oil distribution company and I recalled the logo on the trucks. Around 1999, the father sold the company to a Dutch concern for 13 million dollars and the rest of the family, to this day, has not ever seen a penny of it.
But not surprisingly, the guy had his own shop, was leery of government records, all his inventory was paid for cash, his address was a box number, he uses no credit, and does not ever keep all his eggs in one basket. You might be prompted to ask what does the rest of the world know that American’s don’t. We ordered up some real Venezuelan food while waiting for delivery on that battery. That, and the charge time.
Later, JZ and I went out for a few beers and chasing women. All we got was the beers. Still, it is the longest visit we’ve had since Xmas. I don’t care for the gambling casinos, particularly the way their advertisement portray the place as entertainment and show the building full of sexy women. Or at least that television fantasy version of sexy women: She’s a housewife, but does a little modeling on the side, the frumpy broad’s daydream. One thing they all do have in common is the same hairdresser.
There is no way JZ and I will be doing much travel any time soon. He is bound up working 6 days a week, including the upkeep on the family mansion. That’s the place it took us three months to paint. He’s been neglecting his own place and his truck. Ah, but after my stern lecture in the Everglades, he always has new tires on it these days.
Last, Mr. Will is no more. He passed away last Sunday. Not many details, but he may have just made it back home to his family in Georgia for a day or two. His last words were “Tell Jackie if anything happens to me.”
[Author's note 2020 - Jackie passed away around a year later.
