Leaderboard

Boy howdy. Russian roulette with a 454 casull?? Damn. I know if you lose the game it's going to leave a mess for someone to clean up, but useing a 454? Son, there's a mess, and then there's a mess.

My old Landrover air conditioning - Flaps Up or Flaps Down

I 8 Sum Pi.

That looks like one of those college fraternities my buddy told me about. Either I Tappa Kegg, or I Bitea Pie.

And is WAAAY ahead in today's market!!!!!!!!

That guy's an idiot. She's a keeper.

Just a snake eating a croc

Stalking shoplifters!

Trying to stem crime

Speed dating New Zealand style

Fruit, cream, or pizza?

678. A QUIET VOICE Sheriff Linn Keller eased his long, tall carcass down onto the Deacon's bench in front of the Sheriff's office. Why it was called a Deacon's bench was beyond him: he wasn't sure the Deacon ever set there -- ever -- and the Deacon generally set with his wife, in the pews, during church: no, he reckoned it was just called that, and that was good enough. Linn set down on clean, smooth, sanded and varnished wood; he wiped it down every morning, before parking his backside, because the smooth surface tended to gather dust, and he had no wish to have white dust marks across his back and across his hinder. Behind and above him, two wanted dodgers, neither for any great amount of money; the descriptions were vague enough, the reward small enough, the engravings that printed the wanted man's face, were of such poor quality he doubted they would ever be matched up against the actual criminal. Linn pulled out a Barlow knife and a whet stone. It was not out of the ordinary for men to whittle and spit here, to tell outrageous lies with carefully straight faces; Linn could whittle with the best of them, but try as he might, he just could not make a working set of pliers out of a single piece of wood: he'd probably reduced half a cord of wood to shavings, over the years, for he was a hard headed man, contrary enough to keep trying until it worked, but try as he might, the trick escaped him. He spit on the stone and began to work on the Barlow's edge. A man Linn knew was coming up the board walk, a man who walked as if he was worn out, done up, ready to quit: he walked as if each step was approaching his very limit, and yet he kept on coming, steadily, one slow pace after another. Linn never looked up from his sharpening. "Might as well have a set," he suggested quietly. "You look done up, friend." The man stopped, sagged: he turned, set down on the other end of the bench, leaned his head back against the logs, heedless of accumulated dust: in truth, his hat was in such sad shape, a coat of dust might have improved it. His rough, shoulder-frayed coat was not much better, nor were his scraped, scuffed, heel-worn boots. Two men sat in companionable silence. Linn tried the Barlow's edge on the back of his arm: he raised the blade, puffed his breath over it, and arm hairs, freshly shaved from the back of the lawman's left wrist, floated out into the still air. "Damn." The man shook his head. "I cain't put an edge on a knife to save me." Linn folded the Barlow, stuck it back in his pocket. "Let's have it," he said. "I'll edge it for you." A clasp knife was handed over, nearly new; Linn tried the edge, nodded. "I could ride this one from here to Buffalo and not get cut." The man nodded, his hat falling to the side: he ignored it rather than go to the effort of picking it up. Linn looked over at him. "You look like you been drug backwards over some bad road." The man stared sadly across the street, his gaze apparently looking at something several miles past the opposite structures. Steel whispered secrets to shaped stone; silence grew, then: "You et?" "Naw." "I ain't neither." The Sheriff did not usually sound quite so unlettered; he tended to tailor his speech for his audience. "Reckon the Silver Jewel's got somethin' ain't been et yet." The man closed his eyes, leaned his head back against the logs again. "When's the last time you got a good night's sleep?" "Don't recall." Linn pulled out another stone, a coarser one; it was going to take some work to set an edge on this old slay, he knew, and the best start was with his harsher sharpening stone. "Say, Sheriff?" Linn looked sidelong over at him, looked back to his work. "How's a man get his name off a wanted dodger?" Linn considered the knife's edge, set down the coarse stone: it hadn't taken as much effort as he'd expected. "A man could go back to wherever sent out them dodgers in the first place and either square up what's wrong, or tell 'em they got the wrong man." A grunt. "Fat lot of good that'll do." "How do the particulars stack up?" "How do you mean?" "Well, a man could ride the territory and tear down every dodger for that pa'tickelar outlaw, but that's a lot of ridin'." Another grunt. "A man could take a close look at the pa'tickelars and see what don't fit." Linn could feel the unspoken surprise -- illiteracy was not at all uncommon, and it was possible this fellow was unable to read, and either determined for himself he was the one on the wanted dodger, or someone was lying to him about it. Linn stood, turned. "Take that one rattair," he said. "That's a poor likeness to start with. I'd sure as hell not arrest on that man's picture. That engravin' looks like it was cyarved in a copper plate with a dull crick gravel and then printed." The other fellow stood, his breath hissing from between yellowed, clenched teeth. "This'un says sometin' about a scar on one wrist and a pa'tickelar finger, and one at the belt line left side where he'd healed up from an infection." Linn tested the edge, nodded, handed the blade back. "Try that one, an' don't let me catch you scrapin' rust off anvils with that!" "Damn, Sheriff," the fellow said admiringly, "I could shave with this!" "I've shaved with mine," Linn nodded, "but it's not so uncomfortable with soap and hot water and some shavin' cream spun up." The man reached out, knocked one of the dodgers with his knuckles. "You don't reckon this one is talkin' about me?" Linn looked at the dodger, looked at his guest. "You got them same scars?" The man bared his wrists -- like most men thereabouts, he was tanned where his hide stuck out of his shirt sleeves, but the shadowed flesh was pale, if unwashed. "I don't see none." "How 'bout that finger?" The digit was presented: "Nope." "Then you ain't him." The Sheriff's voice was pitched for reassurance: he was no stranger to troubled men coming to him for advice. "You ever been mistaken for someone else, Sheriff?" Linn laughed -- a good easy laugh, a flash of even white teeth -- "Last I was in Denver, some fellow come up and just wrung my hand and Judge this and Your Honor that, come to find out he was a new lawyer in town and I patted him on the shoulder and said I looked forward to hearin' his presentation in court and he went just a-struttin' down the street like he'd met the King himself." Linn thrust his chin toward the Silver Jewel. "Right now I'm hungry and I hate to eat alone. 'Twould be a blessin' on me if you'd join me, I'm buyin'." He clapped a hand on the man's shoulder, ignoring the minor cloud of dust that rose with the effort. "Then there's the time I went back East and got mistaken for a Presbyterian preacher. Damn near performed a weddin' on a riverbank, until the real sky pilot showed up and rescued me!" Two men laughed and went inside, one intent on assuaging his hunger, the other's soul considerably less troubled, thanks to the words of a pale eyed man with a quiet voice.

.... fine, .... but stir a little Vegemite and chopped onion into the mashed potato ...... .... and use Bacon loaf instead of that horrible devon .... wbj, helping make great recipes even better, or, at least, edible .......