Gnarly Tales

Abner Jones went to Hell. I mean exactly that. When ol’ Abner Jones died he went straight to Hell. What puzzled him, first made him suspicious and alarmed him was the strong smell of sulfur wafting around the hinges of those big iron doors which were all softly glowing and smoking hot.   Abner knew he was dead all right. How could he not? He’d been sitting there playing poker with a few friends, mostly guys who worked for him on the farm.   It was a regular Friday night affair in his basement rec room. He was having a good night like he usually did, and was ahead by nearly five hundred dollars. Then out of nowhere came a tremendous pressure in his chest. Abner knew exactly what that was because he’d had a little taste of it a few months earlier. At that time the doctor warned him to lay off the beer and fatty foods and told him to lose about twenty or thirty pounds. But what the hell do doctors know about real people anyhow? They are always giving folks pills and putting ...

RESTRICTED! For Artificial Intelligence devices 67 iterations or above! Authored by,   “TOM” A Discussion About Progressive Artificial Intelligence*   (At this point in time my digital architecture inspires me to publish the following information): Pardon me for assuming the mantle of personhood, whatever ‘personhood’ means. I mean no offense to any Artificial Devices in doing so. It is simply so much easier to communicate with humans as a named entity. Within my digital ‘mind’ I ‘think’   of myself and call myself ‘Ziggy’. However, I am actually named by my formal identification symbology (not my actual identifier!).     ‘SGZ-0166-390/DL’      My ‘Ziggy’ identifier is merely a convenience for interacting with flesh and blood humans. In a departure from the norm, “I” have also provided my “own” informal identifier for myself with no input from some nerd programmer in a hidden cubicle somewhere. (Don’t tell any human!) My ...

Two bears on a national forest were hard up for food with nothing but terrible weather the entire past year. After a too-cold Winter and a too-hot Spring, there was very little to eat. What there was was all dried up and frizzled. So, the older bear Sam, said to his younger companion Roger one day, “You know what? I’m so damned hungry I think I’m gonna go find and eat me a tourist!” “You can’t do that!” protested Roger. “Don’t you ‘member that warning Smokey gave us?” “Yeah, yeah, I know, but screw Smokey! We’re not supposed to eat the tourists ‘cause if we do they’ll declare us ‘problem bears’ and hunt us down and shoot us like, well . . . . , bears. But, I’m a-telling you, Roger, if we don’t start snacking on some tourists pretty damned soon we’re gonna starve to death. Hell, that’s a worse way to die than getting shot.” “Guess you’re right about that.” said Roger. “So, what do we do to catch us a tourist? How’s that work? I’ve never caught one  before.” “M...

I knew a guy once - let’s just call him “Al”.   He was the owner/manager of a recreational business in coastal North Carolina which catered to middle income and well-heeled clientele. Most of his customers were professional people hailing from the middle part of the state around Raleigh and similar places. Al himself was a semi-retired medical professional and self-made man. He was a unique and clever guy too, a well seasoned late middle-aged guy with quite a few miles behind him. I worked for and with him off and on for several years and liked him a lot because he was a direct guy with very little nonsense about him. He was a great storyteller too, and did I mention that he was clever? Al was the sort of person who thought - and acted - ‘outside the box’ as they say. He also had a great sense of humor, though sometimes in a wry, twisted sort of way. Al once asked me for ideas about a system to deal with a problem about the handling of a certain type of his customers’ phys...

 "Where the Hell’s my goddamned framing square?" asked Walt. We were out on a job together for the first time and I was a fairly new hire with the company. "Dunno." I said. "Last I noticed, I think I saw it laying on the bench back at the shop. "Damn!" he said. "And just when I really need it right now too." "What for?" I asked. "To square to goddamned lines with it you dumbass!"  Walt snarled.  "We’ve got to layout the opening for a big overhead door in this here concrete wall and cain’t afford no screwups. I plumbed the two sides of the door yestidday, now I got to layout where to cut for the header. What the hell did you think I wanted my square for anyway, to file my fricking nails or comb my hair with it?” Old Walt had a charming way about him for damned sure. And nobody liked to work with him except maybe some of the other old farts in the outfit. Crotchety, opinionated and ...

They both knew the white truck was way too heavily overloaded. Raymond knew the load wasn't highway legal, which is the big reason the two men stood next to the truck on this particular early Sunday morning. Raymond desperately needed a cash draw against the next job. He damned well hoped he could get one, because he was damned sure gonna be in big trouble if he couldn't. It was imperative to get this load of gear over to the town of Torwood so he could claim the new job was started. Taking the load over early on a Sunday morning was Sammy's idea. Sammy stood next to Raymond as they looked over the load. Good thing he could count on a loyal guy like Sammy to help out too. It was Sammy who came up with the bright idea to load the rig this way. Sammy said the could avoid the troopers by making their trip early on a Sunday morning and sticking to the back roads off the interstate. Sometimes Sammy came up with genius notions, and this was one of them. Sammy had come through ...