Reverse Mohawk II and the Blessed Can Opener!

(Continued) Running for my life, I was trapped like a rat that had been backed into one of the corners of our rattlesnake cages upstairs on the third floor - only this was in the kitchen and the snake was Ulrich. I had nowhere to go, Ulrich was wound tighter than a "rattler" ready to strike and I knew that I was a gonner.
To think that this was all about throw-up at church that left me nothing left in my stomach to defend myself with - no super powers.

That's when I saw it!

And that's when I remembered, and that is when I heard angels singing.

The "Blessed" can opener had been swung away from the wall and latched down into it's lock position.

I remembered how many times I had barely made it underneath that thing and almost had the skin on the top of my head scalped off by its sharp underbelly.

And... it was right there in the sudden flash that I was struck by divine Epiphany. Okay, maybe it wasn't so divine, but it was right at that moment that I REMEMBERED THAT ULRICH WAS ONE INCH TALLER THAN I WAS!

I screamed for help as I ran around mom who just stood in the middle of the room like a zombie and did nothing.  She had already changed enough diapers that if they were stacked on top of each other- it would rival Mount Everest. She had already sewn a million costumes for Halloween, she had attended too many parent conference meetings...she had already stopped ten thousand fist fights...she had already been to the police department to bail out my brothers a hundred and eighty-seven times;  she had already been to the zoo one too many times; locked in a car with a zillion-screaming-farting-fighting kids and traveled across country six times too many and she had been to Salton Sea way too many times.  She had already typed too many term papers for procrastinating teens; she had already saved me and my brothers from killing each other about a billion times... and had watched the Lennon Sisters on the Lawrence Welk show 8,000 times too many...and now her eyes were glassy as she stood three - having earned the privilege to check out.

I screamed, for help, but I knew I was on my own. The good news was, I was able to use her as a body shield as I ran around the outside of her AND DIRECTLY UNDER THE LATCHED-DOWN CAN OPENER!


The can opener caught my helmet and nearly threw me backwards, but luckily the Sugar-Water concoction I had plastered my hair with (my dad's invention for cheap hair gel - blog post 9/21/13) cracked and I...Yes I, little Markie D, RAN UNDERNEATH!

                          (Dad's sugar-hair-gel concoction seen to the right)

I heard the crack! And I heard the scream and I heard the thud and I saw the blood. Yep, I ran directly underneath that good 'O can opener - (my friend) - which had caught Ulrich straight across the cranium from forehead to calic like the bloody furrow of  a deep rut in a field plowed by a ruthless tractor.

Ulrich laid on ground with a bloody, reverse Mohawk. Mom didn't even see anything happen, she just stepped over his body and walked up stairs with her Carnation Instant Breakfast drink, asking the good Lord why the Dahlins couldn't be more like the Blasers or like perfect Lennons across the street (she still believed that they were the best Catholics in the entire universe (post 4/28/13).

I think she thought the news of my vomiting in Mass was going to reach the ears of the Pope at the Vatican and that we were going to be unpleasantly invited to join the Lutheran church...i.e.  "Excommunication."

With broom still clutched in his fist...Ulrich had come back into consciousness and had begun to slowly stagger to his feet. "UH OH!"

I said a quick "Mea Culpa" and some Pig Latin... "ownay Iay eednay otay etgay outay ofay erehay... Oray Iay AM DEAD!

I ran out the back door.. asked the Veloci-Rooster to protect me as I darted into the chicken coop...shut the door, clucked like hen and said another prayer- figuring that I deserved payback of Biblical proportions.  I knew this wasn't the end of it, especially since Ulrich would have to wear bandages on his head for the next two months at Saint Monica's High School and that I had ten-fold coming back unto me for the giving thusly unto Ulrich.

Amen!

The next story involves this boat (and as you can see in this picture it was old - 8 years ago), Chewbacca, a whale, a storm, Gherhing The Great and Sister Edith's prayer - AGAIN!

There Was No Way Out!

Star date: Saturday September 10th 1966 The third longest day in the history of the world next to the day I was left behind at Salton Sea (blog Post) and the day the sun stood still in Joshua's time (recorded for us in the Bible).

8:00-10:00 am So far this morning "Chapped-lipped-Jimmy" and Tommy came over to help me on the finishing touches on one of the 7 wonders of the Fort-Building World ! (Blog pos 7-29)


10:00 am-12:00 noon The older boys woke up and began working on a way to make the "fire escape" pole even more diabolical, by hooking it up to the dangling electrical wires that dangerously hung out of the kitchen wall, which we used to electrocute unsuspecting guest, girl friends and even a Saint Marks Catholic school nun. 

Zit King or oldest my brother, "his highness King Gustav," came pulling up in his 9 billion horsepower legendary Ford "Rat Killer" that woke up the neighborhood for at least a quarter of a mile around...including Gherhing the Great, who made his way over to my house.

My house was the center of the universe (at least that is the way it seemed to an 11 year old.   

Chewbacca, my second oldest brother, while standing in the azalea bush, had the runaway rattlesnake climb up his pant leg and precariously snuggle up with his boy parts. He threw Puke Breathe, 3rd or 4th oldest brother (depending who you count) onto the top of the fort, trapping "booger-slurping Jimmy" inside.

Gustav threw the switch, electrocuting both Chewbacca and the rattlesnake in order to save Chewbacca's life. It worked!The boys were able to pull the pants off of the dazed Chewbacca and removed the stunned rattlesnake.

12:00 noon - 1:00 While putting the rattlesnake back, the hideous and dangerous Iguana from hell (AKA Del Diablo) got away. It was Chewy's fault. He freaked out when he got pissed on by a "harmless"garter snake, which subsequently sunk its sharp fangs into my arm, which slapped Chewy in the face when I swung around in alarm which caused Chewy to cry out "Ave Marie" in his native tongue who then tripped over a stick which opened the latch!

the dreaded Iguana "Del Diablo" assaulted Chewy then fled down three flights of stairs, across the street and into poor Mrs. Tripp's house and became an uninvited roommate in the wall heater(blog post 8/1/2013) 

 1:00 - 2:00 pm When the Wolf Pack (that's my brothers) all came back across the street, little Johnny Gillamonster (pictured below), stole his mother's Nova and broke the drive-shaft trying to show off to the hordes on Harding Avenue. 

The Wolf Pack viewed that unfortunate event as fortuitous bounce of luck as they bankrolled it, into a serendipitous distraction to stage an accident involving my best-est 5th grade buddy - Gherhing the Great.  When the good-hearted Helms Bakery delivery man came to check on my friend who was under the front bumper of the disabled automobile (with an entire bottle of ketchup spread all over his chest and around his head -  the Wolf Pack raided the delivery truck of its ever elusive delectable cream-filled eclairs (Blog post 8/3/2013)

With traces of cream still hanging from his lips and hair covered in ketchup, Gherhing and I discovered the stinky poop that Jimmy left in the "bathroom" corner of the fort.

As we filled in the four foot pit with dirt, the boys decided to terrorized my mom's guest - Jerry "TT" (blog post).  It was psychological warfare. They ran up the front porch stairs, in through the wide-open front door, past the living room interrupting mom and her guest! The long hair hippy-want-a-be's made sure to wave as they scurried past the living room, then proceeded past the fouled mouthed fowl - the Mynah Bird - that was taught to cuss, up three more flights of stairs - to the third floor where they picked up speed- running the length of the long back room as if it were a airport runway for a takeoff. The boys then leaped out of the third story window some thirty-forty feet from sure death below like suicidal flying squirrels.

Over and over they did this making sure that Jerry "TT" and mom saw their faces...in each interruption as they passed by the living room. 

And that's where we left off.

2:00 - 2:30pm 
Tired of the entire interruption-affair, upset and frustrated mom came to the end of her rope. This is where she invoked THE CLAUSE!  The Clause rarely ever failed!  The only reason it didn't work at the Zoo when we let all the monkeys out, was because Ulrich said, he couldn't hear her over the adulations of the adoring crowd that he had been entertaining while precariously perched on the edge of monkey habitat (blog post 4/29/2013).

What Jerry couldn't figure out, was how on earth he kept seeing some of the same faces as they ran in through the front door and up the stairs.


IT WAS IMPOSSIBLE: How could a hairy tribe member, run in through the front door, head up stairs and come back in again through the front door? To Jerry this was like something out of the TWILIGHT ZONE. The scheme had the effect the boys desired; not only did it confuse him, but also incited him to anger. "YES!" They got got into his mushy head.  They owned him and they knew it.



Mom stood to her feet and screamed. "UNDER-PAIN-OF-MORTAL-SIN...You will stop that this instance! Do you hear me?" The only problem was that, several of the kids were not Catholic and did not share the same fear of purgatory like the rest of us...AND Gherhing the Great and I had been outside putting dirt in the hole, which was once a fort that rivaled the Sphinx in Egypt.

With blatant disregard to "The Clause" Dooh-Dooh Pants came back through for about the fourth time when Jerry took this act of disobedience as permission to chase down a few of the boys (he might of have some ulterior motive as well - yuck!). In both anger and secret delight, Jerry launched himself after Dooh-Dooh Pants and chased him up the stairs. Dooh-Dooh Pants made sure not to out run Jerry, but wanted to make Jerry believe he had a chance at catching him. Up, up, up, up they ran. See Jerry run. Run Dooh-Dooh Pants run!

When they reached the top floor Jerry knew, he had his prey in sight. Dooh-Dooh Pants was trapped in the long back bedroom - the very same room that held all the snake cages (last post). THERE WAS NO WAY OUT. Jerry had him right where he wanted him as a sinister smile of evil delight broke across his face - like the Grinch when he looked down on poor Whoville after stealing all the Christmas presents. 

 Dooh-Dooh Pants contorted his face in contrived fear allowing Jerry "The Toucher" to come within a foot of two.  As Jerry "TT" approached with that icky look on his face... Dooh-Dooh Pants face lite up with a diabolical grin of its own and took off running.  With no where to go, Jerry knew he had Dooh-Dooh Pants trapped.

Dooh-Dooh Pants "cut the cheese" and to the utter dismay and unbelief of Jerry "TT" threw himself out the window.  Jerry correctly reasoned that Dooh-Dooh Pants would rather commit suicide than to be caught alone with him.Leaving Jerry in a cloud of fish-stick and spoiled spaghetti stench Dooh-Dooh Pants flung himself out of that third story window jumping for the pole that perilously dangled from the tippy-top corbel of the old turn-of-the-century house.

Out Dooh-Dooh Pants flew and down he slid, falling the last six feet or so onto the azalea bush below. Up he looked and grinned in satisfaction to the glaring dissatisfied stare of Jerry "TT".

Enraged and empowered by the clause..Jerry "TT was now raging to catch a teenage boy.

Jerry came back down the stairs and stood in the front entry, just waiting for his next victim to come through the front door... the Mynah Bird had some choice words it parroted to Jerry. Jerry was standing there with hands clenched ready to ring the neck of a morally innocent bird when Gherhing the Great and I came in through THE BACK DOOR wanting to get into the fun.

This is where everything went terribly wrong! Gherhing the Great did manage to escape and slide down the pole, but the on the way up the stairs, I decided to zig when I should have zagged! Gherhing was moving too slow and I made a ill fated dash for the front room of the second floor that was filled with junk...

Bad choice, Markie d. Bad Choice!


Meanwhile the Lennon's on the corner... the famous Lennon Sisters and siblings were all securely tucked  away from the mayhem inside the safety of their house.

Next time, see if Markie D escapes the clutches of Jerry "TT" and Chewy's fateful fall!

Until then Know: Du är älskad!

Day of the Iguana. Del Diablo

Saturday 12:00 - 1:00pm, The Long Day continued.  Dooh-Dooh Pants held the diamondback rattlesnake as tight as he could around its neck with one hand and gripped the 5 foot body with the other while rushing back up four flight of stairs. He carefully zigged and zagged around the piles of junk that had accumulated on the steps in the past 24 hours as if they were landmines. By the time he got to the second floor the electrocuted snake had come back to life and began to put up a fight.

Several of us went along with him to the third floor as part of the recon mission to return the deadly viper.  Built into the dormer-walls of the long back bedroom (where most of the older boys slept) was a reptile cage that ran the entire length of the room.

The reptile habitat had been segmented into five sections. One was for poisonous snakes; one was for regular garden-variety snakes, one was for Chuckawallas and leopards lizards (crawly things that we caught at Salton Sea); in one section we raised mice for food; and the final one was for...

                               ...Iguana Del Diablo

Del Diablo was no ordinary pretty-green variety of iguana that you could buy down at Allan's Aquarium on Lincoln Blvd. NO! This Iguana was the oldest, meanest, ugliest looking iguana in the entire world. It literally looked like it climbed out of the pit of hell. The name of this hideous dinosaur came from the smuggler the boys bought it from. 

I think this was the spawn from the lying creature that Adam and Eve encountered in the Garden of Eden.

Anyway... the boys had decided that we had to move the rattlers into the other cage, since this had been the third poisonous felon to escape in the last six months.  Now, that we had to swap all the rattlers into the cage where we had kept the king and garter-snakes; it took the entire Wolf Pack...to juggle the menagerie and to wrangle the other poisonous "sidewinders" from their domicile.

I promise it wasn't my fault! Chewy was the one who began all the trouble - really! I think that's why King Gustav threw the electrical switch when it was Chewy's turn down the "fire escape" (That's not until 3:00 - I'll tell you about that later).

Anywho... Kleghorn and Primo had managed to get a hold of the other two rattlesnakes that were being evicted by the use of a special stick that looked like a Y... and the three boys with the rattlesnakes wisely kept their distant while Chewy, Ulrick and Puke-Breath hunted down the four other occupants of second cage. These four snakes were perfectly harmless, so what could go wrong? 

Have you ever said those words out loud and at the very moment they crossed over the threshold of your lips, you knew it was the wrong thing to say - like a jinx! Yeah, like that! Chewy was from Mexico and said he knew ALL about snakes. He pulled the harmless garter snake from the cage like he was an expert and the awesome snake pee'd on him. "Expert" Chewy freaked out and threw the snake at me. I don't like snakes, but had to pretend not to be afraid because we're supposedly undaunted Vikings - remember that part? Well, neither did I.

The crazy snake didn't just land in my arms...NO...it landed teeth first! Both fangs embedding themselves as deep as they possibly could into what little flesh I had on my boney 11-year-old arms. At the time I only knew how to say "ouch" in one language... and so I screamed as the non-venomous viper dangled from my arm. I swung around and the snake swung straight out around me as I did several full revolutions; swinging and biting my tongue - not really sure how the thing was ever going to come off. The snake hit Chewy in the face and screeching, he stumbled over one of the rattlesnake sticks... which tripped the latch on CAGE NUMBER 5.

Iguana Del Diablo hissed and sprang for Chewy's leg, who danced like a...um...ah...I'm not sure what he danced like...because it wasn't very...um... how do you say...not masculine by any stretch of the imagination?! With the black ugly beast-of-hell attached to his jeans, he screamed, and cried, and jumped up and down, and kept shouting "Ave Maria"  louder than the honking noise that booger-slurping Jimmy makes.

Gustav was going to grab the insidious looking creature, but before he got the chance, Chewy shook it off his leg and the "creature from hell" took off running for the stairs. Ulrich slapped Chewy to knock some sense into him as the boys still had to get the rattlers into their new cage and I still had to get free from the garter snake that was still dangling by its fangs which were sunk even further into the tender flesh of my  left arm.

Del Diablo flew down three flights of stairs past the foul mouthed mynah-bird, "Dirty Bird. Dirty bird."
"Shut the front door" Tony yelled to Pinky who was halfway in, but too thick headed to respond quickly. Before Pinky knew what hit him the the devil-lizard tore across the porch and nearly leaped all six stairs to the front yard.               You know what? The Addams Family had nothing on us!

Several of the neighbors had heard Chewy screaming and came out to see what the Dahlin raucous was all about  - this time! As  usual Mr. Steadman yelled to his wife, "No wonder lions eat their young. Lock the doors honey!" The Nargies, the Blasers, the Lennons and the Tripps were all watching the show. "This is better than street cleaning!"(blog Post "Cirque De Soleil," 7-13-2013) Ricky Tripp said, prematurely to his older sister who were standing on their front lawn watching the show.  The demon lizard shot across the street with a bunch of blonde-haired hippy-types in hot pursuit. Turns out that Darlene and her brother Ricky made a big mistake. They forgot to shut the front door.  Before Mrs. Tripp could say, "Bob's your uncle" that lizard hurtled right through that open door and onto that green shag carpet followed by a dozen Dahlin boys and friends. After a clumsy couple circles around the living room turning over tables and knocking over lamps and things and a similar destructive loop around the kitchen, the wicked reptile shot up the small opening into the base of the wall heater and wedged himself there.

The boys tried to flush out the uninvited guest by turning on the furnace to full blast, but the spawn of Satan gave a sinister grin of satisfaction to the pursuing Wolf Pack as it dug its claws into the heating tubes as though it intended on staying for a quite a while.

So we caught one, but lost another one.  Sorry Mrs. Tripps. Chewbacca said they should be thankful it was only DEL DIABLO in the heater and not a poisonous rattler up a pant leg.  I don't think they took any comfort in that at all.

With all that excitement over and the two deep puncture wounds in my arm wrapped in a sock secured with masking tape, good O' Gherhing and Great I decided to head into the backyard to see if we could salvage the fort!

Oh, just so you know - in this picture if you look over the window on your right - you can see what eventually became of the Diamond Back Rattlesnake.

Today when people around the world exclaim, "Shut...the front door!" Now you know where that expression came from.We invented it way back then... and Mrs Tripp could be heard saying it over and over again!

(Ricky Tripp, thank you for this great memory.  Markie d)

Electrified Rattlesnake Mayhem

"As it is written in the Book of Jashar.        The sun stopped in the middle of the sky and delayed going down about a full day. There has never been a day like it before or since..." 

Star Date: September 10th, 1966.  The Bible records a day the sun stood still... and this Saturday had the makings of such a day.

Captain's Log: This very, very, very long day includes:
            AM  8:00-10:00   Welcome to Hotel Crazy   (Last blog post)
                                                   Honking Jimmy and the incredibly chapped lips
                    10:00-12:00  Electrified Rattlesnake Mayhem 
                                                   Discovering the rattlesnake while electrifying the "fire escape"
            PM  12:00-1:00    Day of the Iguana
                                                   Catch one and lose another - the poor Trips!
                    1:00 - 2:00    The Dreadful Discovery: What Jimmy left behind
                                                    Jimmy literally thought we meant bathroom.
                     2:00-2:30     Fire Pole Terrorism: The Not-So-Great Escape
                                                     Chased by Jerry "TT" (See last blog post) Not Good!                           
                     3:00- 4:00    Chewy's Free Fall.
                                                   The switch gets turned on, mom rushes Chewy to the Hospital
                     4:00-5:00     The Great Escape.
                                                   "The Rat Killer" verses the Venice Police Department...
                                                      ...and the stupid hitchhikers!

                    Time out for french fries. We had to eat sometime (and gather resources). 

                     6:30-7:30     The Prank on Edna's Porch
                                                    The whole stinking shooten-match
                     8:30-9:30      Burning Down the Lennon Sister's House
                                                    What happens when a homemade Chinese lantern goes very wrong!
 
10:00 AM. The peaceful jungle on the third floor was suddenly alive when dad beat the ceiling and walls with a  broom handle to wake up the Wolf Pack. The hot Oatmeal he had made was now nothing more than a lump of cold gruel.

Jimmy was still hanging out in the fort probably slurping the boogers and Vaseline that lathered together on his upper lip. Tommy had run home in fear and Gherhing the Great came by when he heard Gustav's "Rat Killer."   The excitement was just beginning. Gustav didn't dare "hot-rod" down Harding, because of what Mr. Lennon did to Leland's car with a well placed golf-ball using his 5 iron, but that didn't keep Gustav from waking up Venice with the roar of the billion horsepower he had under the hood of his rather nondescript outside packaging of that old 56 Ford (deception at its finest).

I told Gherhing the Great (my 5th grade buddy from Saint Marks) that it wasn't safe inside - at least not for me, because of Milk Wars (blog post 7 13 2013). So I kept Gherhing the Great at bay until the Wolf Pack finished their food fight and emerged from the back door to begin their diabolical plan of electrifying the "fire escape" pole they installed years earlier that dangled precariously from a tippy-top corbel at the peak of the roof. 

                       Here is a picture from years earlier!

and years before that...

                                                       ...and years before that!







It appears that we liked to climb and fight and hang on to things that would cause irreparable damage if we fell - hence all the broken bones and the need for a hospital bed in the dining room (last blog post). Putting ourselves at risk seemed to be in our DNA.




Making the flying leap out the back window of our three story house had ceased to thrill them and they felt compelled to come up with some brilliant plan in order to satisfy their sweet tooth for peril. With Gustav there you can bet it would included something to do with electricity... since they had already found out a way to electrify me, John Masson and one of the nuns from Saint Marks Catholic grammar school.

With king Gustav's help they employed the bare electrical wires that hung out of the kitchen wall (blog post 7 11, 2013 "Shocking") with bunch of jumper cables he had wired through a crude switch.

The pole, however, missed the ground by about six feet, which still made the final leap to the ground pretty hairy for someone my size. Below the pole was an old Azalea bush that helped cushion the landing... while Puke Breath was standing on Chewbacca's shoulder attaching the jumper cables... that is when we made the most terrifying discovery...or should I say, that is when the missing rattle snake discovered us. Well, not really us  - but Chewbacca. Turns out that this just happened to be the hiding spot of choice for the fugitive rattlesnake.  Since Chewbacca's feet were glued to the ground with Puke Breath standing on his shoulders, the snake decided to seek refuge up Chewbacca's pant leg.

Chewbacca stiffened and screamed as the snaked slithered northward towards his boy parts. He vaulted Puke Breath off his shoulders who landed 8 feet away on top of my new fort crashing the roof in on top of Jimmy who was still inside. Jimmy Honked letting the boys know he was trapped underneath.

Honk!

No one had any idea what was going on with Chewbacca as he froze like a concrete pillar and pointed to his pants. The Wolf Pack grew frustrated as they decided to tackle him and take him down. Chewbacca turned slowly and the Band of Brothers could see the snake slithering up towards his crotch.

Chewbacca was dead. There was just no way to rescue the doomed 18 year old.  The flustered tribe couldn't come up with any way to coax a deadly and agitated rattlesnake out of someone britches?  In a snide comment Dooh-Dooh Pants sarcastically said, "Why don't we electrocute him."

"That's it" Gustav said.
"What's it?" Dooh-Dooh Pants said.
"What you said!" Gustav said.
"What did I say?" Dooh-Dooh Pants asked.

"We'll electrocute them!" Gustave said, snapping fingers and beginning to bark out orders.

"Them?" Chewbacca asked fearfully discering the plural in the word "them." At this moment he felt he would rather take his chances with the deadly viper that had begun taking up residence in his crotch. "No" he begged, trying not to move his lips or any part of his body, but it was too late.

Dooh-Dooh Pants was already in place with jumper cables ready to forcefully make contact to Chewbacca's exposed forearms at Gustav's command. "Now!" shouted Gustav as Dooh Dooh Pants touched the metal ends to Chewbacca like paddles of a electronic defibrillator.

Chewbacca screamed as all that long blonde hair shot straight up, he stiffened and keeled over as if dead.

The boys rushed in and descended on him like a pack of wolves on a downed bear.  They unzipped his pants and pulled them down to his ankles in a split second. As Chewbacca laid unconsciousness (like I usually did after one of his infamous "Templates" - blog post 6 24, 2014 "Template of Doom") Dooh-Dooh Pants, our official snake wrangler, had the stunned rattler around the neck so it couldn't strike with its deadly teeth and carefully began to transport it back upstairs to the cages up on the third floor.

Meanwhile, Chewbacca came to (that was good news), but staggered to his feet in nothing but his tightly-whities...tripping over the pants that had been pulled down around his ankles. At least mom didn't have to make a trip to the emergency room.

Mind you, I did take great literary license in this story, as I conflate the big picture of several stories and put them together. I think, however, you're beginning to get an idea of what life was like at my house i.e. "Hotel Crazy"  (I also changed the names to protect the innocent - or should I say guilty).  







                   
                                                   

Something between Vampires and Frankenstein

A look at the blossoming Wolf Pack. 

Welcome to dinner at my house.

(Continued from last blog post "Fish Stick Fiasco") With the "beware-lost-rattlesnake " flag flying over the house and Kleghorn clanging the old alarm on the back porch, Dad walked into the house to find the Wolf Pack in hysterics. Four eyes and the girls were screeching, the mynah bird was cussing and the rest of the Viking brood were hair pulling, standing on couches and climbing walls and up on top of each other for safety. It looked like a fight at a hockey game had broken out. A couple of the boys were hanging from the molding over the doors and a couple were clinging to the wainscoting not wanting their feet to touch the ground. It was a sight! It was a typical Friday night at the Dahlin house.

As soon as I heard my dad, I stopped shaking the baby rattle and returned to the mayhem inside. Dad stopped at the wooden double-sliding doors that separated the dining room from the living room and just shook his head in utter dismay. He watched the hysterics looking for an explanation. Ulrich...tried to explain that the fugitive rattlesnake was somewhere in the room.

"KLEGHORN!" dad yelled, as a command to quit sounding the ancient and bullet ridden firehouse alarm.

Kleghorn joined the others in the dining room who had grown silent trying to prove to dad that they had heard the deadly snake slithering around the downstairs. There wasn't a sound, not even one shake of a rattler's tail. I smiled (mostly on the inside - afraid of giving my secret away). Dad shook his head, rolled his eyes and scavenged the kitchen for any leftover fish sticks as things returned to the normal high-decibel hullabaloo.

Being thoroughly embarrassed, the big brave hippies had something to prove to their girlfriends and began hatching their plan for the "Albino Camp Hike." (I'm pretty sure this isn't politically correct now-a-days, but this was the cultural/historical setting back then).

Back then, none of us were really sure what Albinos were. In the hierarchy of things that we had to be afraid of...we thought they were somewhere between Vampires and Frankenstein, right up there with ghost - way above lost rattlesnakes.

This Albino-camp-hike-thing they did was like a snipe hunt, combined with camp-fire stories about the "one armed hatchet murderer" and "submarine races."   Back then I was too young to knew what submarine races were and still thought snipe were real.

How perfect was this for the older boys...this was like shooting fish in a barrel. They would take all their girl friends on a late night hike behind that movie star - Ronald Reagan's house up on Amalfi drive.  They would walk that old dirt road lined with eucalyptus trees with these girls who were scared spit-less holding tightly to arms of the brave Viking men and crew.    Oh boy... could it get any better for those guys! 

They sat around the living room and told the girls about how dangerous the hike would be!

One of the guys tried to explain what Albinos were to the girls and said, they were half human and drank blood.

Gustav said they had thin transparent skin like desert geckos and could only come out at night.

Bjorn said the Albinos had to be locked up in this secure facility to keep them from straying off and eating the flesh of other humans.

Knut agreed saying they had razor sharp teeth.

Ulrich said they had red laser-eyes and if you looked into them you would be disintegrated. When Ulrich said this, three of the boys swatted him on the head...for exaggerating.

Dooh-Dooh Pants talked about their boney hands and pointed fingernails.

In broken Spanish, Chewy said they made the sound of the chachalaca.

They hadn't even left the house yet and the girls were already terrified and clinging to the boys.

My dad looked across the table and winked at me as though he had his own spark of genius.

The herd of wild hair and anxious felines jumped into the black Lincoln we called the "Scuba-Mobile" and headed off for Santa Monica Canyon.

Down, down, down the long dirt road they walked terrified in the darkness of the moonless night. Fearful and on edge the silly girls practically wrapped themselves around the brave, fearless Vikings. Cautiously they forged ahead along the path, wary of Albinos that might have escaped and lie in wait for fresh human flesh. With every step, hearts pounded in rapid palpitations. Fear had even gripped the older boys, but they pretended to be brave. Approaching the gates, the eclectic congregation peered through the wrought iron bars searching for the elusive Albinos.

Ulrich saw white figures swaying in the gentle ocean breeze and let out a blood curdling scream. Panic ensued, girls cried and feet fled. The mob ran hysterically back towards the large black car...when the very worst thing imaginable happened. Albinos had managed to squeeze through the bars and indeed laid in ambush.

I'm sorry, but I'll have to finish the gory and frightening details in my next terrifying blog post...

Until then...  Vet att du är älskad  

Friday Fish Stick Fiasco and the big scare.

It was only Friday on  Markie D's first week of fifth grade. His first week of surviving...Chewbacca's new invention of the "Template of Doom" (blog post June 26, 2013) and having to survive Sister Godzilla was coming near an end, but there is still a lot more that takes place between now and Monday morning. Yet to come is: Friday Fish sticks fiasco...Albino camp raid...poop in the fort...Jerry and the fire escape...another broken arm...the run-away-Iguana...and the near burning down of the famous Lennon sister's house - and that is just in the course of the next day and a half.

It is no wonder that dad was always off selling Real Estate and mom had locked herself in her bedroom.

Mark had just finished dancing with Irene and had been re-energized enough to face another day. The rattlesnake flag was hoisted high up on the peak of the steep roof and the neighbors were in a tizzy. It wasn't exactly like the scene from Frankenstein...where the townsfolk angrily gathered their pitchforks, shovels and lanterns and marched with malice to Dr. Frankenstein's castle. Never-the-less, the neighbors were frightened and most of them locked themselves inside their house in fear of discovering the poisonous snake that had escaped. Believe me, they would have marched, if they weren't afraid of  the deadly snake and retribution of the mischievous Wolf-Pack.

The Lennons on the corner, were on special alert...and their house was put under curfew... it would be sing-along Friday and they would be enjoying the new-fangled fish sandwich from McDonalds. As Catholics, we were not allow to eat meat on Friday and a couple years ago a McDonald's franchise owner in Cincinnati Ohio invented a thing called the McFilet-O-Fish Sandwich...that finally made it our new McDonalds - last year in 1965. 

Vatican II changed that a little bit, but..uh..uh... if the Lennon's weren't going to eat meat on Friday then neither were the Dahlins. The only difference was, we could buy a whole box of Fish Sticks for the same price as a couple of those 15 cent fishy-burger-thingys. You can bet the Blasers and Lennons ate those expensive McFilet-O-Fish sandwiches... but not us...we were condemned to Van De Kamps frozen fish sticks.

Look at that thing - pretty gross, right?


Here's the rub! I hate fish, it's really not a matter of hating them, it's more a matter of throwing up every time the taste of fish enters my mouth... and you can probably guess that the Wolf Pack would capitalize on this weakness. But after throwing up on all of them last night - haha ((blog post "Vomitous Thursday" July 11 2013)...they might think twice about doing something stupid tonight. RIGHT?

To be safe, I hid away in the new fort Tommy, Jeffery, Robert Smith and I had been working on in the backyard. With all the car parts and boat parts and old wood and junk my dad collected, our yard was absolutely the best backyard in the history of the world for building forts - I mean think about it...you couldn't really hurt anything. Anyway we had dug about a four foot pit and put a roof on it. It was really groovy! We put a old van seat in it and a sink we found in a camper and pretended like we had a living room and a kitchen. I closed the lid of the clubhouse-fort and hid from the fish and from the Wolf Pack... I was safe.. everything was copacetic and I was feeling groovy - man.




I chuckled as I heard the hordes inside fighting over the fragments of pressed fish - parts, and as soon as it became apparent that I wasn't there to taste test my dad's milk experiments(blog post July 13th), I could hear them yelling my name.

For sure, I wasn't about to give myself away as I hunkered down quietly and listen to the raucous inside.

"Mark! Mark..where are you?"
"Yeah, you little drip...where are you hiding?"


On and on it went until they sent Flea-Bait and his cohort of little angry men on a search and extraction mission. Flea-Bait found me and the three of them dragged me up the back stairs and into the great big dining room where the Wolf pack was howling with laughter. They knew what touching my lips with fish would do...(they got a taste of it yesterday) and took extra precautions as they made me sample the milk!

This time someone snuck a chuck of fish in one of the sour tasting bottles of milk, which made me gag and heave as they shoved me through the door into the back hallway (near the bathroom). BUT NOT until! NOT UNTIL I managed to hit Flea-Bait... with some warm deliciousness of fish-milk. I smiled like the Grinch on the way out.

Yeah... it was Friday and everything was indeed groovy, man...and getting better!

Seconds later, one of the older boys heard something that frightened the beegeebies out of the Wolf Pack. "Rattlesnake!" someone yelled. Boys and girls and hair - all of them began screeching like third grade girls at a camp fire ghost story.

People shoving and pushing and standing on couches and on chairs and on the table..and on each others shoulders. Chewy blurted, "Ave Maria!" 

"Someone sound the alarm!" Tony shouted out the command. On the back porch was an old rusted fire bell that Kleghorn began clanging by pulling on the attached rope.  the whole house was up in arms. The rattlesnake was somewhere in the room; under the table, under the piano, by the back door, somewhere... they had all heard it slithering around. More screaming, more fighting, more name calling, more mayhem!

Smirking in shear delight and hiding under the back stairs Markie D shook the old baby rattle... and hummed a few bars of his and Irene's song.

"I got-a wings.. all God's chilluns...we got-a wings." (must see blog post July 15, 2013: Its Friday)

And tonight was the big surprise at the Albino Camp.      Oh yeah!