Ammo Grrrll would like to introduce us to a few of the nameless PEOPLE I HAVE BEEN HAPPIEST TO SEE IN MY LIFE. She writes:
There are people whom we are not at all happy to see who appear with appalling frequency – tax auditors, traffic cops when we were barely going 30 miles per hour over the posted speed suggestion, process servers, boring co-workers, freeloading distant relatives, and the like.
And then there are the sainted people who have appeared at exactly the right time and in desperate circumstances.
Although it is hard to rank such fortunate appearances, topping my list would have to be the anesthesiologist in the Labor Suite at the University of California Medical Center in San Francisco, late May 1973. Naturally, we had taken the Lamaze Class in which we learned such hilariously useless and deceitful techniques as calling a heart-stopping labor pain a “contraction,” or breathing exercises destined to distract the laboring woman to the point where she hyperventilates and, mercifully, passes out temporarily.
Her husband was also supposed to be doing the heavy lifting of writing down times between “contractions,” giving the wife lemon drops or ice chips for her dry mouth from all the heavy breathing, and generally telling her what a great job she was doing while removing to a safe distance anything, including JELLO, that could be used as a potential weapon.
After 17 hours of labor, repeated “dilation checks” by the nurse which was every bit as fun as it sounds, and being hooked up to a blood pressure monitor shrieking that I was near stroke level, a decision was made that it would really be best to do a C-section and soon. A lovely young man came in with fabulous drugs that deadened all the pain (I’m sorry, “contractions”), and I can honestly say that I have never before or since been happier to see an individual.
I was awake until they got the large, displeased baby out – a shockingly short time, maybe 2-3 minutes! It is a very disconcerting sensation to feel yourself being sliced open, pressure but no pain. My “coach” had been removed from the operating room lest he pass out. My doctor had appeared, with some kind of trainee in tow and the words “Don’t nick the bladder, now” were mentioned, to which I heartily “seconded that emotion.”
The anesthesiologist stood at my head, gently describing everything to calm me. Beautiful Baby Clone Boy was presented – Paternity Suit, Exhibit A – and then they put me under to sew me up. I had already fallen madly in love with the anesthesiologist and would happily have promised to have gratitude sex with him — although not right then — but I am pretty sure he played for the other team.
Much, much later, the first flight I was forced to take after 9/11, sometime in late October, I was flying (hate it) on a small plane (hate it), going to Montana (love it)! The entire plane was filled with hunters — large manly toxically male masculine men (my favorite kind). It was close enough to 9/11 that emotions still ran high and every man on that plane was mentally prepared to pulverize any potential terrorist with his bare hands, box cutters be damned. I was extremely happy to see them. And not just because they put my luggage into the overhead compartment and got it down again!
They were very impressed with the weapon I had snuck onto the plane in my carry-on – a baseball and a pair of tube socks. Got through Security, no problem, put the ball in the toe of the sock and tied a knot. Not as good as a Walther PPQ in 9 mm, but something to give me a fighting chance. I also had a roll of quarters as brass knuckles. (Improvise, adapt and overcome.) Thank God neither was necessary. Since there were no terrorists on the plane, I would have been just as happy to bean a femi-ninny who opened her piehole about “American Rape Culture,” which subject was all the rage then and continues to this sad day.
The last Person I Was Happy To See that I will mention today – there are many more for future columns – was the Paranoid Texan shortly after we had first moved in next door to him. Sure, I had HEARD about scorpions, but had never yet seen one. My dear Mr. AG, playwright and composer, not yet novelist, had gone to San Diego to present his new play. I was not invited for the rehearsal weeks – Yoko Ono and all that. I was to join him the next day for a month in a nice condo in La Jolla. Opening a drawer to his bathroom vanity in search of a new toothbrush, there – lying among the lotions and creams – was a large ugly scorpion. I thought it was dead, but then it moved. EEEEEEEK!
I screamed and slammed the drawer, then opened it again and smushed the scorpion with whatever came to hand, if memory serves me, a deodorant. To say I was somewhat upset is to say the Democrats were mildly peeved when Donald J. Trump won the election. All I could think of was that we had to move again to a different state. I called the Paranoid Texan. He came over with a black light and searched the entire house while I hid on the patio whimpering helpfully.
Now watch this clever segue into Some Other Folks You Will Be Happy To See, albeit fictional ones. And just in time for Valentine’s Day. Yes, Max Cossack has completed his fourth novel, called Low Tech Killers, in which we revisit his delightful cast of characters from small-town Minnesota who, oddly enough, also winter in Arizona.
You’ve heard of tales “ripped from today’s headlines”? Max believes that gremlins (or possibly either Jeff Bezos or Putin) are stealing his fiction and turning it into reality. No sooner than he chronicles a group of Super-Woke Infighting Revolutionaries than James O’Keefe gets the goods on a brutish braindead BernieBot who can’t wait to send us all to gulags. And you think the Second Amendment was some kind of afterthought the brilliant Founding Fathers just threw in to annoy future sissies and billionaire munchkin soda scolds?
Anyway, I read the new novel all in one sitting because I couldn’t put it down. It’s hilarious and heartwarming, a cautionary tale and a blueprint for resistance.
It was said that both Napoleon and Hitler were defeated in Russia by General Mud and General Winter and once again, Minnesota winter takes a star turn in this novel. It also features an ex-father-in-law legal wizard; a precocious 10-year old trying to help her clueless father understand women; a disgraced IT guy; a moody chick singer; and, oh yeah, a great dog.
Enter the world of Hack Wilder and his long-time friend Gus Dropo, pop a beer, or pour a nice single malt Scotch, and linger over Low Tech Killers. Order today from Amazon. As always, Max and I thank you for your purchase and 5-Star Review on Amazon! If you are ever in the area, Max volunteers that I will cook for you. Breakfast or dinner, your choice.
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