Category: Arrowflinger Reports

Today’s topics and issues from the perspective of a Southern Outdoorsman

Trucking Broncos and Sour Mash Victims

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Old Bronco Bit Hard

By Al Gray

 English Setter “Jake” circa 1978

Calla Jean produced one fine litter of pups in the spring of 1960. In dog breeder parlance, Calla was the dam and Pal was the sire.  When the pups arrived, Stevens Creek Road had been paved a scant 4 years. Eisenhower was still President. Folks in Augusta knew the Old Fruitland Nursery. The Masters was dispensing tickets to all. Down the hill there was Bowen Pond, but no West Lake, only about 850 acres of Rhodes family and friends’ land which would become the pups training ground.

Nell, Bullet, Rock, Sand, Penny, King, and Bronco were lemon and white English pointers from a long line of the breed that had served the Rhodes family for decades. They came up during what was perhaps the heyday of quail hunting in East Central Georgia.

Penny turned out to be ours; or rather we were hers, especially my father. She was the first respectable quail dog he had owned, despite having a father, Allie Gray, who loved quail hunting about as much as he did gospel quartet music.  I would never say this to my father, but Penny had a couple of faults. First, she fancied herself a rabbit dog and you never wanted to encourage her by shooting a cottontail, because that would mean getting rabbit points the rest of the day. You could usually tell when she was pointing a rabbit, because her tail would have a crook in it. If it really was pronouncedly crooked, that probably meant a snake. If you didn’t encourage Penny to snake and rabbit hunt, she was a very good quail dog, too.

Her brother, Bronco, would turn out to be the stalwart bird dog of the litter. He belonged to my great uncle Land Rhodes, who did more quail hunting than anyone else in the family and even most anyone in the state. He took Bronco all around, starting with the usual trek from the gate into Bowen Pond, up to Mr. Skinner’s old hog farm, over to Baston and Furey’s Ferry Road, where his cousin Sterling Rhodes ran a small store. (This is the corner where the First Citizen’s Bank now sits.) There Bronco and the other bird dogs could be watered while the hunters took their own refreshments while gossiping with Sterling.  The return trip carried the party back through what is now Watervale subdivision and on home on Stevens Creek Road. It was a half-day hunt. In that day, the hunters could bag a couple of dozen on that hunting trek.

Other hunts took our family of hunters to McBean, Girard, Stoney Bluff, Millen, Hephzibah, Vidette and Sylvania. Mostly we hunted out of my father’s mechanical Broncos from the Ford factory.

Land Rhodes with Junior Gray (looking back from Bronco window)
Bronco, the English Pointer, purely loved to hunt. He was also a wizened master of the hunt and nonverbal communication. Many were the times that we made a turn, missed seeing Bronco, then found him standing expectantly at the corner of an adjacent field on the other side. He would be ‘saying’ “I got ‘em down here in the lespedeza patch, fellas, where did y’all go?” After he knew we had seen him he would dutifully trot back and remake the point that we had missed. Sometimes we would not even have to turn around, because Bronco would stand unmovable at an intersection of a field with his head high, until we noticed his resolute beckoning style and hunted his way.

Those were the days. Moonshining was not remotely dead in rural Georgia in the early 60’s and thrived until growing marijuana displaced it. Liquor stills were in the middle of the densest parts of the woods along branches and creeks. It was not uncommon to encounter one quail hunting. Old Bronco was part of one visitation. He had pointed a single bird on the edge of a corn field in sparse blackberry briars. Uncle Land was up to shoot with this writer as back up. The bird erupted from the broom straw and sailed into a high, twisting flight over the top of the more towering blackberries close to the creek. BAM! The quail tumbled out of sight. We gingerly walked around the briar patch until we found a path – a recently used path – that led to the fallen bird. After stooping under vines and briars for about 20 yards, we came to a clearing, in the midst of which stood an operating still. Not wanting to tarry, the search for the downed quail resumed in earnest. Turning to leave empty-handed, Land spied the quail – belly up in a vat of sour mash!

The years passed and Bronco began to lose a step. His range, never great, diminished. Along came the trio of Go Boy, Rusty, and Freedom, all of whom had greater range and complimenting abilities. The day came in which there were hard decisions on which dogs to carry in the aqua Bronco, with Bronco the Hunting Fiend increasingly relegated to the half-day hunts. The old warrior became a yard dog, an old, decrepit relic of glory days past.

He didn’t like that one bit. He did not hide it well either.

He liked it less when he was left behind even on those short hunts. He was left pacing the yard twice, I think, before The Day. It was early one morning, shortly after daybreak, when we pulled into Uncle Land’s yard. We began to load Go Boy, a young pup and Rusty into the bog box with Freedom and another dog of mine, who had already settled in for the next leg of the ride. I left the passenger side door of the aqua wagon open to load coolers, guns, and ammunition.

The implausible happened. There was the sound of loose gravel. I turned to see a lemon and  white blur LEAPING through the air and through the open truck door! Old Bronco had had enough. He was going today, thank you very much. The old boy clambered atop the dog box from the inside, laid down, and had his graying head facing the front. I made a motion to grab him by the collar.

He growled.

It was a very serious growl in Bronco’s life-long history of nonverbal communication. It said “Sonny-boy, we go way back. I remember when you got on the school bus every day. You didn’t want to make that trip. This trip is different. I am going hunting today…..or do you want to lose your face?” Yep, all that came out – loud and clear – in that growl.

I backed out and called for help. Uncle Land, Bronco’s master, was ready to go and wasn’t going to tolerate nonsense from a canine retiree occupying the space where the cooler was supposed to go. He reached up a grabbed Bronco’s collar. Well, it is a good thing the dog was dull and gapped toothed because Bronco was in no mood to be trifled with. He bit Land hard.

Old Bronco went hunting that day. The cooler got strapped onto the tailgate.

After then, it got to be a game. We knew to avoid leaving the door open and we knew to block the doors into the dog box, but yet again, Bronco managed to leap through. We learned that you could not let him even get onto the tailgate, for if you did, you had a snarling fiend on your hands.

After the season, we redesigned and rebuilt the dog box to prevent a dog from wriggling to the top of the dog box from the outside.

Bronco the English Pointer, who morphed into one very mad dog when it became necessary, set the example for the other dogs and was indispensable in training them. Eventually even the headstrong Go Boy and Freedom learned the trick of coming back for misdirected hunters. None other ever went to such lengths to go hunting as old Bronco.

We should all be like that, never giving up the hunt, leaping at opportunity, and hanging on for all the glory we can embrace.

Sometimes this old scribe has occasion to journey to some of those hunting haunts of so long ago. In places, the fields are much as they were 40 years ago. The last time I was down below Girard, upon turning down the River Road, a glance out of imagination saw a statuesque lemon and white pointer, head erect, saying in his old style “Sonny-boy, there are quail down in the broom straw field………”
The next time I will make sure I am driving this vehicle of mine.
The 1969 Ford Bronco in July 2012
One day maybe Bronco will bring along these two fellows in my vision.

Land Rhodes & Junior Gray approach a pointing bird dog circa 1978
That will be one fine day, even if Bronco bites me.

American Man-Gods Intentionally Foul, Bringing Woe

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A Lawless Nation Reformed
Sunday, July 15, 2012
Augusta, GA

By Al Gray

This week the long-awaited and much-dreaded Freeh Report came out on the horrible child molestation cases at Penn State University, with particular emphasis on the enormous cover-up on the part of the coaching staff, athletic department, and administration. The guilt was universal. It was deep. It was inexcusable. It was disturbing.

It was American hero worship perfected. Coach Joe Paterno was revered across the land. Lauded and praised without limit and without cease. Paterno became a god among men.

It should not have taken these revelations to put the lie to the notion that any man is a god. There is one God and HE is about to render judgement on us all.

America is collapsing before our eyes.

The Rule of Law is DEAD.

The elites are utterly corrupt and they strengthen their grip on the good and honest folks every day.

There is nothing new under the sun and we find guidance readily in the Bible in Habakkuk 1.

1 The [a] oracle which Habakkuk the prophet saw.

2 How long, O Lord, will I call for help,

And You will not hear?

I cry out to You, “Violence!”

Yet You do not save.

3 Why do You make me see iniquity,

And cause me to look on wickedness?

Yes, destruction and violence are before me;

Strife exists and contention arises.

4 Therefore the law is ignored

And justice is never upheld.

For the wicked surround the righteous;

Therefore justice comes out perverted.

5 “ Look among the nations! Observe!

Be astonished! Wonder!

Because I am doing something in your days—

You would not believe if you were told.

Yes, the law is ignored. It is ignored in Washington, DC. The law is disregarded under the Gold Dome in Atlanta. The law is antithesis to the government of Augusta, Georgia.

Justice is never upheld. Justice comes out perverted. This political season the burgeoning Liberty Movement succeeded in bringing forth the votes to carry many state and local conventions, yet they were denied victory by unethical, blunt naked power plays. In finance, a Federal Reserve primary dealer – a bank empowered to buy and sell US Debt as a government agent – stole $1.5 billion from customer accounts, an action met with no arrests. Last week Peregrine Financial Group was alleged to have done the same thing to the tune of $200 million. This month has also seen Liborgate, a global interest rate scandal that victimized billions of people, implicate the central banks of England and the US Federal Reserve. Justice is never upheld.

The wicked surround the righteous. Look at the Penn State mess. Those who notified authorities saw no investigation, only greater accolades heaped on the perpetrators. Who would believe their words against the man-gods of national champion football staff? Here in Georgia, the legislature is designated the most corrupt in the USA, this in a “Bible Belt” state replete with prayer breakfasts and notions of the “religious right.” We are horribly gone wrong at the hands of these people.  God will not be mocked. In Augusta, we see a government adrift, one that has only functioned over the last 4 years by wave of deceit, duplicity, and horse trading of largesse bestowed on the connected of the two warring factions.  This is happening in the face of a Greatest Depression. The parasites have multiplied and grow more aggressive in their demands for appeasement.

Something has to give and it will.

Observe! I am doing something in your days. Yes, the Lord is doing something. In the day of Habakkuk, it was the Chaldeans who swept out the corrupt. Tomorrow it will be the kids in the Liberty movement. The corrupt are old and weak. The lovers of Liberty are youthful and principled. They might have been overcome this time by deceit and strong-arm thuggishness, but the next time they will be stronger, more numerous, and more experienced. The judiciary may be co-opted by the forces of deceit, but judges and politicians have to live in society. Facts and truth forcefully presented will make even a judge fear to take the side of wrong. We are not there yet, but that day will come.

There is an awakening across America. Woe be unto the deceivers. Their power is built upon lies and lies disintegrate in the face of truth. The ugly truth may terminate Penn State football. It should, just as it should sweep out nearly every politician in the land.

We are not there yet. The corrupt are still in power.  They still control vast portions of the media, nationally and locally. They can still destroy the reformers. The Paterno-god was not the only fake deity. Locally we have more than our share.

The awakening  is happening. The awakening will not be denied. Sooner than most can understand, forces will align and the evil will be swept away.

Matthew Henry’s Commentary sums it up well.

The prophet complains to God of the violence done by the abuse of the sword of justice among his own people and the hardships thereby put upon many good people (v. 1-4). II. God by him foretells the punishment of that abuse of power by the sword of war, and the desolations which the army of the Chaldeans should make upon them (v. 5-11). III. Then the prophet complains of that too, and is grieved that the Chaldeans prevail so far (v. 12-17), so that he scarcely knows which is more to be lamented, the sin or the punishment of it, for in both many harmless good people are very great sufferers. It is well that there is a day of judgment, and a future state, before us, in which it shall be eternally well with all the righteous, and with them only, and ill with all the wicked, and them only; so the present seeming disorders of Providence shall be set to rights, and there will remain no matter of complaint whatsoever.

Tomorrow will be bright in America, but for now some of us must gird for battle like modern day Chaldeans on a mission from God. In verse 6, the Lord says “behold, I am raising up the Chaldeans.” Reform won’t come by any foreign Chaldeans, but from us, all of us, arising to take American back.

The Legend of Squaw Alice

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Squalling Tires Braking for Wildlife on the Winston Circuit?

Saturday, July 14, 2012
Augusta, GA

By Al Gray

The first time anyone met Alice Babe it was unforgettable. Alice was gruff. Alice was tall. Alice had big arms – with tattoos in a time in which you just didn’t see women with tattoos, especially a contracts payable clerk in a Fortune 50 corporate accounting setting.

Alice was a biker chick in an outlaw motorcycle club, who spent her weekends riding from Winston Salem over to Wrightsville or Myrtle Beaches, generally in the company of her husband, Butch, and a crowd of others who were most certainly not accounting types. Every Monday she would come in with her eyes looking like red-rimmed slits of malevolence. The woman had me intimidated so badly that I avoided her until Tuesdays.

The tattoo on Alice Babe’s arm was of a fierce Amazon warrioress astride a stallion clutching a bow. She muttered something about being of Cherokee descent on one of the rare instances she did more than grunt or issue profanities. Maybe it was from working with contractors, who knows. At any rate the tattoo, her size, and her bouffant hairdo were really domineering.

Photo by Henry Orr on Unsplash

If you had to pick which one of the apparel group accounting clerks who would have really turned outlaw, it would have been Alice Babe, but that dubious honor went to her friend, Windy Hawley. Windy set up a dummy bank account in the name of one of the company’s vendors. She then would take accounts payable checks to deposit into the fake account. This rocked on pretty well for Windy, until one day she encountered a replacement bank teller who knew that the company, payee to the checks, did business with Wachovia, not First Union. After a few visits from the company Certified Fraud Examiners, guys who fittingly always seemed to have 5 o’clock shadows and were from New York, the story came out that Windy had stolen $775,000 and had a very large boat docked in Fort Lauderdale. Alice stormed, “You mean that witch had a yacht down in Florida and didn’t invite me once? I hope she rots!”

Windy went to prison. Alice was aghast, only because she was wondering, “Why haven’t I had the nerve to try that?”

Strangely, we got to be friends. She and Butch lived around the corner off of Reynolda Blvd. in a white, wood-framed house with an enormous garage full of Harley motorbikes. I didn’t visit much, because they were gone nearly every weekend and I was on one of three mega project sites during the week.

Alice reveled in her tough woman persona. I was actually intimidated by her and Butch. After one weekend war, Butch came home all sliced and bruised up, without part of his left ear, lending credence to their braggadocio about being outlaws.

All of that intimidation vanished in a flash. Late one Sunday night in May 1993, my phone rang. It was Alice. She was screaming in anguish, hysteria, and genuine fear. “HELP!!!!!!” she yelled, “there is some horrible MONSTER in our house!!!! You are a woodsman guy, right?” I admitted to being prone to visit the woods now and then. “COME OVER AND DO SOMETHING with this AWFUL ANIMAL!” Alice squalled.

I threw on some clothes and took off for the Babe house. When I got there, Alice and Butch were quivering in the yard. She prompted me to enter the house. I said, “Where is this creature?” She said, “In the bathroom.” I had a big stick, but really didn’t now what to expect, for surely anything fierce enough to turn Butch and Alice into tubs of jelly was something to be respected.

When I saw what it was, I started laughing.

Photo by Mikell Darling on Unsplash

The monster in Alice’s bathroom was a possum! I used to catch possums in my rabbit boxes as a kid, so I knew to grab him by the tail, but be wary that he would turn up on his tail and bite me if I let him. I threw the critter into a corrugated box, so I could release him over at Wake Forest University across the way, where wildlife fits right in. (‘Demon Deacons’ is right!)

Out in the yard, Butch and Alice were visibly relieved.

Something got lost, though, and it was my sense of intimidation from those two.

Turning to face them, putting my hands on my hips, I looked and started laughing. “Just look at y’all,” I said. “You had me fooled into thinking that you were tough people who could hurt me just as soon as look at me. Now THIS! Y’all were afraid of a lil ole possum? You, the fierce outlaws?” I laughed all the way to the car. I am pretty sure Mr. Possum was grinning, too.

Warrior Queen Alice existed no more in my eyes. Her frizzled hair wasn’t that way of of being deliberately unkempt, it was that way because of fear. The possum magically reduced her from an Amazon woman to the point that she was seen as a squalling basket case. Squaw Alice of the Hawg Rider clan she came to be for me. I never dreamed a possum could have that much power. Hoping for a reprise, though, I turned Mr. Possum loose at the trash chute of a girls’ dorm.

It never hurts to try to prolong one’s fun.***

A.G.

Trickery Backfired on a Lincoln County Road

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Sneaky Snakes and Mars Rocks

 

Saturday, July 7, 2012
Lincolnton, GA
By Al Gray
 
Have you ever read a story about Mars rocks being found on earth, like this, and think, “How do they know it came from Mars?” and then wonder if it was some prank?
 
Some years ago, after an afternoon hunt in the Ogeechee River Swamp, your Arrowflinger was walking down a clay road through some South Georgia live oak forest – after dark, with a powerful light, but one which quickly drained its battery. He would shine the road, then cut his light off and walk a ways. The Arrowflinger had just flipped his light back on when a shuffling noise came from right over his right shoulder. When he swung the light around it rested on the form of a monstrous rattler, which apparently had slid down the road bank upon his passing.
 
After regaining his composure, old Arrowflinger started looking all around for a stick to kill the snake with. The road had been freshly graded, leaving only bare ground and some dirt clods. (Do you remember what a dirt clod is?) Nearby was a clod about the size of a basketball. It was beyond belief that this was the only thing available to kill the snake, who had probably crawled over his bow and arrows getting there. The clod was sun-baked and was sufficiently hard to break the snake’s spine. There was only one problem – the object was too big to hold with one hand and the other hand was needed to hold the light.
 
In the meantime, the rattler began to crawl away. Kicking some loose clay on him succeeded in getting him to stop and start rattling vigorously. Holding the light between his legs, your nervous Arrowflinger hoisted the dirt clod to his chest, then heaved it toward the reptile. It missed, shattering into fragments, leaving the larger piece about the size of a volleyball. Fortunately this piece had rolled away and was no longer within striking distance. The intensity of the rattling at this point was unnerving enough, when the unthinkable occurred. The 150,000 candlepower light was down to its last 50,000 candles and those were fading fast! After kicking his “weapon” away from the rattlesnake to retrieve it, and trying to focus the dying light on what was a tremendous snake, the Arrowflinger prepared for his final toss. This one found its target, breaking the rattler’s spine. A third attempt permanently disabled it. Then the light died completely.
 
Your near-snakebite-victim pulled his deer stand out of the edge of the woods and sat on it there, alone in the dark with his scaly friend, waiting for his brother-in-law to come and pick him up. Every minute or so the rattler would start a faint buzz with its tail. Eventually some headlights appeared in the distance. It was Robbie, coming down the twisting road. He immediately pulled the truck in position to shine its headlights on the animal. Upon jumping out of the truck, he exclaimed, “This snake is not dead-only stunned!” Upon retrieving a piece of pipe from the truck, he promptly dispatched the reptile.

 

 
Next to be picked up on that dirt road was John, a guy with a tremendous fear of snakes. Robbie said, “Put that twitching snake right there in the corner by the tailgate on John’s side of the truck.” That done, the truck of hunters headed off to get John. Sure enough, John went to set his beltpack inside the truck and felt the still-moving scaly reptile. He let out a shriek, followed by a stream of less-than-adoring or complimentary description of our ancestries.
 
The snake stretched from one side of the pickup tailgate to the other. We took several pictures of it upon our return home. It was late, so there was no time to dispose of the carcass.
 
The Arrowflinger was hunting the next morning in Lincoln County, about 100 miles to the north. At the time he owned a tract of about 100 acres there. Upon going in the gate, it was realized that the dead snake was still in the truck bed. It was before daylight. He started to toss the snake in the bushes, then had a thought, “Maybe I can have a little fun with this snake!“
 
You see, there are almost no rattlers, other than pygmy rattlers, in that part of Lincoln County. This snake was really big! There is little industry in the county and most of the residents have to leave early to get into Augusta to work. So there were going to be a lot of cars coming by in the next half hour.
 
Your Arrowflinger picked the snake up and stretched him across the outbound lane, then hid in the bushes by his gate. Action was not long in the making. A car came around the curve, went WHUMP-WHUMP as it passed over the snake, and flashed its brake lights. They must have been late for work. A minute later Car No. 2 made the WHUMP-WHUMP noise, squealing its tires shortly thereafter. The driver stopped for a minute, then proceeded on. The driver of car number 3 must have had his morning coffee. It was an old, dark-colored Thunderbird. The driver slammed on the brakes to kill the snake, sliding by it in the process. Slowly he backed up until his headlights rested on the snake. He stopped the car, got out, and pulled something from the backseat. 

 

The engine was still running, so he could not hear your trickster laughing. Then the arrow flinging practical joker heard a metallic noise as he approached the front of the car. Suddenly the Arrowflinger realized that the joke was on him! This guy was going to shoot the snake and guess who was in the line of fire! The Arrowflinger!!! Quickly diving for cover just as the trigger was pulled – BLAMMM! – he heard bird shot ring through the trees over his head. Then the man picked the snake’s body up, put it in the trunk, turned that car around and took the snake back home. The shaken bowhunter dusted himself off, plucked numerous briars from his flesh, wiped away the blood and went hunting.

 
Well this story was not over. Your wayward archer was working on his fence the next July, when an old, black Ford Thunderbird pulled off onto the shoulder of the roadway. An old fellow got out and said:

 

“Mistuh, You sho bettuh be careful aroun’ ‘dis place. My bruther whut live down ‘dis heah road, he killed de biggest, meanest rattlesnake what ever been killed up heah in Lincoln County! One mawnin – Ah do believe it wur las Septembuh – he whur headed fo wuk down to Shapiro’s meat packin plant down yonder in Augusta when dis here rattlesnake crawled into dis road rightchere. Bo – he be my bruther – slammed on his brakes and tried to kill Mr. Rattlesnake, but dat only made him madder’n a wet hen! Dat snake threw hisself into a qurl and started to singin. Ole Bo he be lucky he had his ole 410 in de back o dis car. He shot de snake in de hed and brung him back to sho me. When he opened de trunk Ah dang neah went into a swoon. Dat snake he were a MAN! He looked lik he been eatin plenty o possums and rabbits. Ah do believe he wuh big enough to swaller a coon. So mistuh, ole Jake don’t wanna tend to yo bidness none, but you sho outta be careful around dis place heah. Dat ole big snake has a momma ‘roun heah fo sho’, ‘an you sho don’t wanna be bit by no snake dat big!“

 
Fighting back tears, the Arrowflinger thanked Jake for his advice. He got into his car and drove away. It was hoped that he did not look into his rear view mirror. The Arrowflinger collapsed, howling, before he got out of sight. The sores on his tongue went away after about a week. He never thought that a dead snake would cause such an uproar and exaggeration. The Arrowflinger even heard about, “Dat big rattlesnake ole Bo kilt‘ up at the local store one morning.”
 
Could this be what happened with the Mars rock?***
A.G.

Special Report: Heerily Missing

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Friday, July 6, 2012

Augusta, GA

By Lori Davis

The photo above shows the floor of the Harrison Building, the old brick building shell preserved as an entrance to the TEE Center. This picture was taken on June 7, 2012, during a TEE Center hardhat tour by Convention and Visitor’s Bureau chief Barry White and Heery International’s Jacques Ware.

Heery is the program manager for the City of Augusta’s hundreds of millions of dollars in sales tax funded building project and Jacques Ware is the Heery project manager over the TEE Center.

Below is a photo of the TEE Center Exhibition Hall, the enormous 38,000 square foot open room that is to house the trade shows and various TEE Center exhibitions.

At the time of the tour, the CVB folks excitedly made the point that the floor was going to be poured the next week. This was on June 7.

Interesting.

R.W. Allen LLC’s progress billing number 24, through March 29, 2012 (Page 4, Item 10) shows that two whole months earlier, an incredible 84% of the concrete walls and slabs

were complete!

How can this be? The main exhibit hall room is a staggeringly large percentage of the total concrete slabs on the project. How can 84% of the slabs and walls have been complete back in March when the main floor was still dirt?

Isn’t Augusta put at risk, when subcontractors are paid so far in advance of the work performed? Isn’t the previously noted issue of $1.4 million of kitchen equipment that was paid for a nonexistent kitchen proof that Heery is just rubber stamping contract payments?

Let me see now. The commission relies on Fred Russell, who relies on Heery, who apparently sees construction completed that just isn’t there.

Unreliable fits and this time, it will be set in concrete…….eventually.***

L.D.

Breathtaking Events Engulfed Jonah

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Three Gulps

Sunday July 1, 2012
Augusta, GA
By Al Gray

Early last month, big government looked to strike again. Mayor Michael Bloomberg of New York City proposed banning big sugary drinks with the hope of saving us from obesity and diabetes at our own hands. The Big Gulp came to mind for we know that staple of decades, an oversized 7-11 beverage, pretty well. A Big Gulp is the very definition of gluttony. Saint Thomas Aquinas said this about the matter – “Gluttony denotes, not any desire of eating and drinking, but an inordinate desire … leaving the order of reason, wherein the good of moral virtue consists.”

Jonah was a glutton for punishment, the fish that swallowed him was a glutton for a big gulp, and these days we all are gluttons for pushing a failed society beyond all bounds of prudent. Jonah might have wished that a commandment from a leader like Mayor Bloomberg carried the authority to save him from himself or hide him from the Lord. It wasn’t going to work that way.

Our scripture for today is Jonah Chapter 2. Jonah rebelled against the Lord’s instruction to go to Nineveh; he had gulped at the prospect to preaching to imaginably hostile crowds. Then the fish gulped down Jonah. In chapter 2 we read of Jonah gulping in anguish at being separated from the light of the world and the light of God. We get a sense of Jonah’s reality check at the seriousness of his position and his new-found faith that got him out of it.

2 1 From inside the fish Jonah prayed to the Lord his God. 2 He said:

“In my distress I called to the Lord,
and he answered me.
From deep in the realm of the dead I called for help,
and you listened to my cry.
3 You hurled me into the depths,
into the very heart of the seas,
and the currents swirled about me;
all your waves and breakers
swept over me.
4 I said, ‘I have been banished
from your sight;
yet I will look again
toward your holy temple.’
5 The engulfing waters threatened me,
the deep surrounded me;
seaweed was wrapped around my head.
6 To the roots of the mountains I sank down;
the earth beneath barred me in forever.
But you, Lord my God,
brought my life up from the pit.

7 “When my life was ebbing away,
I remembered you, Lord,
and my prayer rose to you,
to your holy temple.

8 “Those who cling to worthless idols
turn away from God’s love for them.
9 But I, with shouts of grateful praise,
will sacrifice to you.
What I have vowed I will make good.
I will say, ‘Salvation comes from the Lord.’”

10 And the Lord commanded the fish, and it vomited Jonah onto dry land.

There are trinities all through the Bible.  The Book of Jonah is the story of the Three Gulps. The first gulp was one caused by Jonah’s imagination of the indifference, ridicule, and hostility he might receive at the hands of a foreign people, amongst crowds of strangers. Most folks we know are like that. They will do anything to avoid speaking in public, about anything, much less preaching about the one Lord in a pagan land.

The second gulp was that of the fish swallowing Jonah. While we can be sure the Lord summoned the great fish for the purpose of bringing obedience to Jonah, we can also imagine that a fish large enough to swallow a man would have a Big Gulp out of natural proximity to prey not too big to swallow.

It was the third gulp of realization in this story that is the most important. Gulping can be out of apprehension of the imagined, such as the prospect of preaching to a novice; it can be a physical act of taking an inordinate swallow, as the fish exhibited; and it can arise at a sudden very real assault on the senses, as the near-drowning, then engulfment of Jonah. There was a sudden need for breath, a desperation causing panicked swallowing of nothing but stale air. Then came realization, not just of his predicament of being in the belly of a fish, but the recognition of how wrong, sinful, and dismissive of God he had been, not just in avoiding Nineveh, but all through his life.

Lastly, the third gulp brought redemption. Jonah made peace with the Lord and promised to follow his commands, after his emotions had ranged from despair to calm assurance in the Lord’s presence and forgiveness.

Are we in this day and age so jaded, so conceited, and so consumed with gluttony from constant immersion in this corrupt society that it will take a massive shock to our senses to bring us to the conclusions to which Jonah was brought? Let us pray to the Lord that we might be mindful of the story of Jonah.

Three gulps there were. One arose from imagination. One arose from the aggressive gluttony of another, albeit that of a fish. One arose from physical assault on a fragile human body.

Mayor Bloomberg cannot save New Yorkers from a Big Gulp, nor can President Obama and Congress spare the American people. There will be no deliverance. Yet there will be redemption for those who believe in our Lord Jesus Christ.

No one had greater trials than Jonah, Job and Moses. Let us pray that, should the time come, the Lord will give us their

perseverance and focus on Him.***
A.G.

White on Black Climb, an Execution Stayed

  By , ,

Photo by Quinn Buffing on Unsplash

I Called The Bug Babe, But She Laughed

Saturday, June 30th, 2012
Lincolnton, GA
By Al Gray
 
 
Most homebuyers know to require a home inspection, including a termite report. Well, you need to know there are lots of pests that many folks just don’t think about when they sign a real estate contract and close on a house. Another thing is that there are critters that the pest control firms shy away from. Ask the Bug Babe of Augusta’s Advanced Services. Some things make her laugh.

 

 
Your tale teller’s house is in Lincoln County, Georgia, situated on 38 acres on the southern end of the county near Clarks Hill Lake. It was purchased at a very reasonable price from a guy who had been transferred to his employer’s Atlanta office. (How’s that for a change in lifestyle!) This previous owner, Tim Rambleton, owned horses and had constructed a 20×20 pole barn to hold his “stuff.” That shed had little value. The poles were not plumb and were misaligned. That might have been surmountable, but the roof was skewed. The lumber was infested with carpenter bees, that look like this:

Photo by Kai Wenzel on Unsplash

 
 
 
The worst thing was the floor. Tim had laid out a series of wooden pallets and nailed sheets of particleboard over them. This left a space about four inches high under the floor. The immediate thought was, “What a great snake den!” As it turned out, that could not have been more wrong!
 
 
Although the house was only three years old, it was considered a “fixer-upper.” The mud room was just that – covered with Georgia red clay. There were no exhaust fans in the bathrooms. The ceiling fans made all sorts of racket. The deck was 12 feet square. Their dog had gnawed on the outside office door. It took a lot of work. Oh, one last thing is that there was no garage door.

 

 
Shortly after moving day, during the winter of 1998, conical holes in clusters came to be noticed in the yard. The clusters grew in number and size. Some sort of critter was tearing up the yard! “What” was a mystery. Then one night, your story teller awakened around 2 AM and decided to cut on the lights to see what was out there. The floodlights glaring, the mystery was solved. There were several skunks out there digging.

 

 
A call went out to the Department of Natural Resources to inquire as to what could be done with nuisance skunks. The game warden said, “Trap them in a WIRE trap!” Seriously. Mama raised no fool, and there was absolutely no way this guy was gonna move a wire trap with a skunk in it.  The man just as well should have said, “Catch them in a fish net.”

 

 
Lethal measures were the only resort. Five of them were shot. Some sprayed. When they did that, the smell lingered for the better part of a week. With others, lucky shots resulted in no noxious mist rising from the corpses. None of them made it back to their warren – it turned out to be the space under the pole barn’s rickety flooring.

 

 
The clusters of burrowing holes grew smaller. The skunk infestation looked to be over. Then came the night the skunks turned the tables … almost.

 

 
A very long day of bowhunting for deer sent this house dweller into a very deep sleep, before a need to visit the bathroom created a stumbling, closed-eyed ramble to the window and backyard light switch. Sure enough, there was a very large, classically marked up skunk. He looked like this:

Photo courtesy of Photoartinc.com

 
 
Aching bones and tired muscles shouted, “Let him go, give him a reprieve, he will leave!” Before returning to the warm comfortable bed, a second thought occurred. The late return from the hunt had meant that a needed high powered rechargeable spotlight was face down at the garage entrance. It needed recharging for the next day’s hunt. To the right of the door into the house, the Cub Cadet lawn tractor was parked between the step and the corner of the garage. Having once spotted skunk droppings inside the garage produced a sense of caution, but that light had to be retrieved for charging.
 
Your white maned, sort-of-fat author was dressed only in his boxer shorts.

 

 
Emerging onto the top step, the tractor was carefully examined – except for under the mower deck. Seeing no black and white threat, I decided to go for the spotlight on the floor. No sooner than hand grasped the handle, a rustling sound was heard – from the stairsteps!  There stood the black and white skunk seen earlier at the threshold, sniffing to see if he wanted to go in! Picture what came next, this – a mostly naked, fat, white haired man making a seemingly impossible leap OVER the skunk, through the door, and slamming the door in that skunk’s face.

 

 
The skunk held his fire, sparing the mud room and homeowner from a really, really bad top coating.
 
All thoughts of skunk reprieves vanquished, a shotgun was quickly accessed to accompany the spotlight. The door was opened. No skunk. Warily, the garage was being explored when that skunk bolted for the woods. The first shot missed. The skunk was 15 feet from safety when the second blast took it out.

 

 
Big problem.

 

 
The skunk shot was a black skunk with white bangs … Mrs. Skunk. WHERE WAS MR. PERFECT SKUNK?

 

 
He had to be in the garage. Sure enough, he was there – under the hood of my new pickup truck! One could hear him rustling around on top of the engine! Worst of all, skunks are nocturnal. It would be light in about 45 minutes. What if that skunk was still in there at daylight?

 

 
There was nothing to do but go back to bed. The morning hunt requiring travel would have had to be scratched in favor of a hunt on the grounds. A nice fat doe fell to the bow and arrow, giving even more time for the black and white scent emitter to escape.

 

 
The examination of the truck and ginger lifting of the hood arrived with a trepidation like that of inspecting for a car bomb. With crossed fingers, the engine was started, all the while the truck owner, mindful of his cousin starting up an engine with a cat entangled in it, was expecting a fog of ruin to overwhelm the new-truck smell.

 

 
The skunk was gone.

 

 
Monday, instead of the bow shop getting a sale of the latest Matthews bow, the garage door company got a contract to install a remote controlled garage door, as soon as possible.

 

 
The skunks never came back. One of them had been living under the steps inside the garage. Everyone coming and going had walked over his den.

 

 
Getting “skunked” nearly took on new meaning.

 

 
The lawn recovered and was fine. Then the conical holes started multiplying again. It was the:

Photo by Suzanne D. Williams on Unsplash

 
 
 
That is another story.***

 

A.G.

Stoking a Unity Candle Isn’t for Sheep

  By , ,
The Pinnacle of Babble
Sunday, June 24, 2012
Augusta, GA
By Al Gray

At the conclusion of many wedding ceremonies, the wed couple rise to light the Unity candle, a solemn symbol of the merging of their two lives into one bound with love and Christian devotion. The Unity candle is at the pinnacle of flanking candles representing the two families now joined in matrimony.

All too often the sentiments behind the unity candle  get snuffed out shortly after the flame. The unity candle that winds up truly representing unity is a rarity. When a husband and wife make it to the ends of their lives together, there has to be an explanation.

All joking aside, it takes perseverance and a lot of faith to make a marriage into a true beacon of unity. Forces are too great in society and life for most to make it work.

In the Bible, nothing parallels the symbolism of the unity candle more than the story of the Tower of Babel found in Genesis, Chapter 11.

11 Now the whole earth used the same language and the same words. 2 It came about as they journeyed east, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar and settled there. 3 They said to one another, “Come, let us make bricks and burn them thoroughly.” And they used brick for stone, and they used tar for mortar. 4 They said, “Come, let us build for ourselves a city, and a tower whose top will reach into heaven, and let us make for ourselves a name, otherwise we will be scattered abroad over the face of the whole earth.” 5  The Lord came down to see the city and the tower which the sons of men had built. 6 The Lord said, “Behold, they are one people, and they all have  the same language. And this is what they began to do, and now nothing which they purpose to do will be impossible for them. 7 Come, let Us go down and there confuse their language, so that they will not understand one another’s speech.” 8 So the Lord scattered them abroad from there over the face of the whole earth; and they stopped building the city. 9 Therefore its name was called Babel, because there the Lord confused the language of the whole earth; and from there the Lord scattered them abroad over the face of the whole earth.

Let’s look at the parallels. The people took pride in their unity, and like the married couple, saw a pinnacle as a statement of their determination to remain one people in one place. They sought to make a name for themselves that was greater than simply being one people. In other words, they had status aspirations as deities, for what other levels of “name” were there?

In this day and time in America, aren’t we doing pretty much the same? Technology has become god for much, if not most, of the world. We are putting technology at the pinnacle. We aspire to the loftiest of heights with aggressive, sometimes immoral, and mostly unethical gene splicing. The clamor for every new edition of the iPad causes those without them to feel inferior and deprived. By the same token, in the last 30 years we have grown into a disunified, fractious, and pampered 330 million souls. Like the builders of the Tower of Babel, enormous forces might just blow our nation apart. It doesn’t take something nearly so great as language difference.

Social networking, globalism, and institutions like “conservative” talk radio attempt to monolithically pigeonhole us into some faceless, amorphous mass with a single mind like that of a herd of sheep. A lot of us are rebelling, for that unity which is intended for us by our masters, is built like the Tower of Babel – weakly bonded with readily fractured cement. The question that would have destroyed the unity of the people of Babel long before the tower topped out was the same as that of today. Who deserves to be at the top?

God decided to end that nonsense before it got to that point. Why? Well, in His wisdom He probably saw that more powerful forces than language would eventually wreak permanent damage to the people’s family unity and even the roots of civilization. We see this all the time with politics.

Genesis 11 portrays a pretty stunning truth in these words – “Behold, they are one people, and they all have the same language. And this is what they began to do, and now nothing which they purpose to do will be impossible for them.” We need to read, and re-read that verse carefully. Nothing is impossible for a people united!

Going back to the unity candle, we see that the two-lives become united only through, love, devotion and faith. Can we use the same permanent cement to restore a society that is built on those things instead of overrunning each other to the pinnacle? Sure we can. Nothing is impossible with the help of the Lord, but nothing is possible that arises out of human passions and weakness. We just need to come to our senses in time.

Some months ago, one of the wiser of the leaders in our area, asked your author this question – “What are the chances of that happening?” The answer was, “Slim, but it is the only chance we’ve got.” One chance exists in unity. What will we go through to find that truth?

We have each other and faith can be the cement for unity. We don’t need candles, pinnacles of fake “success,” or to make a “name for ourselves.”

Jerry Clower had the number right.

ONE.**

A.G.

Old Bo – The Tail Wagged of a Thief

  By , ,
T-Boned at the Augusta National

Friday June 22, 2012
Augusta, GA
by Al Gray

This hunter has a confession to make.

I hated old Bo as much as Uncle John loved him.
Bo was the fastest beagle in Uncle’s pack of 32 and the houndish fellow had real charisma, hence John Rhodes would never leave the scoundrel home, as much as I wished he would. You might ask why a beagle could be despised by a fellow, especially one with “Happiness is a Beagle” emblazoned on a 40 year old sweatshirt. For me it was simple. I usually avoid people like old Bo.

The reason Bo always led the pack was straightforward.

He cheated.

While the rest of the pack sought the rabbit with nose to dusty ground, diligently working to stay on track, Bo would run ahead or cut in front. When the more deserving of his fellows would correct the course of the pack, after the rabbit threw them a loop or an out, Bo would always be opportunistically waiting to charge into the lead, his chop mouth a-barking.

I was aghast and disgusted. Bo was a cutter who stole the glory from those who worked very hard for it.

Taking all 32 of the pack was a troublesome affair. The hunters always had to keep count when loading the dogs up, lest one be left behind. A poor rabbit was doomed, because the pack would split, so that when he doubled back, he likely would run smack into the other half. One simply cannot convey the ground shaking racket 32 beagles make!

Uncle John’s best friend was Judson Bentley brother to his brother-in-law Irving Bentley. Judson was a most humorous, often cigar-chomping fellow, who frequently accompanied Uncles John, Land and Andrew on their rabbit hunts. Jud was the grandfather of WGAC radio talk show host Austin Rhodes (no relation to John Rhodes or this writer’s maternal grandfather).

John Rhodes was a notoriously frugal man. He drove a 1964 green Ford Ranger pickup. Instead of footing the bill for a serious box box to go in the back of it, Uncle fashioned a cover over the bed that was anchored in the corner post boxes. Instead of having a real dog box door, the box only had the tailgate to hold the pack in place. It was an accident waiting to happen.

One extremely cold morning in 1966, John, Land and Jud headed south toward Burke County with a half-compliment of 16 charged-up, excited beagles. In those days there was no Bobby Jones Expressway, so that the hunters leaving from Stevens Creek Road in Martinez had to pick a tortuous path down Washington Road, to Berckmans Road, over to Highland, then to Wheeless, over to Lumpkin Road and then south on Highway 56.

A terrible thing happened.

Just as they rounded the corner onto Berckmans Road at the big green water tower on the Augusta National side of the road, the truck either grazed the curb or encountered a bump. The tailgate fell down. All 16 beagles poured out into the intersection of Washington Road and Berckman’s road! Cars swerved. Horns blew. After a few minutes traffic stopped.

It was simply a miracle. John and Land caught and reloaded dogs while Jud, who at this point was pretty serious about events, counted. People got out of cars to help. Babe, Tiny, and Beulah were already rooting around in the vines along the National’s fence trying to jump a rabbit. Sadly what could have turned into a epochal story of a beagle pack running wild down Magnolia Lane was thwarted by the excellent fencing. Beulah was not amused when Land picked her up. She growled.

Travelers kept feeding wayward hounds into the back of the truck.

Jud had counted 15.
Where was Bo? The uncles went looking while Jud lit a stogie.

They heard a commotion from across the street, in the A&P parking lot. A woman had dropped her bag of groceries, which gave that larcenous hound, Bo, his chance. Bo trotted back to his master, meeting him halfway across the lot, with a T-bone steak in his mouth. John Rhodes didn’t know whether to laugh or cry, because he had to pay the woman for her spoiled groceries.Bo had done what he did best, cut loose from the others to steal a treat.

With Bo in hand and order restored, the party headed on down to McBean, where the threat was no longer automotive, but was more in the order of avoiding moonshiners, rattlers, and old Miz Robinson.

Jud talked about that morning for years and it became a Rhodes family legend.

History doesn’t record what happened on the hunt that day, but hunters and 16 beagles were blessed with tragedy averted at the water tower. All have passed and all that remains is their memory.

Arrrr—-roooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!!!!!

I thought I was beyond Bo’s reach when he died, but then cousin Hugh turned loose his pup Flash one morning the next season. The dog raced out ahead looking to cut in front and steal the lead. “Cheater!” I muttered….then a the thought hit.

Bo left a son.***
A.G.
Al and Queenie 1973

Joe Bowles Plays Hardball with Augusta Riverfront, LLC Over Parking Deck

  By , ,
Commissioner Joe Bowles is talking tough over the parking deck

Wednesday, June 20, 2012
Augusta, GA
By The Outsider

Mayor pro tem Joe Bowles has some tough talk for the operators of the new TEE Center parking deck on Reynolds Street: either abide by the terms of the management agreement approved back in February or the deal is off!

The agreement that was hatched at the last minute on February 7th stipulated that  the $7 million liens on the property under the deck must be removed and the property must be transferred from 933 Broad Investment, LLC (a subsidiary of Augusta Riverfront, LLC) to the city’s land bank.

However, we here at CityStink.net discovered that these conditions have still not been satisfied. As of today, the liens have still not been removed and the property has still not been deeded over to the land bank. You can read our full report here–> Exclusive: Fred Wrestles, Augusta Gets Decked.

For commissioners who voted for the management agreement with Augusta Riverfront, LLC, including Mayor pro tem Joe Bowles, this must seem like yet another in a long succession of broken promises, and it has to seem as though the last minute fix to approve the management agreement was little more than a stalling tactic to bide more time for ARLLC. And Joe Bowles seems none too pleased with this latest revelation. In a report by Chris Thomas of WRDW News 12 yesterday, the Mayor pro tem said, “The city is basically operating under an agreement with them that is not in effect,” and that, “It’s not good business practice. That is for sure.” 

Indeed. Since the basic stipulations of the management agreement have not been satisfied by Augusta Riverfront, LLC (who are also the owners of the Marriott Hotel), then the city is paying a $25,000 a year fee to deck operators based on a contract that is made of thin air, much like the city’s air rights for the $12 million parking deck.

And Joe Bowles’ patience seems to be wearing thin with Augusta Riverfront, LLC, saying, “If they don’t go ahead and get this straightened out, I say it’s time to go ahead and bid the parking deck back out. If we don’t hurry up and get that property donated to the land bank, I would say it’s time to scrap the deal and start over.”

When queried by Chris Thomas on this issue, city administrator Fred Russell could only say, “This is a long, complicated process.” 

Joe Bowles is on the right track. It is time to re-bid this parking management contract and get a better deal for the city. In our May 29th investigative report, we discovered that there were bids from other companies on the table that were much more favorable to the city. The agreement that Fred Russell negotiated with Augusta Riverfront, LLC essentially amounts to a blank check, where the city assumes all of the expenses and risks, and ARLLC gets all of the benefits and most of the profits.

In fact, Richard Acree Jr, the Assistant Director of Augusta Facilities Management Division, recommended that the parking deck management contract be awarded to Ampco Parking Systems out of Houston, TX and not to Augusta Riverfront, LLC. However, it appears that city administrator Fred Russell simply ignored the better deal and instead favored a much more inferior management agreement with ARLLC… one that involves more expense, more risk and substantially less benefits for the city. Just why would Fred Russell do this if he is supposedly working for the city?

But it gets worse. In our May 31st investigative report, Augusta’s $714,357 ‘Incidental’ Cost,  we discovered that under Fred’s deal with Augusta Riverfront, LLC, the city was assuming ALL of the operating and maintenance costs for the deck even when 150 ground floor spaces would still be under the ownership and control of ARLLC. And that’s on top of the $25,000 management fee the city would be paying them. In fact, under Fred’s deal the city would even be on the hook for paying for the toll booth operator, when Ampco had agreed to assume those costs under their bid. So, just what benefit is the city getting out of this deal? Not much. In fact, over the course of the agreement, the city would end up paying $714,357 for these additional expenses that should be  the responsibility of Augusta Riverfront, LLC. Fred Russell called these expenses “incidental.”

So Joe Bowles has every reason to be upset, as should all Augusta taxpayers. We believe that the Mayor pro tem was probably giving Fred Russell and Augusta Riverfront, LLC the benefit of the doubt… that they would make good on their promise to transfer the land and that would provide an easy solution to what has become a complicated mess. But unfortunately, there are rarely easy fixes for fiascoes such as this, especially when you have a city administrator repeatedly withholding vital information from commissioners and a series of broken promises from Augusta Riverfront, LLC.

This is precisely why Al Gray and Lori Davis urged commissioners to hold off on approving a parking management agreement with Augusta Riverfront, LLC on February 7th. Al Gray and Lori Davis urged commissioners to put brakes on parking agreement.

But since then more has come out that shows just what a bad deal it was and, to be fair, commissioners were not aware of these new revelations when they voted for it. They probably thought, in good faith, that all the loose ends would be tied up with the land being transferred, but  investing more good faith now in the same people who have continually mislead you would be an act of folly even greater than the horribly bad parking management deal negotiated by Fred Russell.

We hope Mayor pro tem Joe Bowles stands firm in his resolve, and we would suggest for the commission to STOP any parking management agreement being executed between the city and Augusta Riverfront, LLC. We also suggest revisiting the bids from other companies like Ampco that were apparently ignored by Fred Russell that would yield more favorable terms and less expense for the city.

But we will have even more coming out within the next few weeks on the much larger TEE Center management deal between the city and Augusta Riverfront, LLC that will make ParkingGate look pale by comparison. We told you in our Special Report: No Way to Treat a Partner, that a CORE agreement does not exist between the city and Augusta Riverfront, LLC for the management of the much more expensive TEE Center that was built adjacent to the ARLLC owned Marriott hotel. That’s right, the city built a $38 million facility without an executed agreement… and once again, on parcels of land still owned by Augusta Riverfront, LLC. And under the provisions of the original 1999 CORE agreement for the existing conference center, the only agreement that seems to exist that would currently govern the TEE Center operations, Augusta Riverfront, LLC should have been responsible for the nearly $400,000 change order for a more expensive HVAC system they demanded the city pay because of more stringent Marriott corporate standards.

The pattern here seems to be quite clear. Under all of these deals between the city and Augusta Riverfront, LLC, the taxpayers get stuck paying all of the bills and ARLLC reaps all of the rewards.. including having a $38 million new convention center built adjacent to their hotel giving them not only exclusive use of the facility but also substantially raising the value of their property.  Please stay tuned to our upcoming investigative reports into more waste and bad deals in regard to the TEE Center.

So, commissioners may also want to hold off on finalizing any agreements with Augusta Riverfront, LLC over the TEE Center as well… especially after our upcoming reports. As we’ve mentioned, no CORE agreement seems to exist, and like the parking deck, perhaps the city can negotiate a much better deal by putting this out to bid as well.

Also, it should be obvious now that Fred Russell cannot be trusted to look after the city’s interests in negotiating these deals. In every aspect of the TEE Center and parking deck deals, Russell has consistently favored Augusta Riverfront, LLC over the city for which he works. And not only that, Russell has withheld important information from commissioners that could have affected key votes over these arrangements. Can Augusta afford any more of Fred? Perhaps it’s also time to heed Lori Davis’ advice from that February 7th commission meeting and relieve Fred Russell of his duties as city administrator before he costs the taxpayers any more money, because at this rate, keeping him is becoming far more expensive than firing him. Stay tuned, more to come.***
OS

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Maybe it’s time to call the whole thing off!