Guitars, Girlfriends and Karma

I left a secure job with Texas Oil & Gas years ago to start my own company, soon learning that running your own business was tough. I persevered and managed to learn a few things along the way,

I had less than a thousand dollars saved when I decided to vacate a secure job in lieu of starting a new company. Times were tough and I ended up borrowing a thousand dollars from my girlfriend and mortgaging my motorcycle for a thousand dollars. Six months passed without having earned a single penny and I was starting to become desperate.

My girlfriend Carol knew that I had talent. I had often thought that I was the world’s greatest oil finder. Of course, I have many other delusions as well. We had gone to a movie at Shepard Mall (the first mall in Oklahoma) and were passing a music store.

Carol and I stopped, gazing in at the most beautiful guitar that I had ever seen. It was a maroon-colored Guild and I knew the moment I saw it that I could not live another day without it. I bought it about ten minutes later with the last few dollars of credit remaining on my last credit card.

“You are an idiot,” Carol told me. “You haven’t made a penny in six months and you are wasting money on things you don’t need.”

“I’m making a statement,” I argued. “I’m demonstrating that I think my financial situation is temporary and showing my resolve that things will soon turn around.”

Carol left me shortly after I bought the guitar but I was soon able to repay what I owed her because I made almost four-hundred-thousand dollars the second six months that I was an independent.

Many years later, back in 2003, my business was also failing. Remembering the crimson Guild, I talked myself into buying an electric guitar on eBay that I could ill afford. Amazingly, business turned around almost overnight, shortly after it arrived.

Times are tough. The stock market crashed, along with the price of oil and gas. Like almost everyone else in the country, I feel as if someone has nailed me square in the gut with a steel pipe. I know what I intend to do about it. When I sign off on this post, I am going to log on to eBay and buy a twelve-string Martin. Wish me luck because if this works, I will take everyone along with me.

Eric'sWeb

College, Bowling and Coconut Cookies

My Dad and Mom insisted that brother Jack and I attend college. My father was a pipefitter and made good money when he was working. Problem was he often had long stretches between jobs when he and Mom lived on unemployment. During these times, Jack and I had to provide for ourselves.

During a down cycle in the construction business, I went an entire semester with almost no money. I was working at a bowling alley at the time and living in a one-room apartment with Trellis, a friend and fellow college student. Trellis was one of the smartest people I have ever met, but he had an attitude from hell.

Trellis was so smart that he did not need to study. This was a good thing because he never did. He once aced a calculus test, doing so by listening to the lectures. He never cracked a book or worked a problem. Oh, and did I mention that Trellis was as eccentric as they come?

Trellis loved to bowl and worked at the same bowling alley as I. That semester, he had more money than I did, but not much more. We stretched our food budget by buying powdered milk (ugh!) and cheap canned goods. I once bought ten cans of Showboat spaghetti for a dollar, and I still feel I came out on the short end of the stick.

Trellis was an only child and did not believe in sharing, and one of his many foibles was his distaste for coconut. The primary problem with eccentricity is that people can take advantage of you. While I am not a person that normally does that, I did take advantage of one of Trellis’ foibles, and even after all these years, I am still not ashamed of my actions.

Trellis had squirreled away enough money to buy a bag of chocolate chip cookies and a quart of real milk. As I watched, he began eating the cookies, one by one, and drinking the milk. I watched as he fished each cookie out of the bag, one at a time.

“Can’t you even give me one cookie?” I asked. “You have a whole bag full.” He just smirked, not even bothering to answer. It was then that I saw the flash of a word on the bag of cookies – the word coconut. “I thought you hated coconut,” I said.

Trellis was smart and got my meaning instantly. Following a long look at the cookie bag, he threw it at me in disgust.

“Help your self,” he said.

I did not much like coconut myself, but I never let Trellis know that, eating every single cookie as I smacked my lips and smiled, as if I had suddenly died and gone to heaven.

Finances became easier after that semester and I moved out of the apartment and back to the dorm. I lost contact with Trellis through the years but recently heard that he owns a bowling alley somewhere in California. Go figure!

Eric'sWeb

Black Gold and Stringbeans

Growing up about thirty miles from Shreveport, I attended the Louisiana State Fair every year until I moved out of state. One year, I met a very famous person indeed.

I began collecting rocks at an early age, and decided that I wanted to pursue a career in geology long before graduating from high school. I don’t remember what the year was when the meeting with the famous person occurred, though it was probably the late fifties or early sixties. I was still a boy, not yet in high school.

Visiting the fair with my parents and grandparents, I followed along behind, bored from looking at too many prize roosters and blue ribbon pies. I wanted to be out on the fairway, smelling the hot dogs and cotton candy, and waiting in line for a seat on the roller coaster. Uninterested as I was, my ears picked up when my Grandpa Rood pointed someone out to me.

“See that man over there? It’s H.L. Hunt, the richest man in the world.”

The person my granddad pointed to did not look like the world’s richest man. Dressed in clothes that obviously came off a department store’s cheapest rack, he looked more like a shoe salesman – a mostly unsuccessful shoe salesman at that. At least he was wearing a bowtie. He was standing alone behind a small booth along with a display of canned goods.

Hunt had a little canning company called HLH. It sold beans, carrots and corn. H.L. Hunt was a Texas oil magnate but his passion was selling canned string beans. Every year he would attend the Louisiana State Fair and man the tiny booth displaying his canned goods. I am quite sure that few people there knew that he was the richest man in the world. My Grandpa knew who he was because he had worked in the oil patch all his life, finally retiring with Humble Oil.

“Go introduce yourself to him,” my grandmother said. “Tell him you’re going to be the best oil and gas geologist that ever lived.”

I am not so shy now, but I was painfully so then. Cajoled by my parents and grandparents, I finally sidled over to his booth and introduced myself. I told him that it was an honor meeting him and that I wanted to grow up and become an oilman just like him. I don’t remember much about what he said, but it was something like, “That’s nice, son. Take a can of my string beans to your mama. See how she likes them.”

Yes, he handed me a can of HLH string beans, clasped his hands behind his back and then turned away, tiring of his conversation with an adolescent Louisiana hick. I thanked him though his faraway stare told me he was not listening.

“What did he say?” My Grandpa asked when I returned to my very impressed parents and grandparents.

“Not much. I did most of the talking but he did give me this,” I said, handing my mom the can of string beans.

My meeting with the richest man in the world may have impressed my parents and grandparents though did little to impress me. I am sure he felt likewise. The brief encounter was no more than I just described though I have often thought about the strange man many times. Even though he was one of the most successful oil persons that ever lived, his passion was selling canned string beans that likely never added a nickel to his vast wealth. So many years later, I think that I know the answer why.

I kept my promise to H.L. Hunt, becoming an oilman - albeit not quite as successful - like himself. I also became a competent oil and gas geologist, using that talent to support myself in good stead for many years now. My passion, however, is pecking out words on a keyboard, and regurgitating my thoughts, memories and mysteries for anyone that will read them. I do not possess vast wealth in oil money, but I could not live a month on all that I have made from my writing.

Writing is my passion but, yes, I have a very deep love affair with geology and the study of the earth. I suppose that frumpy man in a bowtie I met so many years ago probably felt the same way about oil and gas. As I think back, I realize what a shame it is that I didn't have him autograph that can of string beans.

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Born near Black Bayou in the little Louisiana town of Vivian, Eric Wilder grew up listening to his grandmother’s tales of politics, corruption, and ghosts that haunt the night. He now lives in Oklahoma, where he continues to pen mysteries and short stories with a southern accent. He authored the French Quarter Mystery Series set in New Orleans, the Paranormal Cowboy Series, and the Oyster Bay Mystery Series. Please check it out on his Amazon author page. You might also like checking out his Facebook page.

Old Hosston Blackened Catfish - a weekend recipe

Louisiana is called the sportsman’s paradise. I’m not much of a sportsman, but I remember fishing at Black Bayou with young friends Billy Williams and Ronnie Elkins. That beautiful summer day, we caught a single catfish that we filleted and cooked on the bayou. It was more than good, it was wonderful. Here is a recipe for blackened catfish, Hosston style that qualifies as southern comfort food. Enjoy.

Old Hosston Blackened Catfish

Ingredients:

· 6 to 8 catfish fillets
· 1 teaspoon black pepper
· 1 teaspoon thyme
· 1 teaspoon salt
· ½ teaspoon garlic powder
· ½ teaspoon onion powder
· ½ teaspoon paprika
· ½ cup butter, melted
· lemon juice, a few drops

Rinse fillets and then pat dry with paper towels. Mix thyme, cayenne pepper, black pepper, salt, garlic powder, onion powder and paprika in a small bowl. Brush melted butter lightly over catfish fillets and sprinkle with blackened seasoning. Coat each fillet.

Heat iron cast skillet until it is very hot, about 10 minutes. Pour the leftover butter into your skillet. Cook fillets in skillet for about 4 minutes on both sides. Turn the fillets when the smoke turns gray. Serve finished fillets over a bed of white steamed rice. Add a few drops of lemon juice to each fillet.

Eric'sWeb

Ski Trip From Hell - part 4

To alleviate the tension, I tried to say something light and humorous on the way back to the Saab. They ignored my one-liner. I know that I am not a perfect person, and I can take my fair share of friendly ribbing. What was coming out of Nan and Gail’s mouths wasn’t friendly; it was mean, hateful and meant to hurt.

Already humiliated by my failure as an athlete, I headed back to the condo as Nan and Gail continued verbally attacking everything from the way I walked and talked, to my manhood, or lack thereof. Soon unable to contain my silence, I began returning their verbal jabs with a few well-placed oral slams of my own. As we walked into the front door, the three of us were fairly yelling at each other.

I went to the frig and popped the top on a Coors, slamming it in a gulp or two and then quickly opening another. Nan and Gail followed my lead, each grabbing a beer and drinking them between evil outbursts. By this time, we were all saying, or more precisely shouting, things we should have regretted in the morning. Locked in the heat of verbal battle, it did not matter.

My marriage to Gail would last a few more years, but already strained since we had moved to Oklahoma City. I knew that Gail had issues with me but had not known until that moment how contentious they had become. I do not think that Nan had a clue about the depth of Gail’s dislike for me, but it was obvious that she was enjoying the contest. It was then that the door to Mick and Nan’s bedroom cracked open.

It was Mick, still dressed in his pajamas, his eyes as red as blood, his dark hair a rumpled mess, and his complexion the pale color of someone approaching the River Styx.

“I’m sick as a dog but I’ve been listening to you two bitches attacking Eric. As ill as I am, I’ll be damned if I’m going to let you trash my best friend.”

The battle of the sexes was on; with Mick on my side, a weight lifted off my shoulders as the cavalry of his presence charged over the proverbial hill. No longer outnumbered, I began verbally fighting with renewed energy.

We continued arguing until we had gone through every beer in the refrigerator, and the lone bottle of red wine we had bought. I can’t remember too much about the argument except that there was no clear winner.

“Damn it, I’m hungry,” Mick finally said. “At least arguing with you two bitches has cured my flu. Let’s go get something to eat.”

We had our fancy dinner on the town that night, and then danced until closing at the loudest, most garish discothèque we could find. We were all smiling that night when we returned to the condo, and still smiling in the morning. We skied half a day Monday, and then started back to Oklahoma City, the snow on the roads melted and our return trip without incident.

Back at work the next day, I stood in the parking lot, staring at the crumpled hood of my beautiful orange Saab. I still loved it dearly but knew in my heart that no matter how expert its repair, it would never again be - much like my rapidly failing marriage - the car I drove off the showroom floor.

Eric'sWeb

Ski Trip From Hell - part 3

Much as our day of skiing had disappeared, our plan for dinner and a few hours of wild nightlife dissolved along with Mick’s good health. We had stopped at a grocery store and laid in a loaf of bread, some canned food, luncheon meat and a few beers. Lucky for Nan, Gail and I as that was all we had to eat and drink.

The little condominium had two full-sized bedrooms, a living room with a wood-burning fireplace, a small kitchen and one bathroom. We three healthy ones built a fire, had a sandwich and a few beers while we listened to Mick tossing his cookies through the thin walls. Mick’s flu continued through the night. The last time I looked at the clock it was three in the morning. Early-riser Gail shook me awake around six.

“Get up or we’ll miss half a day of skiing.”

Dragging myself out of the warm sack, I washed my face and pulled on my heavy ski apparel. It was only twenty-eight degrees outside as Nan, Gail and I drove up the hill to the ski resort, Mick still too sick to get out of bed. We were soon on the bunny slope, Nan giving Gail and me a few quick instructions.

Nan smiled and nodded when Gail said, “I can do this. Let’s go to the top of the mountain.”

After a quick demonstration of how to get on the ski lift, Nan and Gail mounted the chair in front of me. I slipped and slid but managed to scurry into the next chair beside an older woman that refused to look at me. She was dressed in the finest skiwear, her boots and skis the top of the line. She had a frown on her face and just kept shaking her head. She did not reply when I said, “Nice day.”

Mounting a ski lift is one thing, exiting the first time something altogether different. My heart raced as we approached the dismount area. Having no idea what to do, I pushed my rear off the wooden seat, my boots instantly tangling. It wouldn’t have been so bad to fall off the lift, but the moment I lost my balance, I grabbed the snobby woman beside me. She struggled to release herself from my grasp, but like a drowning swimmer, I held on, refusing to let go.

The stranger and I tumbled off the lift and slid down the hill for at least a dozen feet. When we finally slid to a stop, the woman quickly untangled herself , dusted herself off and skied away, hoping, I suppose, that know one had seen the disgraceful debacle.

Two people had. Nan and Gail were standing about ten feet away, laughing their butts off. The remainder of the day deteriorated from that point. I tried my best, but I could not get the hang of free falling down a mountain on a pair of unwieldy fiberglass slats. By noon, I was bruised, exhausted and completely humiliated.

Gail, on the other hand, was a natural athlete. She skied to the bottom of the mountain, never falling. I should have been so lucky. I made it to the bottom of the mountain, but mostly on my face. When I finally reached the lodge at the base of the mountain, I found Nan and Gail waiting for me.

“You’re a real piece of work,” Gail said. “I don’t even know how to describe how much you embarrassed us, or even what to call you.”

“Super Klutz,” Nan said, laughing. “When it comes to skiing, you just suck.”

Like the mountainside, the day continued downward from that point. Feeling like a complete fool, I followed the two laughing females up the mountain again, dismounting with much the same results as before.

Next time down, I pulled off my skis and went to the bar in the lodge. There I waited until five when Nan and Gail tapped on the picture window to indicate they were ready to go back to the condo. As I plodded to the orange Saab, I was looking forward to a peaceful evening. My humiliation had only just begun.

Eric'sWeb

Ski Trip From Hell - part 2

I had the brakes nailed to the floorboard but the bright orange Saab slowed not a mile-per-hour. The pickup truck in front of us had stopped for a red light, a naked engine block in its truck bed to supply rear-end ballast on the icy roads. The four of us had an eternity to brace ourselves for the ensuing impact. It seemed like forever as we finally experienced the sickening thud that followed.

The very low speed impact had no effect on us physically, or on the truck that we hit. It did peel the hood back on the Saab and bend the radiator backwards. The Texas farmer just smiled and shook his head when we offered to call the police, or at least exchange phone numbers.

“You hit that old engine block. You did not touch my truck. You don’t owe me nothing and it was your fault, so you’ll have to pay for the damages on that orange whats-it of yours. I don’t see any reason to call the police.”

Neither did I. We quickly decided there was no mechanical, only structural damage to the car and continued the final two-hundred-fifty miles to the Red River Ski Resort.

The remainder of the trip went without incident but it was late afternoon when we reached Red River – not enough time to ski so we got the keys to our condo instead and then stopped at a ski shop to rent boots, skis, etc. It was dark when we pulled into the front of the little condo, Mick frowning and less than a happy camper.

“This condo is nice, and at least we can eat dinner at a nice restaurant and catch up on a little nightlife.”

Mick’s frown and silence had accompanied us practically since leaving Dalhart. “I don’t know about dinner,” he said. “I’m feeling a little sick.”

“Don’t be that way, Mick,” I said. “I did the best I could.”

Mick was glancing around for a bathroom, his right hand shaking in time with his head. His other hand was at his mouth. “It’s not you,” he said. “I’m sick and think I’m gonna puke.”

CONTINUED TOMORROW

Eric'sWeb

Ski Trip From Hell - part 1

I skied for the first time with my best friend Mickey. We both worked at Cities Service Oil Company during the middle seventies. Mickey and his wife Nancy were expert skiers. My wife Gail and I had never tried it. They were our friends and convinced us we should take a weekend ski trip to Red River in New Mexico.

“We’ll leave Oklahoma City right after work and drive straight though to Red River,” Mick said. “We’ll get there in time to ski the whole day and then rest up a little before party time begins.”

We were all younger then and the plan sounded plausible. We left OKC before six and headed west on I-40, soon aware our plans had already begun going awry. It started snowing around five, I-40 becoming increasingly impassible by the time we reached Amarillo and stopped for a hamburger. Gail and I are both from Louisiana and not used to snow, much less the amount that had fallen and was continuing to fall.

Gail and I had our first new car, an Oklahoma State University orange 1973 Saab. It had a heated passenger seat and front wheel drive. The salesperson had assured me that no car was better in snow or on ice than that particular automobile. His words gave me little comfort as I had struggled to keep it on the road for the past six hours.

“Let’s get a room here in Amarillo, I said. “The Interstate is a mess.”

“Not in the plan,” Mick said. “We keep moving. Conditions will improve.”

Famous last words. Mick and Nan slept in the back seat, Gail in the passenger seat as I plodded through a blizzard worse than I could have ever imagined. When I finally made it to Dumas, I pulled into the first motel I found. Mick was less than enthralled.

“We can’t stop here. We’ll miss an entire day of skiing.”

Mick, Nan and Gail, having slept most of the distance from Amarillo, had no idea of the weather conditions. On the other hand, my eyes were almost blind from trying to discern the pavement from the ditch – all solid white - for the past two hours.

“I’m stopping,” I said. “If you’re serious about heading on to Red River, I’ll call you a cab to the bus station.”

Mick glared at me but followed me to the office of the motel. There was one room left, thank heavens, and Mick and I flipped a coin for the single bedroom. He won. He and Nan spent the night on a real bed, Gail and me on a lumpy couch. It didn’t much matter because exhausted, I fell asleep almost immediately.

It was no longer snowing when we awoke early the next morning. Mick questioned my manhood as we ate breakfast at a nearby truck stop. I ignored him, all the way to Dalhart. We were in town when he began yelling.

“You’re on a sheet of solid ice and driving way to fast. Slow down, Wildman. You’re going to hit that truck in front of us.”

Driving on ice is one thing. Stopping quickly on ice is something else altogether. We braced ourselves, and held our collective breaths as we plowed into the back of a stationary pickup truck.

CONTINUED TOMORROW

Eric'sWeb

Mardi Gras Fever

Today is Fat Tuesday and the old city is abuzz with revelry and celebration. Wish I was there.

http://buzz.yahoo.com/buzzlog/93388?fp=1

Eric'sWeb

Marching in the Venus Parade

As a freshman in college during the '60s, I joined a precision marching group called the Fusileers. The college I attended required two years of ROTC and the national paranoia concerning Vietnam hadn’t yet set in. Besides, we got to do some neat things like taking trips to Mardi Gras and marching in parades.

In 1965 I went with the Fusileers to New Orleans to march in the Iris and the Venus Parades. Although I didn’t know it at the time, Venus is one of the older Krewes, or carnival clubs. We arrived at Jackson Barracks, an old army post on the Mississippi River named after Andy Jackson, in an old bus we called the Golden Goose. The night before the parade most of us left the barracks on foot in groups of five or six and made our way toward Bourbon Street. My group stopped at a neighborhood bar, drank Regal Beer for twelve cents a glass, and sampled the gumbo. We made it to Bourbon Street around dark.

I bought a fifth of Early Times at a drugstore a block or so from Bourbon Street. Most of us got separated in the throngs of people crowding the French Quarter. John T, the last member of the Fusileers that I’d arrived with to the Quarter disappeared down Conti, towing a college girl he’d just met. It didn’t matter because I wasn’t alone.

Comforted by the gentle caress of Early Times, I followed the drunken mass of humanity pressing against me to the entrance of Pat O’Brien’s Irish Bar, the crowd funneling into the courtyard informing me that I’d found the place to be. When I finally made it into the enchanted courtyard I realized my instincts had been correct. The courtyard was a compilation of flowing fountains, Spanish tile, potted plants, and lingering mystery. I soon found my own college girl in the mass of humanity packed into the magical place. Or I should say she found me.

“Can you help me?” she said, grasping my hand a bit too tightly.

“If I can,” I said.

Blond hair draped her shoulders laid bare by her orange, University of Tennessee sleeveless tee shirt. She was looking me straight in the eyes as she squeezed my hand, so close I felt as if she were reading my mind.

“Can you go into the men’s bathroom and see if my boyfriend is there?”

“How will I know, even if he is?” I asked.

“Call his name, Tom. Tell him Susie is looking for him,” she said.

The mob in the men’s bathroom didn’t respond when I shouted out Tom’s name nor did anyone even give me a glance when I told them Susie was looking for him. I didn’t even feel like an idiot because everyone else seemed far more screwed up than I was. Susie grabbed my arm, pulling me close when I walked out the door.

“Well?” she said.

“He’s not in there,” I said.

“You sure? Maybe passed out in a stall?”

“No,” I said, hoping she wouldn’t let go of my arm.

She didn’t, drawing even closer, one arm around my waist, her dark eyes darting around the people in the courtyard.

“Can I stay with you?” she asked.

“Sure.”

“Then let’s go into the bar. I’ll buy you a Hurricane.”

She pulled me into Pat O’Brien’s where dueling pianos were serenading loud and boisterous patrons from some university or the other. The tables were full, standing room only as she ordered drinks at the bar.

“What is it?” I asked when she handed me the icy glass with a syrupy concoction.

“Hurricane,” she said. “The signature drink of New Orleans. Don’t drink it too fast or you’ll be sorry.”

“Wow!” I said, sipping the alcoholic nectar through two red straws that I couldn’t from my lips seem to unlock. “I wonder what happened to your boyfriend?”

“He’s a chicken shit,” she said. “A man was following us. Someone in the crowd told us he was a professional boxer.”

“What did he want?” I asked.

“Me,” she said. “Tom got scared and deserted me. When we finish our Hurricanes will you take me back to my room?”

“Sure,” I said.

“You can keep the glass. It’s a souvenir. Why don’t we just go ahead and leave? We can finish our Hurricanes on the way to the hotel.

She began pulling me through the crowd toward the exit. She let go of my arm when we reached it, recoiling when she saw a short, prematurely bald man glaring at us. Before I knew what had hit me, the man smacked me on the bridge of the nose with a roundhouse right that snapped my head back. The unexpected punch sent my glasses flying across the crowded bar and the Hurricane glass crashing to the tile floor.

As a freshman in college, I was around six feet tall and weighed about one hundred thirty pounds. I must have looked meaner than I really was because the man who had sucker-punched me had hurried away, melting into the Mardi Gras masses outside on the street. Susie, my new Tennessee girlfriend, quickly clutched my arm as someone from the crowd retrieved my glasses and handed them to me.

“Let’s hurry,” Susie said. “My hotel isn’t far away. We’ll catch a cab.”

When a cab pulled to the curb in the darkened outskirts of Mardi Gras mania, I held the door for her as she entered.

“I can’t go with you,” I said. “I’m a soldier. I have a twelve-o’clock curfew and need to get back to the barracks.”

Her dark frown and tightly crossed arms were like a slap in the face as the door shut and the taxi hurried away into the night.

Though I don’t remember how, I made it back to Jackson Barracks, albeit without my Hurricane glass, before the witching hour. Cut nose, broken glasses and the recent memory of Susie’s warm breasts pressing against my arm were my only souvenirs.  I stayed up the rest of the night reading the Terry Southern erotic classic Candy, thinking of Susie and what might have been.

Mardi Gras that year was my first taste of crazy and surreal Carnival. I’d lapped it up, maybe because I had viewed it through tired, near-sighted, hung-over eyes. Even though my feet hurt like hell the next day, after the seven-mile parade that lasted six hours or so, I would gladly have done it again. With another seven-mile parade on tap for the next day, I never returned to Bourbon Street or Pat O’Brien’s.

Soon after the trip, things got worse in Southeast Asia. John T. dropped out of school, was drafted, sent to Vietnam, and died within the year; one of the war’s many victims. I didn’t sign up for the third year of ROTC and quickly forgot my childhood dreams of becoming a soldier. I had my face rubbed in my childhood dreams when I was drafted shortly after graduation and quickly learned the truth about the old saying, “Don’t wish too hard for anything. It might just come true.”

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P.S. - Though I didn't attend my first Mardi Gras until I was seventeen, I'd already visited New Orleans many times. My brother Jack and I spent time there with our Aunt Carmol, a schoolteacher. My first wife Gail grew up in Chalmette, a suburb of the city. Though my first French Quarter Mystery, Big Easy wasn't published until 2010, I knew I was destined to write a series that would include the dirt, trash, innuendos, and accusations about people, places, and events I'd gleaned through years of listening to the people around me. Hope you'll give them a read and see for yourself. Eric

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• Born near Black Bayou in the little Louisiana town of Vivian, Eric Wilder grew up listening to his grandmother’s tales of politics, corruption, and ghosts that haunt the night. He now lives in Oklahoma, where he continues to pen mysteries and short stories with a southern accent. He authored the French Quarter Mystery Series set in New Orleans, the Paranormal Cowboy Series, and the Oyster Bay Mystery Series. Please check it out on his Amazon author page. You might also like checking out his Facebook page.

Year of the Tiger

I awoke this morning to a light dusting of snow, strange because it was nearly sixty degrees here in central Oklahoma. Maybe not so strange. Today is the first day of the Chinese New Year, the year of the Tiger.

It is also the last weekend of Mardi Gras, this Tuesday being Fat Tuesday, and it is also Valentine’s Day. The planets have seemed aligned in a unique way this year such as I have never witnessed.

I was in Houston this week at the North American Prospect Expo. South Texas was overcast and rainy, north central Texas in the midst of a record snowstorm. I took some eerie pictures as my friend Mickey and I drove through Dallas, and a foot of snow, on Friday.

Yes, things seem a little strange but it is the year of the tiger, so happy Chinese New Years, Valentine’s Day and Mardi Gras – oh yes, and President’s Day. The weather can only get better. Can’t it?

Eric'sWeb

Fried Garfish Balls - a weekend recipe

Growing up in northwest Louisiana - not far from Black Bayou and Caddo Lake - I saw many large garfish. I didn’t know that these prehistoric denizens of many southern rivers and lakes were edible. Today, I learned differently.

My good friend and fellow geologist Mickey O. spent a couple of days this week in Houston (sorry Aunt Dot. I didn’t have time to call) at the North American Prospect Expo. On the way home, before traversing fifteen inches of snow in Dallas, we stopped for lunch at a Mexican seafood restaurant in Houston adjacent to I-45.

One of the items on the appetizer menu was garfish balls. They also had octopus tacos, which I didn't try. I didn’t get the recipe for the garfish balls at the restaurant, but I found this one on the web. Quite tasty.

Fried Garfish Balls

· 2 lbs ground garfish
· 1 cup green onions – chopped
· 1 lb. boiled and peeled potatoes
· 2 medium white onions – chopped
· ¼ cup Creole seasoning
· ¼ cup all-purpose flour
· corn flour

Boil potatoes; mix the first 6 ingredients together in a bowl. Roll the mixture into balls the size of golf balls or maybe even a little bigger if you like. Put the balls in the cornflour and roll them around to fully coat the balls. Put the balls in the fryer preheated to 375° and fry until golden brown. Serve as appetizers or as a side with the main meal.

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Born near Black Bayou in the little Louisiana town of Vivian, Eric Wilder grew up listening to his grandmother’s tales of politics, corruption, and ghosts that haunt the night. He now lives in Oklahoma where he continues to pen mysteries and short stories with a southern accent. He is the author of the French Quarter Mystery Series set in New Orleans and the Paranormal Cowboy Series. Please check it out on his Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo and iBook author pages. You might also like to check out his website.

Oil Well From Hell - part 2

You do not open a drill-stem-test tool after dark; at least that was true twenty years ago when standard light bulbs commonly illuminated the drilling rig. This is because an exploding light bulb can easily ignite natural gas. It was not something we were worrying about on this well, but we should have been.

I stood on the drill floor, watching as the drill stem tester opened the tool for the first time, anything that might be in the formation sucked into the drill pipe by hydrostatic pressure. If there were enough pressure, whatever gas or fluid in the pipe would flow to the surface. In anticipation of this, we had a pipe from the test tool protruding out to the reserve pit. I expected to see nothing at all, but I got a big surprise.

The sound of natural gas accelerating up through the pipe soon began stressing everyone’s ears. When the gas hit the surface, it streamed from the relief pipe in a super-charged, jet-like whoosh. My eyes were wide and I was holding my ears when the oil hit, spraying from the pipe in a jet of solid crude, projectile vomiting from the well.

Two minutes passed with the well showing no signs of abating its wild flow of oil and natural gas. James W., the assistant Cities Service field superintendent stood beside me. It took a minute for me to realize how stressed that he had become. James was a big man that looked a little like an over-the-hill professional wrestler. He was not acting like a macho wrestler. There were tears in his eyes and I had the distinct impression that he was on the verge of passing out.

“James,” I said, grabbing his big right shoulder. “What’s the matter?”

Daylight was rapidly disappearing, but even in the flickering luminosity coming from the rig floor, I could see that his face had taken on the ashen expression of someone suffering a near-death experience. A sorrowful moan exited from his open mouth as his upper body rocked back and forth like a strong oak in a whistling gale.

“Are you okay?” I demanded, administering a vigorous shake to his arm.

All he could say was, “Oh God Damn, oh God Damn!”

It was then that I realized we were in trouble and I did not have a clue what it was, or what to do about it even if I did. I am not a small man, but James was six inches taller and a hundred pounds heavier. Still, I was becoming quickly agitated by the scream of natural gas, roar of erupting oil and the look of total desperation on my big friend’s face. Grabbing him by the shoulders, I wheeled him around, shook him as hard as I could and screamed in his face.

“You get a grip, James, or I swear I am going to slap the shit out of you. Tell me what the matter is, now!”

James quit shaking and opened his mouth, as if to clear his plugged ears.

He was moaning when he said, “This is how my Daddy died, burned to death on a drill stem test pulled after dark.”

I was still shaking him and screaming in his face. “What do we need to do?” James did not answer me. He just keep wobbling from side to side and shaking his head. I let go of him and grabbed the tester. “Shut in the well, now!”

Heavier than the air, natural gas had pooled around the drilling rig. We were ten feet off the ground, but the liquids-rich gas flooded my nostrils. The drill stem tester quickly shut in the well, instantly stopping the flow of oil and natural gas to the pit.

“Get off the rig!” I shouted, moving from one roughneck to the next. “Get away from the rig! Do it! And don’t crank your cars.”

We were soon all standing a hundred yards from the abandoned drilling rig, the roughnecks and driller looking at me as if I were a crazy man. It was in the days before the cell phone. After threatening the crew, I returned to the location, cautiously starting my company car and driving ten miles to the nearest pay phone.

A company engineer reached the location from Wichita in about an hour. He never told me if I had done the right thing, but he sent the crew home and told me to return to my motel room. Next morning, a knock on my door awoke me. It was Fred, the head geologist and my company supervisor.

“I’m relieving you for the rest of the well,” he said.

Fred and I had breakfast but he dodged every effort I made to try to find out if my rash actions of the previous night were met with agreement or discord. I never learned. No one in management ever gave me an atta boy, or reamed my ass. I did not see James again because I never sat another well in that district.

I left Cities shortly after the incident, never learning from anyone in the company if I was a hero, or an idiot. Looking back, I was probably more of the latter than the former, but it was not my fault. Put in a position of responsibility for which I was sorely incompetent. I could only do the best that I could do. As a Vietnam veteran, I well knew the look of desperation, and had only acted after seeing that expression on James’ big face.

There are few occupations as dangerous as drilling oil and gas wells. I can live with the realization that I am probably a fool because it is better than the possibility, no matter how remote, of attending the funeral of a charred burn victim.

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Oil Well From Hell - Part 1

As a geologist, I “sat” many wells during my stint with Cities Service Oil Company. Sitting a well included staying on or near a location during its drilling, usually in a small trailer. The well site work was noisy, often dangerous but usually boring. One of the last wells that I sat was anything but boring and it caused me to think about another line of work.

It was the dead of winter in Harper County, Kansas, twelve feet of snow on the ground. I had a motel room in nearby Anthony where I would go to shower and take an occasional nap. Drilling an oil well is a 24-7 operation that continues without pause until the intended total depth is reached.

The wildcat well was running low (a geologic expression that usually portends bad news) and we had just penetrated the top ten feet of the Viola Dolomite, one of the zones we had thought might be productive. I saw some oil staining in the samples and had a slight “kick” on the gas detector so I called for a drill stem test to evaluate the zone, even though no one had much hope left for the well.

A drill stem test is simply a tool attached to the drill pipe. It is lowered to the formation to be tested. It is a little like putting your finger on the end of a straw and then sticking it into a glass of water. When you remove your finger, the straw fills with water. A DST is a little more complicated than that, but you get the picture.

A complete DST includes pulling the drill pipe, attaching the DST tool and then running it back in the hole. Once the packers are set, the tool is open and shut for a prescribed period to see if anything flows to the surface (e.g. oil, gas or water). After picking the packer seats, I left the location and went to my motel room for a much-needed rest.

A DST can take many hours, so that night I had a good rest. I returned to the location to observe as they opened the tool for the first time. We were running “low” and not looking very good, and I expected to see nothing more than a possible puff of natural gas. What I actually saw came as an almost complete shock.

CONTINUED TOMORROW

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Mysteries of Life

The lives of people often entwine inextricably. Take my family, for instance. In 1969, during the first Vietnam-era draft, my lottery number was thirty-eight. My father’s lottery number during the first draft of the World War II era was the same number. Coincidence? Maybe.

My brother, father and myself were all born in Louisiana, my mother in Mississippi. I was twenty-six when I first visited Oklahoma, my brother the same age although he is two years older than I am. My mother was eighty-four before she ever set foot into Oklahoma, my father eighty-six.

My mother died here, three years ago. My father has Alzheimer’s disease, in assisted-living care, and I am almost certain that he will die here. Both my brother’s family and my family now live in Oklahoma and both of us will likely breathe our last breaths in this state.

You are all in the same family, you say. It is logical that you will all die in the same place.

I am not so sure. Life’s mysteries may be no more than coincidence. What statistical analysis do scientists have to prove this? Perhaps we are all actors destined to play many parts opposite the same members of a large cast. Clad in ever-changing costumes, cultural backdrops, different eras and mores, we act out a play cast and directed by some nebulous being.

Reality is only what we perceive, or think we perceive. My father with Alzheimer’s is but a semblance of his former self, but he still functions, eats, sleeps - He still knows my brother and me. His recent memories are gone, but he can remember his childhood and his experiences in the war. Still, what is reality when perception has vanished?

My father is now more like my child. Maybe, once, he was my child. Who really knows? Yes, he is still my father but like so many sons before me, he remains almost a complete mystery. There are many questions I have for him. Now that I am brave enough to ask, all that I get in return is a blank stare.

Yes, some lives entwine inextricably. Of this, I am quite certain. Well, maybe not. In the words of Bob Dylan, “the only thing I know for sure is that I don’t know anything for sure.”

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Souvenir Tee Shirts

Decades of clutter populates my house and office. An organizational message appeared in my mail not long ago. If you have not used something in two years, it said, chances are you never will. Toss it was the impending message. Clutter slows you down, impedes your life and makes you unhappy.

Maybe so, I thought as I folded my laundry. Maybe I should throw away some of my old tee shirts, especially those with tears and stains. I began sorting the tee shirts on my bed with that thought in mind.

The first tee I held up for inspection was from the Redbud 10K race of 2000. I had to think a moment before its relevance came to mind. When it did, it poured over me with a poignant flood of memories, still painful after almost eight years.

Barely managing to cope with the death of my wife in 1998, I had gained an enormous amount of weight, and I continued to seethe with an inner anger that would not quit saying, “why me?” Jogging had helped me maintain my sanity during Anne’s illness and I needed to know that I still had the physical, and the mental strength to go the distance.

I parked my car a mile from the starting line and walked the rest of the way to loosen my muscles I knew would be screaming uncle long before the finish of the six-point-two mile course. Halfway there, a young man jogged up and began walking with me.

“Are you doing the Freedom Walk,” he asked.

“Nope,” I said. “The 10K.”

“You sure you can make it, big fellow?”

“Don’t know, but that’s what I’m here to find out,” I told him.

“You can do it,” he said. “But you need to go out slow. Don’t get caught up in the crowd. Just run your own race. If you get tired, then walk for awhile.”

With that, the man I am positive was an angel tapped me on the shoulder and jogged away without another word. Before I reached the starting line, it began to rain. It continued to rain until I completed the 6.2 miles that I did without stopping, not even once. The torrent ended as I crossed the line.

“I can’t throw this baby away,” I said, folding the tee shirt and putting it aside.

The next tee was from the Downtown Oklahoma City Art’s Festival of 1995. There was no Oklahoma City Art’s Festival in 1995. City Fathers canceled the event because of the Oklahoma City bombing attack on the Murrah Building in April of 1995. I bought the tee a year later, as the festival had an unsold stock of them. The tee had a torn sleeve where my Labrador Lucky had taken a bite from it when he was a puppy. Lucky, my best friend in the world, had helped me survive my grief. Folding the tee, I put it aside.
“Can’t throw this one away either,” I said.

Ten raggedy tees later, I had failed to throw even one of them away.

Sitting here now, punching these random thoughts out for all you anonymous people in the blogosphere, I cannot help but think of the clutter in my life. Yes, I need to throw some things away. I know existence would be simpler and better if I could control the chaos in my house, my office and yes, in my brain.

Maybe, but perhaps the clutter in our lives is really the essence of our being, the essential glue that binds our very souls. I do not know. What I do know is that without memories we would be little more than pulsating blobs of protoplasm.

Stuffing the tees in my chest of drawers, I forced shut the drawer and decided to worry about the chaos later.

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Crab Imperial - a weekend recipe

Many years ago, I took a field trip to Venice, Louisiana with some fellow geology students from NLSC (now University of Louisiana, Monroe). We spent the night in an onshore barracks and then took a crew boat out to visit a few offshore drilling rigs the following day. After reaching a location on a choppy sea, we had lunch on one of the rigs.

Drilling crews stay on the offshore rigs for days on end, twenty-one days on, seven days off. There is television and the game room, but little else to occupy your time while stranded miles from shore. The food makes everything bearable. When my geology class visited, I was impressed (as any twenty-one-year-old man would be) at the steaks, chicken, red beans and rice, multiple desserts, etc. available four times a day.

Offshore cooks are the best in the world at keeping people happy. I found this recipe on the web, donated by Dick English, a cook on an offshore drilling rig. Thanks, Dick. Try it and enjoy it.

Crab Imperial

Ingredients:

½ pound of butter
1 cup of flour
2 cups of milk
½ cup of celery, chopped fine
½ cup of mushrooms, chopped fine
½ cup of parsley, chopped fine
½ cups of green onions, chopped fine
½ cup of pimentos, chopped fine
2 pounds of lump crab meat
Worcestershire sauce, to taste
Tabasco sauce, to taste
Salt and pepper, to taste
Breadcrumbs

Cooking Instructions

Melt butter over low heat and stir in flour. Cook until bubbles appear on top. Add milk slowly, stirring constantly. Add celery and mushrooms. Continue cooking while adding parsley, green onions, and pimentos. Fold-in crabmeat. Add Worcestershire sauce, hot pepper sauce, salt, and pepper, to taste. Pour mixture into individual baking dishes and sprinkle with breadcrumbs. Bake until brown in a 350-degree oven.

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Born near Black Bayou in the little Louisiana town of Vivian, Eric Wilder grew up listening to his grandmother’s tales of politics, corruption, and ghosts that haunt the night. He now lives in Oklahoma where he continues to pen mysteries and short stories with a southern accent. He is the author of the French Quarter Mystery Series set in New Orleans and the Paranormal Cowboy Series. Please check it out on his Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Kobo and iBook author pages. You might also like to check out his website.

The Wait is Over

My business partner and fellow writer r.r. bryan, is also from Louisiana. Yesterday, he told me something that both of us found hard to believe.

“Did you know they cancelled a Mardi Gras parade in New Orleans?”

I didn’t know. Mardi Gras parades are never cancelled or postponed. They always go off on schedule, even in a driving New Orleans rainstorm. The cause of the cancellation – Saints mania.

Sunday marks the first Super Bowl appearance for the New Orleans Saints and the city is practically locked-down in anticipation. School is cancelled, jury trials put on hold and some restaurants closing for the first time ever for non-holiday events.

Sunday is a historic day in the Big Easy, a sports-happy city that has patiently awaited this even for more than four decades.

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Getting Old

Central Oklahoma hasn’t seen a winter as cold as this one in more than twenty-seven years. Two major snowstorms since Christmas Eve have left snow that has yet to melt. About ten days ago, the weather took a toll on me.

I was walking with my pugs in the backyard. The ground was slick and it was dark. When I reached the two-foot step down, I missed the first step. Plummeting face first, I landed on my left shin, skinning it and lying on the ground for minutes as my puggies swarmed me, thinking I was playing.

Several days passed before my right leg began to ache. Soon, the pain was almost unbearable. I began taking aspirins, ibuprofens and Tylenols, nothing doing much to stem the pain in my leg. I finally made a doctor’s appointment, afraid that I had a blood clot, cancer, or maybe something worse.

Doctor L x-rayed my knee and determined nothing was broken. He prescribed a steroid pack to lessen the swelling and inflammation in my leg. He is a miracle worker because this morning I awoke with no pain. I walked around, awaiting the sharp throbbing pain to start. It never did.
I spent the entire day without taking a single pain reliever. I think I’m on my way to a cure but one thing still bothers me: I have an overwhelming desire to play major league baseball.

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Gondwanaland by Arvis Tatom

For all of you geology wonks out there, here is an entertaining, and educational, music video.

A Trip to the Trees City Field

My Dad was born in Trees City, Louisiana, just after the First World War. An honest-to-God boomtown little remains of the once bustling town. My brother Jack and I are moving my dad, a World War II vet, to the world-class veteran’s facility in Norman, Oklahoma, so I am reprising my story about my last trip to Trees City.

The last time I visited northwest Louisiana, I visited Trees City. The town was founded by the legendary oil finders Benedum and Trees. These two wildcatters had moved to north Louisiana after finding large oil fields in Oklahoma. They discovered the Trees City Field in far Northwest Louisiana.

Trees City quickly became a boomtown, complete with churches, honkytonks and a post office. During the height of the oil boom, 25,000 people lived there. Today, it is little more than a memory.

Thick trees, vines and creepers cover most of what was once a thriving city. Permanent steel towers, constructed on site for the drilling of a single oil well, still peek up through the tall trees. Even the post office is gone, located now at the Oil Museum in nearby Oil City, Louisiana.

Benedum and Trees sold their interest in the Field to Gulf Oil for a million dollars, an enormous sum of money at the time. The amount pales compared with the vast riches recovered by Gulf Oil. It doesn’t matter much now. Where roughnecks once toiled to recover Mother Nature’s dark liquid bounty, only ghosts wisping silently over Jeems Bayou still remain.

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Stealing Watermelons

My ex-partner John and I drilled and operated our first well in 1978. The Kelln, located a few miles north of the tiny Major County, Oklahoma town of Cleo Springs is still producing after thirty years. Thirty years ago we weren’t so sure how it would turn out.

John and I are both geologists (he is also now a lawyer) and knew little at the time about drilling and completing wells. We hired a man that did, a geological engineer named Bill A. Bill had engineered hundreds of wells in the area, mostly for Texas operator T.F. Hodge, and there was little he didn’t know.

Much like today, it was hot and dry when we drilled the Kelln well. The area north of Cleo Springs is largely agricultural and Bill knew the location of a nearby watermelon patch.

“We’ll load up the trunk,” he said. “There’s so many out there that the farmers won’t miss a few.”

I was riding shotgun as Bill drove his Chevy field car off the section line road, into the large watermelon patch that stretched as far as we could see. Following a farmer’s trail, he drove into the middle of the patch and parked beneath the sparse shade of a stunted blackjack tree. After watching him pop the trunk lid, I followed him down a row lined with huge watermelons.

Bill was tall and had to really bend to thump each melon to determine its ripeness. We soon chose six prime specimens and loaded them into the Chevy’s deep trunk. So enthralled were we with our search, we never heard two men in a pickup truck pull in behind us.

“What are you boys doing?” a voice behind us said.

Bill and I turned to see two large farmers, both dressed in sweaty overalls. Neither man appeared particularly pleased. I was at a loss for words but not Bill. Reaching for his wallet, he pulled out a twenty and handed it to the older man.

Bill was as tall as the men confronting us but lanky, unlike the two barrel-chested men with huge arms and farmer’s tans. With a big Texas grin on his face Bill never missed a beat.

“We were just coming to look for you two boys,” he said, purposely adopting the local drawl in his speech. “Is twenty enough for these melons we bought?”

The big man nodded and took the twenty without answering or returning Bill’s mile-wide smile. Glancing at me and cocking his head toward the door, he signaled me to get in the car. He slammed the trunk shut and followed me, not bothering to say bye to the two farmers.

They watched us drive away, mopping sweat from their heads with their worn out ball caps and ignoring our dust. Bill didn’t say a word until we were about a mile down the road. That’s when his infectious grin appeared again on his expressive face.

“I’ve been stealing melons from that patch for years. Guess it was about time I got caught.”

By this time he was laughing and I joined him, wondering as I did if stolen watermelons tasted better than ones you purchased. As we continued down the road in a trail of dust I decided that was information I didn’t need to know.

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