JimBob and I now have a regular weekly discussion on my bus home and his to work. yesterday he asked me, "Well any ideas on new books?"
"Yeah, One of my readers suggested a poor tour, a survey of the bars to go to and not to go too—eateries as well."
"Christ Bro, that will be an encyclopedia—and you'll probably get killed somewhere along the line—which would go along ways towards insuring flush royalty checks for your inheritors... Listen, I worked in over a dozen bars and have drunk in over a hundred since the eighties. I can give you some leads to look into—that bar that was low end back in the day and maybe still opened today—places with character! Unless of course the yuppies have gentrified them."
"Please tell me you're not going to the block house on Sinclair Lane."
"The Cedonia Inn—have to, a point of honor."
"Fuck that! Take a rifle company at least—you know Enfield's, pith helmets, get yourself a navy thirty-six in a shoulder slung holster and prepare to duck spears!"
JimBob's voice was echoing deeply through the confines of the ebony humanity packed bus.
"I'm going to check it out with my new publisher, Mescaline Franklin, a white kid from Camden New Jersey."
"Well, have fun with you masochistic friend, and don't forget to duck. My favorite in Fells Point was 'The Bar' just the fucking bar. Has a sign out front that says bar—still there. Place was dirty as shit—filthy, no amenities, no food, us wait staff from the restaurant trade we loved to get together there en drink after eleven."
The ten year old black kid seated next to JimBob is perking up, perhaps at the mention of his ancestors somehow throwing spears at the white bearded man across the aisle with the note pad and pen, listening to this odd ramble of the ancient white ape, regarding him like some relic out of an ancient world of high adventure.
"Jerry's Belvedere over in Govans* is a reliable dive. Old man bit it a few years back but his sons are still managing to attain the same low quality service their old man was renown for. The place should be a gold mine, but they barely get by."
"The real dive was Murphy's Govans Bar. Just down the street from the Senator you should get two food rushes, one per a show. If you have a good kitchen you make bank. Cheap beer and you keep the college kids coming. The owner—Murphy—was a stone cold alcoholic—a total drunk. He drank the profits. Couldn't pay for trash pick ups, so emptied the dumpster with his car and dumped the trash in someone else's dumpster. He would sublet this kitchen to this dubious character who used to bring whores into the kitchen and fuck them—right there on the prep table—while he was cooking. Let's just say I suspected his sanitation. A little afternoon delight—fucking the whore—and then back to flip the burger! What's not to like—need anything extra on that, pal?"
The young boy is looking up at JimBob with big eyes, like a priest who just found out that God farts.
"Now, I drank there because I worked down the street and the beers were cheap—the draft. Of course, you needed two coasters for every draft, one to put the beer on so that the sweat would not liquefy the dirt on the unclean bar top and have mud dripping down your wrist, and the other to cover your beer in between swigs so that the roaches falling out of the ceiling did not end up doing the backstroke in your beer. Old Murphy never had money for an exterminator."
*York Road and Belvedere, just below where Northern Parkway crosses York, above the Senator Theater.
James, had a fellow guide pork a bar fly from a local joint in Afton Wyo, we slept 4 to a tent, our beds were only a foot apart head to head, try to sleep through that one. Ishmael