The Man in the Yellow Hat (Part 2)

The evening started with the monthy membership meeting for the entire company. This was my first, due to the fact that fire school ran on the same night as meetings, so it was interesting to see the turnout. I guess roughly two/thirds of the station was there, many of whom I've never laid eyes on.

The company meeting was fairly uneventful. There was a brief debate over the responsibility of the officers getting their probies through their probationary periods in expedient order. I suspect this should have served as foreshadowing for me, but I focused more on the various participants of the debate, and some of their rather overt yet inept partisan antics.

I had heard a rumor earlier that we would be getting our new turnout gear after the meeting, so my focus at that point was figuring out how to subtly ask for all my new shit without sounding like the poser that I am. The rumor was true, and a brand new set of Globe pants and coat awaited me - name emblazoned on the back. It fit well, the name was spelled right, and my little world was once again balanced on it's axis of hope, love, and swag.

Since this particular night was also duty crew for me, I just laid out my new gear, turned in my old, and started bantering with all my friends coming out of the meeting. Shortly thereafter, Drillzilla told me to start cleaning the bathrooms. That was cool, but odd. For all of his storied rage and oppressive tactics, Drillzilla never once singled me out for any unsavory task. This probably should have been another clue.

Once I was finished with the bathrooms, my captain told me to stay put in the lobby, and more importantly, stay out of the bay. At that point I knew something was up. There would never be a call to separate somebody from the crew, especially when there was work to be done. That fact was underscored when Homeschool was instructed to stay there with me, presumably for companionship. Two Redhats, given direct orders to do nothing? Yeah, something was amiss.

At that point the Chief came up and asked me what I was doing.

Me - "I was told to stand here and wait."

His face instantly registered awareness: "Okay, generally I would stick around out of morbid curiousity, but I don't feel like filling out injury forms tonight, so in the interest of plausible deniability, I'll be bidding you adieu."

Yep. I was fucked.

The Captain, or Drillzilla - I forget which - came and grabbed both Homeschool and I and told us to get our asses into the bay. Once there, he gave me brief and incomplete instructions as to what was going to happen. I caught a glimpse of the Quint and the Tower, both aerials raised and kissing at the top, but other than that, I didn't see much when I heard...

"GO!!!"

Of course, new gear is about as pliable as virgin cardboard, so my on-the-truck two-minute drill was not particularly speedy. I made it out in fairly decent order though, all chipper and ready for what lay ahead.

First up? 200-lb dummy pull through a series of cones. Not horribly hard - the dummy had webbing attached to it's shoulders and was pretty draggable. The cones, however, were set up in a way that made navigation painful. After about 50 feet - 100 including the turns - I was at the base of the Quint.

The Quint is a gender-confused apparatus - half truck, half engine. It has a 75 foot aerial ladder, and carries several cross-lays and 500 gallons of water. Most crews don't like it because it's slow, and like many multi-tools, doesn't perform any one task particularly well. This night, however, it performed it's only function - fucking with a redhat - just fine.

On the first step of the not-quite-vertical quint ladder I knew I was going to be hurting. My legs were burning from the dummy drag, and my right knee was smarting from some ground-pounding action it got during paintball a few days prior. I managed to make okay time going up the aerial, but I certainly wasn't going to get my name on a plaque.

About halfway through my ascent, I heard a gurgling noise. The quint has a pipe going up the aerial that can attach to a hose at the top. The nozzle that day, however, was directly under me - halfway up the aerial. I braced myself, and about a second later had a deluge of cold-ass hydrant water giving me some chin-music. Thankfully, the nozzle was set on a fog pattern - had it been on straight stream I would have probably been blown right off the ladder. I also suspect they had it at fairly low pressure - nobody wanted to see me die - but it seemed like a lot of damn water at the time.

I got to the top of the aerial, where I was told to clip in by [Spunky], the driver of my engine crew. Spunky is Cheeky's best friend, and they are pretty much the same person. Cheeky is a bit prettier, Spunky would be the tough one. Spunky is the more tolerable of the two by a large margin, but they've both got a rampant case of the Look-At-Me's.

I then transitioned to the Tower ladder, where I climbed down, after unclipping my belt from Spunky. The trip down the Tower was, what turned out to be, my only break. I probably could have performed the descent a bit faster, but I was enjoying the view, and the rest, because once on the ground, more ladder work was in store for me...

The 28-foot truss beam ladder is one of the workhorses on the Tower. It's strong, heavy, it can go to a third story window, and it can be carried by one person; sort of. Not too many folk sign up for the singlehanded 28er throw, but it can be done, and it is certainly drill-worthy.

I pulled the 28 from the Tower, walked it 50 or 60 feet to a nearby building, and raised it. I extended the fly, rolled it, and tied the halyard. Once at the top of the ladder, I was told there were three victims, and that I'd best get to steppin'.

My search and rescue technique was pretty sloppy - I never got down on all fours, I had no light, and I had no tool. I basically walked through a dark room and kicked at stuff until I found some plastic bags. When Drillzilla emitted a falsetto scream upon my kicking one of these bags, I knew it to be my victim. I kicked around to locate the other two bags and headed back down the ladder.

Once I had alighted on terra firma once again, I was told to open up my 'victims'. Inside the first plastic bag was my yellow hat.

The best part was the mini-celebration afterwards. Drillzilla poured a bucket of ice water on me, and my crew, plus another 4 or 5 guys from other crews hung around to congratulate me. It was awesome, and I was overjoyed. My entire crew, plus a handful of others, had spent a good deal of time affixing hoses, ladders, dummies, victims, and aerials for the sole purpose of running me through the gauntlet. It wasn't just that I was welcomed to the group, it was that they trusted me not to fuck up.

Going through this drill, and getting my yellow-hat at the end was the ultimate manifestation of the compliment-sans-words in the fire-service: "We're not going to tell you you did a good job, we're just going to allow you to do other shit. Be happy, this isn't bestowed on just anyone."

Shitchyeah.

The Man in the Yellow Hat (Part 1)

Last Monday was busy.

But, before I get to that I would like to briefly review the steps I've taken over the past 10 months or so. The steps which - at their conclusion - were executed in order for me to accomplish the goal of becoming a firefighter...

1.) All the preparatory shit. Background check (paperwork shoutout to the man), two hour physical (invasive), county orientation (boring), and station orientation (two times, two stations - one by the Gaynadian, one by Robin).

2.) Preliminary classes. The 22 hour class (entree into the world of fire), CPR (sucked), Blood Borne Pathogens (nurse-voice, twice). Emergency vehicle operations (obstacle course for fire trucks).

3.) The actual fire school classes. Hazmat (Chubby Triumvirate - excruciating pain), First Responder (chick palpation), Fire school (hours of drudgery interupted by brief moments of destructive joy), and Mayday (life-affirming, God-affirming, manhood attesting).

4.) Testing. Hazmat, First Reponder, CPR, EVOC, Fire 1, and Fire 2 all had physical and written finals. All of these were conducted by county officials, state officials, or both. All required a person to know both the material, and the actions required to meet a certain objective. These objectives ranged from having a ladder rendered right-side up, to having a person discontinue choking.

5.) The Probie Pack. Never before mentioned, the Probie Pack was a series of worksheets detailing all that was to be accomplished prior to being accredited at Shangri La. There were roughly 30 pages filled with tasks ranging from learning the tools on the truck to reciting the protocols of the bunk room. A probie could have Firefighter certs from every state in the union, but until the Probie pack was signed - their helmet remained red. I clung to this book with my life, it's laws and lessons were immutable, it was the very embodiment of the soul of the station. It was also in the crosshairs of several yellow and black hatted firefighters who found joy in stealing the probie packs and rendering them confetti.

I write this list not as an attempt to itemize the chores that stand in the way of certification, but rather as a high-level sketch of the events that led up to Monday's final test. Because Monday - my friends - I earned my yellow hat...

Graduation - Part 3

The role of the historian, in this case a self-appointed one, is to objectively and accurately record the events that he is observing. Under no circumstances should those events be influenced, modified, or otherwise impacted by the historian himself. Yet, I did just that...

When, the entire class had received their diplomas, our lead instructor informed the audience that there would be not one, but two Top Students. Interesting, but not unheard of. The EMT-B class that went directly before us had two, and the fire school prior to ours had two as well. Typically only one was chosen, but electing two wasn't entirely unprecedented.

With all of us baking under the stage lights, the first name was called out:

"Nickleback"

... in response to this, the entire class - and most of the audience - emitted a collective sigh of 'duh'.

The second Top Student award, however, came as a bit of a surprise: it went to me.

The instructors didn't actually justify their decisions, but in my case, I'm 90% certain it was because I am the best hugger.

Now, there were no speeches, just a brief handshake, and a quick wink from the lead instructor, who had a shit-eating grin on his face. I was expecting him to say "Just fuckin' with ya, the actual top-student is Guido." But he didn't. The award was actually mine.

Had I been expected to give a speech, it would have gone something like this...

"Hello, My name is []. I fucking rule. Have a great night, soft drinks and appetizers are available in the cafeteria."

Of course, I had to remain humble, in spite of my inside voice trying to claw it's way through my thorax, and forcing me to suppress my glee. I respectfully acknowledged people's congratulations, and I was appropriately reserved when shaking the hands of the dozen or so officers from Shangri-la that came over to congratulate us. But I doubt my put-upon neutral face was convincing anyone.

At one point, when walking with Nickleback to get our picture taken together, I just had to give him a shove. He laughed innocently. He thought it was a sign of endearment, one that tacitly indicated that our bond as brothers was truer now, more pure. In actuality, it was merely a way for me to ascertain precisely how strong he was, because clearly, I now have to kill him.

I mean, if I'm going to affect the history I'm purportedly keeping, and violate the laws of the journalist-historian, I'm not gonna do it as co-anything.

It's a shame really - I liked Nickleback.

Graduation - Part 2

In my county, the big certification classes are run on a semi-annual basis, much like semesters in college. There is generally a spring class and a fall class for the Firefighter 1, Firefighter 2, EMT-B, EMT-I, and EMT-P curriculums. Therefore, the county holds two graduations every year, and each ceremony recognizes all of the classes. Several awards are also distilled amongst the graduates.


Tipping back for a second to the first half of this post; I think graduations and awards are important, not just to the Fire Service, but everywhere. A sense of accomplishment, recognition, and certainly competition are key drivers in almost any pursuit. There are the rare individuals who truly don't care if others applaud them or not, but I personally think they are vastly outnumbered by those that do. Paying lipservice to not caring is significantly more prevalent though, and laughing off the efforts of management to pay homage to us is almost an institution. But that is part and parcel with both the event and human nature: we just don't want people to know that we want it.


I'm fairly certain that the reason Bucolic and Cypher didn't show is the reverse of the above logic: they knew the words and applause weren't for them. They knew they barely scraped by, and they knew their fellow graduates resented them, as does any team that is forced to prop up a bitch-ass teammember in order to succeed. So just like most of the firefighters there wanted the recognition without wanting to want it, Bucolic and Cypher knew they wouldn't get it, and probably spent the day trying to rationalize their way out of facing that prospect.

Back to the ceremony.

In Fire 1, there is only one award - Top Student. Top Student is given to the recruit that has the best combination of qualities that the instructors want to see. From my understanding, it will simply go to the person who the instructors would most like on their crew.

Many people in class didn't know there was even an award for Top Student - I was not one of these students. I was aware of the award from the first day I joined, primarily because the Gaynadian was the guy who gave me my orientation. I was also made very acutely aware, after joining Shangri-La, that Shangri-La is pretty used to having their people get the award. Shortly after that I was apprised of the fact that Shangri-La had NOT won in the previous class, and that was not well-received.

Here was the problem: there were at least a dozen candidates for top student, most of whom have gotten ink in this journal prior to now, but will all be detailed here in an cheap attempt to build up suspense for the reader by delaying gratification:

My Short List of Top Student Candidates

(The first 5 have already been discussed in this journal, and therefore get less ink in this entry.)

Product - Unfailing, smart, strong and level-headed. A clear contender.

Ox - Ridiculously strong. Reserved and balanced. Completely sans bombast.

Volvo - A meathead, but a highly valuable one. Unafraid, loyal and reliable. Kinda like a Volvo actually. That is a frightening and ironic simile.

Pixie - One of the most aggressive of the group, her only shortcoming was that she was roughly 1/2 the size of everyone else. She made up for her vagina by working 3 times as hard.

Nickleback - Probably the most technically sound in the class. Also the most fit and best-looking; the fucker. The good news is that Nickleback likes bands like Nickleback, which means that he is very much a resident of Doucheville, no matter how much I like him.

Kitchen - This is Kitchen's first mention here, primarily because - for no apparent reason - I never worked with him in fire-school. Kitchen was a team lead, and an obvious candidate from day one. He is smart, friendly, and built like a brick shithouse. Possibly the only guy save Volvo who would give the Gaynadian a run for his money in a cage match. His nickname is a hair contrived, but my reasoning is two-fold: 1.) His real name is something one would find in a kitchen, and 2.) When I was 18 I was a foreman on a crew of day-laborers, one of whom was named Kitchen - I swear to God. Of course, the Kitchen from my construction years was an ex-convict with prison tats and a 79 IQ, so there isn't that much commonality, but it's gonna be fire school Kitchen's name nonetheless.

Pinto - Another team lead, another first mention. Pinto and Kitchen run together on the Shangri-La rescue side. I was wary of Pinto for the first month or so of school - primarily because he came in guns-a-blazin, jacked up, bossifying everyone... he managed to convert that posturing into real leadership over the next few months, and in so doing made this list. Why Pinto? WHY NOT????

Guido - Team lead, first mention: Guido's nickname came from his crew at Shangri-La. He's Italian, so I guess they weren't shooting for cutting-edge humor so much as just stating the obvious. Guido's crew loves him, and he's probably the most highly respected recruit in my class. Why? He never once talked smack. And, as far as I know, he never made any mistakes. In fact, if there is an ability-to-talkinshit quotient, his would be so high it would be hovering around error. (I'm sure some math jackass is gonna ding me on that... my point is that he never talked smack, hence a zero, hence a divide-by-zero error. Fuck off.)

Photo - Photo hasn't been mentioned before because he used to be quiet enough to make Guido look loquacious. Only in the last month of fire school did he open up - now we can't get him to shut up. He spent half an hour at a party discussing Costco banana ripeness and the obvious impact on food distibution systems, and subsequently the entire well-being of humanity. That being said, Photo was as technically sound as anyone on this list, and he was a big forward-thinker to boot. Photo always had shit laid out prior to anyone knowing they needed it. He also takes pictures.

Me - I kiss inordinate amounts of ass.

Stay tuned - apparently this post has become engorged enough to require 3 parts...

Graduation - Part 1

I suppose some would expect this to be the final post for this journal, since the intro specifies 'rookie' firefighter. I haven't given much consideration to how this is going to wind down, however, so it will have to continue on until I figure out how to wrap it up.

That, or I'll just change the fucking title and keep writing.

Graduation was held in the middle of the week, 7 days ago. It was the first graduation ceremony - at least the first where I wasn't a spectator - since 1993 when I graduated college. For a few of the kiddies, it was their very first graduation - Farmside, Don, Utah, Homeschool, and a handful of others.

I guess I wish I was one of the lucky few who don't stand on ceremony, or don't care about people acknowledging their efforts, but the fact is: I do care. I care very much that people are aware of the ass-busting that many of us - not all of us - did to make it to the graduation. There is no doubt in my mind that we could have drug our feet through the entire 6 months of class and still graduated, but the vast majority of us didn't. In fact, I would argue that 80% of the class will actually be good firefighters if they choose to continue to hone their skills.

Which brings me to my next point - odds are, the last days of fire school probably mark the peak for most of the students in terms of firefighting competence and technical ability. I wish it weren't true, but not too many of us will be going back to stations that drill us every duty crew. Few will be pulling and racking hose, throwing ladders, doing two-minute drills, and tying new knots on a regular basis. In some houses, skills will go unused, unpracticed, and unrefined for months, if not years, until an actual call requires them. Frankly, by that time, things might have languished to the degree that the firefighter will contribute only to the chaos of the scene, as opposed to the real objective of putting out a fire and hopefully saving lives.

But enough of that - on to the ceremony.

Fit chick Kate, from waaaaaaay back in the early days of this journal, was the coordinator of most of the events during graduation. She, of course, was operating at her normal competent and even-keeled best. In an interesting turn of events, Robin - the newly minted Driver from Shangri-La - is now Kate's minion. Two chicks, both journal-worthy, working in an administrative capacity to support me - and to a lesser extent, other firefighters - in my lofty fire pursuits. I'm certainly pleased with that happenstance.

Turns out, fire school graduations in my county are a fairly recent thing. Firefighters from only 3 years back had sporatic ceremonies, or no ceremony at all. Again, not that we do it for the ceremony, and a piece of paper is not ever going to truly represent what transpired over the previous year, but an event to mark the occasion matters very much. I will argue that with even the most vehement "I don't need no [medals, diplomas, ceremony, acknowledgment, other] to validate me" dickhead. The fact is, some don't care to be recognized, but most do. So shut the fuck up.

The woman who sang the National Anthem had a great voice - definitely hit all the notes. Didn't seem to have a great grasp of pronunciation though. To her credit, she got up on stage, behind a podium, and lit up in front of 300-400 people without accompaniement. To her discredit - if you're gonna sing the anthem of the United States, maybe take a few minutes here and there to make sure you've got all the vowels and consonants lined up correctly.

There were the obligatory introductions, the acknowledgement of prior and current leadership, a color guard, a video, and some of the other trappings of pomp - all in keeping with a traditional graduation. There were also two prayers, and the second one - as Product was quick to point out - managed to slip in a terrorism reference, which was certainly fitting, and I'm sure gratifying for the triumvirate.

35 of the 36 people in my class graduated. The 36th was injured and has to retake the entire course this spring. Not all 35 graduates attended, however... who was missing? That's right, Cypher and Bucolic. They got their black hats (in our county, some stations have yellow for newly minted firefighters, some have black) the night before the state final, and we haven't seen them since. They skipped Mayday, and now graduation. Frankly, I was overjoyed that they didn't make it. They represented much of what I loathe about the fire service, and their absence was the best graduation gift I could have asked for, save one...

May Day

My posts have gotten a bit out of order lately... lots of stuff has happened, but my lethargy has won the day, and writing has slowly been edged out by things like work; specifically, I've started to work at work, and that really gets in the way of my loafing around time.

So, I'm four posts behind, with only my most recent activities inhabiting my frontal lobes. I'm guessing that some of my more salient thoughts on the days before the State Exam are going to fade into obscurity, but thats okay, because the next few paragraphs are going to melt the eyes of all who read them due solely to how fucking awesome MayDay class was.

Mayday, a class specifically designed to teach how to rescue firefighters, was the best time I've had in quite a spell. It was made doubly so because Bucolic and Cypher decided not to attend - I can only assume because they had already managed to fully master the infinite variables involved in trying to drag 300 pounds of flaccid firefighter down a ladder or up through a floor.

The first aspect of mayday which made it a bit better than standard fire school was that the instructors had apparently loosened up. Two of them in particular - Chip and Dale - played like a pair of schoolgirls the entire time. Now - and this is important - during fire school both Chip and Dale were possibly the most humorless instructors we had. They were disciplined, fastidious, exacting, and demanding, but certainly not fun. We wanted them to be fun. We wanted them to like us, but they didn't; unequivocally. But all of the sudden, in mayday, they turned into a fucking comedy routine.

The next sorta interesting thing was that the instructors no longer treated us like students, which was a bit of a double edged sword; they didn't condescend quite as much as they used to, but they also cut the cord. What I mean here is that there was no molly-coddling, kid-gloving, glad-handing, powder-puffing, sand-bagging, or any other hyphenated term depicting motherly/tender type of behavior. Most of the behavior on the pad during Mayday resulted in some sort of minor injury, and full-on ass-handings were administered on several occasions.

The class was 4 days long; one night of lecture, one night of ladder work and basic drags, and then two weekend days of chaos-creating mayhem.

The trick to saving firefighters is leverage. Unbridled anger helps, but leverage is key. However, if leverage isn't to be had, raw power is an immense asset. A standout in the field of this power-related ass-kickery was Product. He and I had to drag Mamita up a 100 foot hill, and he absolutely schooled me. I had to take breaks every ten feet, and he didn't have to stop once. Now, Product has always been at the head of the class, but I assumed that I had him beat in the strength department. Not so. Not terribly pleased about that either, so I might stab him in the hamstring to curtail his prowess. Ox also was a standard bearer for Mayday, but his manhood was never in question like Product's was.

The key drills that we did were as follows: the Denver drill, the Pittburgh drill, the Columbus drill, window bails, ladder bails, and rope bails. If a city has a drill named after it, bad things happened there. In fact, during the lecture, the instructor - the Dale of Chip and Dale - basically indicated that every life-saving measure we have today cost more than a few lives to develop. I guess we already knew that, but it's still a sobering thought.

Without detailing all of the drills, I'll try to describe the weekend in a Carlinesque rant of adjectives and nouns; this should be read with complete breath control - no pauses:
Dragging, throwing, air limiting, window heaving, body twisting, victim abusing, psyche damaging, instructor meddling, rope burning, forearm smashing, ladder falling, body through a 16 inch gap pulling, torso crushing, Mamita through a hole falling, brutal, pain-inducing, breath sucking, gear stinking, cylinder draining, rope binding, maze crawling, blind leading the blind anarchy.

It was the best class yet. It still hurts to reach over my head, bend to my left, or drop a deuce... but it was amazing. If a person felt that they had the means, I would highly recommend signing up.

Camo-Toe

When I was 17 I changed high schools; I moved from Colorado to Maryland. During my senior year in Maryland, my class went on a ski trip to a Pennsylvania resort. This ski trip was a banner event every year for the senior class and was highly anticipated by everyone. My friend, Sean, more than most.

Sean was a guy who liked to dance perilously around the edges of the truth, while maintaining an arms-length distance from anything that could substantiate, or discredit, his claims. Skiing was one of these claims.

Four months prior to the ski trip, Sean was explaining to me how he liked to perform backscratchers and daffy's off of moguls on double-diamonds. So much, in fact, that he put "Wild-Man" on the back of his boots. Three months prior, it was really just spread-eagles. Two months prior, he wasn't so much into jumping as he was into skiing really fast. One month prior, he was more focused on working on his form.

On the bus ride up to the ski resort, the lessening of expectations increased exponetially. During the last hour of the bus ride, he was effectively explaining to me how I should allow him at least a day to reacclaimate to skiing, and I shouldn't expect much in terms of form, speed, aggression, or really, anything even remotely good-ish about his abilities.

When we actually got on the slopes, Sean was as inept a skiier as he was a hyperbolator. I didn't really care so much about his abilities, but I didn't buy much of his bullshit from there on in. Once somebody actually engages in a full-on assault of my sensibilities, and they presume that I am dumb enough to actually sign on to their bombast, they are forever measured against a much more demanding yardstick. They will henceforth be hard-pressed to convince me of anything that I can't verify right there.

Enter Camo-Toe.

Camo-Toe is actually the douche-leaning instructor from the 22-hour class. His name was derived based on the fact that wears the eponymous camoflage when he is off duty - and that he is an enormous, poorly-concealed vagina.

Camo-Toe is my new Sean.

What I failed to mention in the 22-hour post was that Camo-Toe loved to talk about the endless amount of awesome from which he drew his power. Strength, speed, street savvy, and my personal favorite - a family name that was admired, loved, and feared in the angry heart of South Boston.

During the 22-hour class, he, at various points of the conversation, indicated that he could man, and advance, a 2.5 inch hose, wide-open, as far as he wanted. He could also climb and descend the 75 foot aerial ladder all day long. His rather doughy physique notwithstanding, he could outperform anybody, at any time, at least when it came to firefightery things.

But these claims all shivered with envy when propped up next to what I learned was his true value, his raison d'etere, the magnum opus of his existence: he apparently owns, operates, and is sole-proprietor of South Boston.

Now, I've got no claims to South Boston. I assume it's an area directly below North Boston. Probably populated by people who take a great deal of pride in where they live - dunno, don't live there. But, I have had the opportunity to meet many people from Boston - and I would guess some were from South Boston. I think that I like/hate them in roughly the same proportions as I do any other geographically specific group of people. Something of which I'm almost certain, however, is that they wouldn't agree with Camo-Toe's claims to being their overlord.

I guess I should actually mention how all this came about.

As duty night on Saturday was winding to a close, Camo-toe showed up to hang out, probably because girls don't want to have sex with him. It could conceivably be because he had some administrative work to catch up on, or some SOP's to review, but I'm pretty certain it was because there is no lovin' at the Camo-Toe abode.

As we were bullshitting, and talking about various things - well, guns and chicks - Camo-Toe had the opportunity to lay this on us:

"Everybody wishes they were a [Camo-Toe's last name]"

A guy from my crew looked at me, and we both said simultaneously: "Nah, we're good."

Camo-Toe then began to explain, in great detail, again how we might be able to survive in this little 'burb, but we'd be dead on the mean streets of Southie. Whereas, in stark contrast, he would be able to rule with an iron-fist, because of the instant credibility his last name attains him.

Really.

I can't even imagine the genesis of this claim. Does he have a cousin that sends him newsletters about his polling numbers in various neighborhoods? Did his parents sit him down at dinner every night, pray, and say "Lord, things ain't that great here, but we've always got Southie. Amen."? Is the Camo-Toe inn where all the town patriarchs come, and sit at the table that Old Euclid Camo-Toe, God Rest His Soul, sat? I guess I just don't get it.

Seriously, there's even a t-shirt that parodies the notion of claims to stardom elsewhere. But I didn't think there were people who actually still acted out the cliche. Perhaps I was wrong.

Either way, I'm not gonna be the one to call out Camo-Toe. Generally I take it on myself to expose oversold claims and exaggerations, but in this case, I just can't. It would take too much, specifically, an 8 hour ride to Boston with a guy who's conversational lexicon is limited to the vocabulary found in a David Duke stump speech.

So, yeah, I'm gonna let this one go.