AJ Omalley's blog

Buffalo

They followed us home Ma. Can we keep 'em?

Practice

By the time they had their act worked out, the circus had moved on to another town.

Every Saturday

Going into town for supplies was always an embarrassment for Polly.

Groan

Armando Schwartz, who could only count to eight and not in any particular order, was in charge of the company accounting. Sarah and Solei Wulff sold zippers door to door every evening after tea. (Yes, a sort of fly-by-night operation.) (groan)

Young man with a plan

You just wait. When I grow up I'm gonna kick your slats out.

Hostile Takeover

Ms Showalter, CEO of the bellwether software and web-management company, SoftWeb Inc. knew how to ward off the hostile takeover by some of her own board members. She met with them privately, one by one in back of the corporate offices and beat the crap out of them.

Melanie's Headband

It was Melanie’s headband, and she was keeping it. It was given to her on that romantic ride with “Standback” and his motorcycle gang out along the city drainage canal.

Melanie’s mother had advised her from childhood to save herself and not fall for the first man that came along; to look around; to play the field; to look deep. Now, at 42 she was very glad she honored her mother’s advice. “Standback” was the perfect match for her. She had thought Eldon Shrough was the perfect match too but he disappeared after only 8 years. And there was Tudie Fence before that and…well that’s another story.

Sebert “Standback” Spang, gang leader, was a janitor at a dry cleaning plant by day and by night a watchman for a pet groomer. He barely had time between jobs to change uniforms. There was no rest for the wicked he knew, and boy was he wicked. He had to learn to sleep standing up and he really disliked his uniforms because they covered his BPP* tats.

But on Sundays, (and alternate Tuesdays) he and his gang, Pete and Jergen Pheltz, went out along the drainage canal to stir up whatever mischief they could muster. Of course there was never anyone else there and so rolling small stones into the canal was always the worst they could come up with. Once Jergen fell in the canal but was able to get back on the bank without help. No one would have helped him anyway because of the smell.

At the end of each frenetic “rave” out on the canal banks the gang vowed to get real motorcycles so they could discontinue renting golf carts every Sunday (and alternate Tuesdays).

Melanie met “Standback” at the pet shop one morning just as the night job shift ended. Melanie rattled the door and woke him. That following Sunday (and alternate Tuesday) they rode together along the canal and “Standback” gave her the head band. Of course, it was really a just dog collar unintentionally left at the pet shop by a forgetful St. Bernard. The engraved name “Wrecks” was cleverly hidden with a strip of duct tape. Melanie didn’t care. She was not ever going to take it off. It was hers and she was keeping it. Besides, her hair was caught in the buckle.


*Ball Point Pen

Simon and Lymon

Simon and Lymon always did everything alike, but not always at the same time.

Beverly, Cyril and Baby Boop-Bop-Sh’Bam

Beverly was about to burst.

This morning Cyril had used her best bowl to selfishly eat all the cold Sugar Clod Cereal so he could get the popular Pixie Powder Girl pin from the bottom of the box. Beverly swore it was his swan song, his ultimate sonata. It was serious enough he insisted on sampling her shoes and sleeping in her slip, now, there he sat, posing in her satin step-ins.

Beverly bought her bus ticket by saving buttons in the bottom drawer of her bureau. Saturday, she and baby Boop-Bop-Sh’Bam would be safely secreted in the spare room of cousin Sparrow’s spacious summer chalet in Sober-Sable, Saskatchewan. And so on.

The Notorious Butterfat Gang

The notorious Butterfat Gang

This is the last known photograph of the notorious Butterfat Gang of Seven who terrorized the dairy industry in the mid 1930’s. Harlan Underln, standing, center, led the gang in raids on milk trucks and neighborhood Rubber Baby Buggy Ice Cream wagons throughout Iowa and County Cork.

The Butterfat Gang of Seven, (actually there were five or so members, but none of them could count) all descended in some way from lineage of the infamous robber, Dennis Moore of the 17th century in England. Highwayman Moore was noted for lupines and doing something completely different.

The method of the Butterfat Gang was simple. They would stand in the road and stop dairy delivery trucks. Eight or nine of the gang members would circle the truck and stand lookout. Three or four other members would then insist the driver sell them what ever stock was carried on the truck. The driver would then be obligated to return to the dairy and restock for the morning deliveries. This certainly confounded dairy owners not to mention the trauma experienced by many cows.

Their last caper was said to be the carefully planned robbery of the 2:40 AM milk train. It went awry when most of the gang members overslept. No one knows how many actually showed up as none of them could actually count. The engineer refused to stop the train anyway.

Throughout their reign of confusion, none of the gang was ever caught. Actually no one ever looked for them either. They all lived well into their fifties and died overweight

Heppel Whitsig, (seated, with cigar) invented the combination creel and picnic basket and went on to a successful retirement in poverty. He never married. His twin brother, Wimpole, (also seated but no cigar) was either the youngest or the oldest in the gang, depending on which account of his birth was accurate. His mother could not seem to recall the event.

Fred (too tall) Herringbun was not on the Titanic when it tragically struck an iceberg. He married young and his wife dressed him funny.

Gable Snoot, seventh from left in this picture, worked briefly as a store window model for suspenders (or braces). He was spotted there by a Hollywood movie director who went into hiding and was never seen again.

The rest of the gang is pretty much unknown but perhaps someone will recognizes a relative or a neighbor here.

These events rarely get a notation in history books although some say the gang activities accelerated the research leading to the invention of the milking machine.