Mon dieu! Would you look at the mug on that kid. Reminds me of a 6 month assignment I had in Kolkata, India back in the late 90s. I was drinking the local hooch which was a rice-based liquor called Yu. It tasted like it was filtered through a dirty woman's underwear. We had howler monkeys in the neighborhood. They were a mischievous and surly lot. Sometimes they'd hide up in the tree above my apartment door and shriek while raining monkey scat down on me. I started trying to lure them in by putting banana or apple slices on my window sill. A horrifically ugly black one--whom I eventually named Drek-- started taking them. Then I started putting them in bowls of Yu that I'd put just inside the aparment. Sure enough, Drek got bold enough to come right in. After a while, I'd skip the fruit part and just put out bowls of Yu. It didn't take much to get Drek drunk. He probably didn't weigh much more than a cat. I learned not to give him too much as Drek proved to be a mean drunk. Once, after 3 bowls of Yu, he whipped a can of Sterno at me and caught me in the temple. When he was just buzzed he was pleasant though. A pie-eyed grin would come over his face and we'd just chill. I recall he really liked Pearl Jam. Anyway, looking at Baby Sledn's horrific grin brought back fond memories of Drek. Praise God he's not a girl or I suspect he'd be livin with Mrs. Sledn well into his 40s.

Warm regards,
Magwitch

Magwitch wrote: