It had been an incredibly lackluster and boring day at Fort Benning, Georgia. I mean seriously, when all your fearless leaders can come up with is area beautification and rock painting, the defense of the free world is in a world of hurt. But there we were raking dirt and painting rocks. Such a wonderful way to pass the day. Every day when we ran past the Rangers, they were singing songs about going off to strange exotic lands and meeting strange exotic people and killing them. Meanwhile, they were doing exactly the same thing we were doing. You guessed it. Raking dirt and painting rocks. Our big bad powerful Rangers. Imagine that. Spend two months out in the woods eating cockroaches and lizards just so that you can rake dirt and paint rocks. Now, I’m not saying I did that. I’m saying the Rangers did that. We didn’t have to do all that bullshit just to paint rocks. We had to do a lot of other kinds of bullshit just to paint rocks. But the long and short of it was that we still got to paint rocks. But I don’t remember God ever issuing painted rocks. But let’s check in with the man upstairs just to make sure. “Hello God. Are you there, God? My question, today, deals with painted rocks. God, did you create painted rocks? I’ll wait a few minutes for a response.” … Well, there you go folks. No response. I don’t think he issued painted rocks. But he may have created them. Why do I say that? Let’s examine the evidence. I do know of a spot in Western North Dakota near Medora, in Theodore Roosevelt National Park called Painted Canyon. In Utah, in Sanpete County, there is a place called Painted Rock Canyon. And, if you have $20 million laying around, Paint Rock Canyon Ranch is for sale outside Hyattsville, Wyoming. Now, those are actual places that have painted rock in the name. And in a couple of instances, the actual locations look like the rocks are painted naturally. If you ever drive by the place in North Dakota on Interstate 94, you will see that it looks painted. If you drive through painted Canyon in Utah, it looks painted. But not by people. If people didn’t paint those places, who did? My bet is on God. So, where did the Army get the brilliant idea to use people to paint rocks? They didn’t get it from the natural examples around the US. Cuz those clearly were not painted by people. “God, it sure would be great if you jumped in and helped out here.” … Still no comment. Oh well. Onto my real point. We had been wasting our time painting rocks, but the day had finally come to an end. I showered and changed and headed downtown to grab dinner before heading to Nichols Alley. It was an off night at Nichols Alley in Columbus, Georgia, so not much was going on. I really went in there just to get a few cheap beers before I went over to my real destination, Someplace Else. After about an hour and a half, I left Nichols Alley. I left my car parked right where it was because it was parked around the corner and down the street from Nichols Alley. Since it was not near any bar, the local donut patrol would not be monitoring it later when they were monitoring the parking lots and parking spots near all the bars. Of course, you know why they were monitoring the parking lots around all the bars. They were looking for customers. They’re in business of sorts too. And like any other business, they have to generate revenue. I don’t fault them for that. I understand that they have to generate revenue, just not from me. I walked over to Someplace Else. When I walked into the joint, as I was going down the stairs, I could tell the place was dead. I thought to myself, “Something is seriously wrong. This place should be jumping but it’s not. There are only a few bikes in the parking lot. What’s up with that?” When I got inside, most of my biker friends were not there. I ordered myself a beer and saw a few regulars, so I walked over to talk to them. After the usual introductory chatter, I asked, “Where is everybody?” One of the bikers that knew me responded, “So, you haven’t heard, then?” “Heard what?” “They were all at a rally on Sunday and somehow it turned into a riot. The cops got called. It got violent. And pretty much the whole gang got arrested.” “The whole gang?!?” “Well, everyone that participated in the rally. That was pretty much the whole gang. So, yeah, the whole gang.” “Damn! So, what’s the story? They couldn’t raise bail? What?” “Well, the way I heard it, bail wasn’t even set.” “Bail wasn’t even set? Where in the hell did this happen? The rally, I mean?” “I understood what you meant. Up in Marietta just north of Atlanta. There’s a bunch of professional wrestlers that live up there.” “Yeah. I know that. Were they involved”?” “I’m not sure. I wasn’t there, man.” “I got Thursday off so I’ll probably run up there and see if I can visit the guys.” “Yeah. We all know who you want to visit. Ain’t that right fellas?” Everybody in the bar started chanting, “Chains. Chains. Chains. Chains. Chains.” “All right already. Give it a rest. I got the message. Yeah. She’s the one I’m going to see, alright. I gotta go up there and see if something can be done.” “No. You gotta go up there and see your squeeze. That’s why you came here tonight, isn’t it?” “Well, yeah. I came to see Chains, so what.” “Like I said, you’re going up there to see your squeeze.” I had walked over to Someplace Else to see Chains and the gang and maybe drink a beer or two. Instead, I walked into what proved to be a hornets nest of ridicule while on an exercise in futility, while also learning that Chains was locked up.
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