From: "Gizmo" Subject: The Adventures Of Smacks Past - The Flaming Knives Part 1 of 4 (Going Out For Business) Date: Friday, November 08, 2002 1:25 AM Hi again. This four part story is not a revision of older stuff. Rather this a bit of a fleshing out the stuff that led up to Adventure #19 (Through The Eyes Of A Child) which will get revised by the time I finish posting these first 4 stories. I probably will have to go an reindex all of them as they're even confusing me. Anyway hope you enjoy. The Adventure continues with: ___________________________________________ The Flaming Knives Part 1 of 4 (Going Out For Business) Copyright Gizmo 2002 A little background if you will. (Going Out For Business.) No, it's not a misprint. It was New York City. We've all heard the term, 'going out of business.' Probably more now in the 21st century. But it's been around a long time. I'm jumping ahead of this story somewhat, but in New York City, as the late 70's turned into the 80's, businesses along Broadway, Times Square, 42nd Street, Avenue Of The Americas, as well as large commercial parts of The Bronx, Brooklyn & Queens, started to hoist huge signs above their shops or in their windows that went something like this: 'Huge Sale, Everything Must Go, Going Out For Business.' For quite awhile I didn't pay it any mind. But I started to notice that these shops were still there one, two, three months, sometimes a year later! I have no doubt the majority of people paid no more attention to that curious distinction between 'going out of business and going out for business' than I did. My own independent, albeit limited research verified as much. I asked business owners, attorneys, people I worked for etc. It was hard to get a real answer. But what I was able to distill out of it was this: It was not legal to advertise your company as 'going out of business' unless you were in fact going out of business. Seemed simple enough right? Wrong… Commercial ingenuity knows no limits. It seems the shop owners had found a way to increase their sales without ever actually going anywhere. They certainly did not 'go out of business.' Fuck no! They were 'going out for more business.' And it worked like a charm. The largely majority of folks in the huge melting pot of NYC who's primary language may not have been English read that sign as just what it sorta kinda looked it. Ye good ole, 'Going Out Of Business' sign. 'Everything Must Go.' 'Sales On All Items As Much As 90% Off!!!' 'WE'RE GOING OUT FOR BUSINESS.' It was brilliant, it worked and I assume it was legal. So what the hell does this have to do with Flaming Knives? Well nothing. But read on, it will come to you or you will come to it. Because in 1970 or so I decided to 'Go Out For Business.' And why not? Maybe I was being prescient. And what better business to be in than the drug business. Easy to start, simple to implement and the ultimate product to sell. Cause you didn't have to sell it. It sold itself. Every sales persons dream. My particular choice? The pot business. Low key. Relatively harmless and not being fucked with too much by law enforcement in those days. It started with $5 bags of pot. This darling of a girlfriend I was dating knew someone in her neighborhood that was selling some primo pot. I was trying to cut down on using smack and being tired of being broke all the time I thought a little supplement to my income was in order. It started with buying ˝ ounces, ounces and eventually quarter pounds. I would have enough to smoke, and plenty to sell. Typically I would at least double my money at this point. As the months passed I upped the ante and started buying ˝ pounds and pounds of stuff. Actually things were getting so good that my connections were more than willing to consign it all to me until I sold it off. And so began a magical time period. The '60's' along with it's counter cultural hippie revolutionary values were over. But some of that spirit pushed into the new decade and I wanted to go along for the ride. I thought I was doing a good thing. Helping keep friends high on good quality weed and apparently hurting nobody in the process. One of my customers soon became my girlfriend. I left home and moved in with her. I than found out A.) She was still married B.) Her husband was doing a bid at Rikers Island C.) Her husband was an old childhood friend of mine from when we were about 12 years old. Was this a good way to begin a new spirited adventure? Well it did give me pause, but not much pause. Soon we moved into our first apartment together. A few months later we got evicted amidst screams and death threats. It seemed the Italian landlord and his wife just couldn't get their arms around the twenty or more long haired folks who came at all hours of the day and night to buy pot. But what did he know? And what did we know? We thought we did better the next time we moved. You betcha. We found a wonderful house to rent not far from our moms and dads. It was perfect for us and….ohhh did I mention her 2 year old son? Perfect. We also didn't know at the time that our new landlord was a NYC cop. We found that out a few months later when he stopped by after work one day to repair something and still had on his NYC police uniform. Oooops. "Oh high, I mean hi Dano. Errrr, ohhhh you work for the Police Department? Ahhh yeah I guess you do." And he did. It wasn't Halloween and "The Village People" were still a few years down the road. "Gee I would like to invite you in, but we have about 5 lbs. of pot strewn about the living room floor." I remember thinking, "this could get complicated." Did I say complicated? Well let's enumerate our 'Going Out For Business' Charter and Bylaws. 1.) We're dealing pot. We're up to 2 to 5 pounds per week. 2.) Our landlord is a cop. 3.) My girlfriend is still not quite divorced. And since I knew her husband from when we were kids, I unilaterally made the decision I would go to Rikers and visit him and tell him about his wife and I and how I thought it would all be for the best. I was sure I could impart to him the sense, logic and high moral ground needed for him to see the wisdom of granting her a simple divorce. Piece of cake, right? 4.) WRONG, He wanted to kill me on the spot. I'm sure he may well have tried if we were not in a prison visiting area behind 2 inch glass he would have. Ahh yes. Our Going Out For Business Sale. Sound, logical, high spirited, cosmic, progressive thinking. That's what it was all about. Add to this the fact that my girlfriend and I had decided to indulge in some long overdue LSD adventures. Amazing the amount of physical, mental and emotional dribble you can juggle when you're in your early 20's. To be continued, Gizmo