Prologue | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20A | 20B | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25-26 | 27 | 28-29 | 30 | 31 | 32 | 33 | 34 | 35-36 | 37 | 38A | 38B | 38C | 38D | 39 | 40 | 41 | 42-43 | 44-45 | 46 | 47 | 48-49A | 49B | 50 | 51 | 52 | 53 | 54 | 55 | 56 | 57A | 57B | 58-59| 60 | 61 | 62 | 63 | 64 | 65 | 66 | 67 | 68-69 | 70A | 70B | 71A | 71B | 72 | 73 | 74A | 74B | 75 | 76-77A | 77B | 78 | 79 | 80 | 81 | 82 | 83 | 84 | 85-87 | 88A | 88B | 89 | 90 | 91 | 92 | 93 | 94A | 94B | 95 | 96 | 97 | 98-99 | 100 | 101 | 102-103 | 104A | 104B | 105A | 105B | 106-107A | 107B
PART V
MIRACLES
108
IT TOOK A WEEK for Marina to convince Trey to move to Minneapolis and to go to college there. Minneapolis had a medical school; Kansas City didn’t. He wasn’t happy, but he wanted to be with Marina and Susanna more than he wanted to stay in Kansas City just because he’d lived there since he was twelve.
They went looking for houses together, big, beautiful ones in lovely neighborhoods, but he was quiet. His eyes didn’t twinkle and he didn’t smile until she caught him brooding. Then he grinned and said something cocky, drew her up into his arms, spun her around, and kissed her.
She didn’t bother to ask him what was wrong.
It was after a long night of tossing and turning that Marina realized: She was used to being sad. Sad was familiar. It was safe. But Trey was never sad. He was a tornado of strong feelings, but sad was not one of them. Sad Trey was disconcerting. He was flat and she didn’t like that person.
In the year and a half that they had been married, they had lived apart almost as long as they had lived together, but one thing she had missed was his big personality. It filled every room he entered, which she hadn’t noticed until she got to Minneapolis.
Now he was in the room, but he wasn’t in the room.
He said all the right things, made all the right gestures, smiled when he was supposed to, laughed, teased, and played with Susanna, went skating and played games with them, but he didn’t fill the room anymore.
She wrote all this to the person who had always tried to make Marina happy even if it didn’t work sometimes, and asked if she was wrong.
I can’t give you any advice about Trey or tell you what to do, but Kansas City is your home and you’re going to miss it and be sad, and before you say I’m cuckoo, remember I was right about your mother, I was right about Trey, and I was right about your tutor. I may be clumsy about how I show it, but I love you and I know you and I don’t think you’ll be happy in Minneapolis for long. Also, Fairyland.
It was true. Marina would miss Fairyland, and the Excelsior Amusement Park was twenty miles from Marina’s apartment and wouldn’t be open until June.
Trey would snap out of his mood. He always did. But after the third week of flat, sad, faking Trey, which he tried so desperately to hide from her, Marina didn’t know how she could stand it until he did snap out of it. Maybe, just maybe, it was enough that he had chosen her and her wants for the first time since she’d caught his eye, and that he was genuinely trying.
He had again taken Marina to shop for homes, leaving Susanna with Ida for the day. Marina stood in a beautifully decorated bedroom of a beautiful home listening to Trey chatter excitedly at the real estate broker about his plans and moving to Minneapolis. He wasn’t putting on a show for Marina’s benefit. He was trying to convince himself.
It was like fingernails on a chalkboard.
“So what did you do back there in Kansas City?”
“Sold insurance,” Trey answered cheerfully. It was so fake it was painful.
“What made you choose Minneapolis?”
“Oh, I’ve had my eye on it a long time. Quiet. Peaceful.”
“It does seem to be a little rambunctious down there where you’re from, according to the newspapers.”
“Exactly! I don’t hold with all those shenanigans. Need to rear our children in an upstanding city.”
Marina almost rolled her eyes.
The conversation went on in that vein for another five minutes, then it turned toward price.
“Sugar, what do you think about this one? Looks quite a bit like the Albrights’ house and I know how much you love it.”
Marina looked at him. He was saying all the right things. His mouth was smiling. His eyes weren’t. His body was tense.
Her mouth twitched this way and that as she thought. Trey and the real estate broker watched her expectantly. Trey had gone out of his way to find homes like the Albrights’ to make her happy, and the real estate broker was slobbering over an impending cash sale.
“I’d rather just have the Albrights’,” Marina said abruptly.
Trey’s fake smile faded into confusion. “I … what’re trying to say?”
“I want to go home,” she said resolutely. Her shoulders relaxed and she reached up to rub the knot out of her neck.
Trey’s jaw dropped. “But you said—”
“If I wanted to stay here, I would have already bought a house myself.” She hadn’t realized that until she said it.
“Sugar,” Trey drawled warningly, his mouth tight. “Is this you being a good wife, saying what you think I want to hear, but don’t really want that?”
“When have I ever been a good wife?” she asked wryly.
She could see his smile come back when the corners of his eyes wrinkled. It grew slowly, but his eyes started twinkling and his personality was seeping back into the room.
“Never,” he declared with a broad grin.
“Now I would like you to take me for sweet tea.”
108
If you don’t want to wait 2 years to get to the end, you can buy it here.
Donations can be made here, if you so desire.
My favorite serial that I haven’t read for months because I bought it on Kindle and still haven’t sat down to read the damn thing but plan to do so very soon.
Also First.
*Thrusts hips
My hip thrust can impregnate a woman. You whiffed.
I bet you shoot candy corn out your cloaca.
That sentence could very nearly apply to UCS’s current story, too. Except I bought the paperback because I was going to get it signed by the author at Honey Harvest, but he refused.
Holy shit you people read slow.
I was done.
Just debating with myself whether this is the last chapter.
Cuz it kind of could be.
Oh, wow. 2 years already?
According to my Kindle, there is one chapter left.
Epilogue next week, then done.
Just one? 😢
I kept typing/erasing “prologue” knowing it wasn’t right, so went with chapter. I guess my brain is ready for the weekend.
Thx, Mo.
Much enjoyment. I knew Mpls was not for them.
Pirates queued up next. I’m kind of nervous about doing that, but Swiss says it’s okay.
Is there gonna be sex stuff?
Dayummm!
Time flies when you’re having fun!
💕💕💕💕
You’re in luck! There was sex on pirate ships.
The bad news…
The pirate book is chock full of it because they’re, well, pirates. That’s what they DO. I figure, if you can stomach SugarFree, you can stomach what-all I wrote.
The fact that you even brought up Sugar Free intrigues me.
if you can stomach SugarFree, you can stomach what-all I wrote
LMAO
My dad says he’s going to write in Nikki Haley, despite things like this:
https://x.com/RonPaul/status/1852493942283239458
I want to make some kind of snarky quip about how, with Nikki, you get Liz Cheney, Chris Christie, and Lindsay Graham.
I’ll be in my bunk
Nikki taking photos of the other 3 enacting the human centipede does it for you?
uh…no. click the link you sick bastard.
Elon ain’t stepping away from his businesses for a govt role that does nothing.
I feel like I’m living this scene with you right now.
Pretty sure most of these special commissions are part-time billets if that. Shouldn’t take up too much of his time.
Nikki is the worst. But chicken-hawks of the world unite.
If we dumped 2/3rd of the other cabinets we wouldn’t need a Department of Deficiency.
Ron Paul as Sec/Treas.
Department of Government Efficiency?
🧐
DoGE
Many cuts, much crying.
OMG I had missed that acronym. Delicious.
It is funny. It would be hysterical if actually attempted.
Two things:
1. Congrats, Mojo, on a child well raised! I loved the time I spent in dispatching, if that is what she ends up doing. It was a great spring board into management, and I loved the intellectual challenge of it.
2. I am gonna have a sign made up, to put up on Nov. 6, that says “HA Ha – Nelson” Don’t worry, it will apply to someone.
The teenage Marina rears her head. As with many teenagers she isn’t satisfied. Mpls certainly isn’t (wasn’t) for everyone and she hasn’t even seen winter. Worse now with Excelsior Park gone.
It has been said that “You can’t go home” once you’ve left but Marina hasn’t learned that yet.
Thanks, Moj, been a great ride.
Not sure I understand. She gave Trey what he wanted and accepted the life path he’s laid out even though she’s not thrilled about it.
Then she rejected Mpls after she wanted to move there. The idea was Trey would go to med school and that was quickly skuttled.
Maybe Trey can get into the U of Phoenix Med School, correspondence edition. He certainly has had his hands on training with cadavers. Marina can go to Law School, after she gets her GED.
He who procrastinates secturbates.
Minneapolis when I was in my 20’s was awesome.
Minneapolis in my 50’s is just not happening.
I returned but lived in St Paul in my early 50s. Closer to Joe’s Sport Shop and Bill’s Guns in Mendota Heights.. Week ends I was commuting Upnorth
Facebook recommendation that I think the vast majority of this crowd would enjoy:
https://www.facebook.com/YourChildhoodRuined
well OK, maybe not vast majority, but still…quite a number of you
Might enjoy but it’s demanding a login
Dammit. I thought they let folks look without signing in.
They give you a couple – tease
I have no words. Except: AMERICA, FUCK YEAH
I really need to rewatch “Jackie Brown”.
On the Weird History Food episode, “Why does Chipotle keep making us sick?”, they use an instrumental piece that sounds kind of like Simcity Music.
I used the Google “identify song” feature to find out what it was.
“Growing Optimism”, by Andrew Swarbrick.
It’s on the album “Another Adventure”.
https://youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_lfSdEMdgve0i1fNN9NLK3sWADdImFXiuA&si=dTH3S3-YmmxzKwjG
His website: https://andrewswarbrick.com/?page_id=125
I’ve made the most amazing pesto. The secret is: lots of basil, lots of olive oil, a healthy amount of parmesan cheese, and garlic and black pepper thrown into the blender. Now put all those indeterminately proportioned ingredients into your mixer and let that machine do the actual work. You’ll have something passably called pesto.
How’d the Greeks ever survive long enough to be conquered by the Turks and like Lord Elgin buy off their marbles?
Pine nuts. You forgot pine nuts.
And I have seen the Elgin Marbles. Incredible.
Apparently it’s some sort of hate crime to call them the Elgin Marbles now.
I saw them a few months ago, though I forget what bullshit PC name they use now.
Incredible, as you say.
zooming
a) the current Greeks are no more heirs to the Marbles than anyone else
b) if Elgin hadn’t removed them and placed them in a museum, most or all would not exist today
Fuck the Greek Generals. Fuck the Argentine Generals.
Lord Elgin’s son burned down the Summer Palace in Qing China in retribution for their torture and execution of British (and French) envoys. Weird coincidence? Fatalism?
I should note that I only know any of this on account of the Flashman Papers, the contemporaneous and entirely accurate recital of events as they actually happened to the severally decorated Flashman.
Trash bags: the new voting apparel of choice
https://x.com/karluskap/status/1852389052680384767?s=42&t=US5RY2XJdxtzBMVTCOokTA
Derelicté. So hot right now.
😂😂
She could have worn it without cutting the hole in it. Ruined a perfectly good bag
I think that’s awesome, and I wish I had the nerve to do it myself.
Re: The Elgin Marbles, sacred burial grounds, Egyptian stuff, every ancient artifact place of reverence everywhere – fuck you, no. I am not giving you any money and I am not bending my knee or bowing or scraping. Really, fuck you.
The bulk of mankind appears to be composed of useless parasites and grifters. I suppose it has always been that way.
Whom is asking you for money (or genuflection) in regards to the Parthenon Sculptures?
In the end it is always about money.
Good morning all,
Just because it’s a week end doesn’t mean there isn’t a lot of stuff that needs being done.
✊
Good morning, 4(20), Suthen, Teh Hype, Sean, cav973, and Ted’S.!
Sup Glibbies?
Don’t forget to set your clocks back tonight (except Pie).
⌚☕😛
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=bOHxtOLfvIo
🎶🎶
I always wait ’til Sunday morning, check to make sure I go in the right direction. My truck clock never gets changed, I just check on my watch to determine the truck time.
One of our wall clocks is an atomic clock with an analog face. Its hands can’t go backwards, so at the autumn time change, the hands start speeding forward until it has set itself forward eleven hours. I find myself debating whether it’s worth waiting up to watch. (I usually don’t.)
https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2024/11/huge-news-ron-paul-is-interested-working-elon/
IT’S HAPPENING !!!11!1!
TOADY!!!
🐸 🐸 🐸
Don Trump, Jr.:
https://x.com/DonaldJTrumpJr/status/1852516365464490346
Somebody with better photoshop skills than me should put Ron Paul, Elon, RFK, etc. onto the 94 dream team poster.
Also, what’s Tom Sowell up to these days? He’s too old to take on a full time role, but maybe he can spare a day per week to own some Keynsians.
We must be very important. Or something.
https://www.wfmz.com/news/area/berks/reading-area/trump-harris-to-hold-dueling-events-in-lehigh-berks-counties-monday/article_993abf28-98b5-11ef-ae0d-07d74df847e0.html
I’d like to see them in a duel.
There are suitable bullets made in Lehigh.
I’m imagining a Vance/Walz duel where Walz would be unable to get his gun loaded.
The most important election of the decade!
https://squaredle.app/?puzzle=spooky3
Tricky.
Trump promises a $10,000 tax credit per child for homeschoolers.
https://notthebee.com/article/donald-trump-promises-10k-tax-credit-per-child-for-homeschooling-families-if-elected
A Homeschool Family, by Tim Hawkins:
https://youtu.be/VM6uqj0_jQc?si=IofpU2nxlgn-XZzs
Morning all. Off to buy a Prius this morning.
It’s the final weekend before election “day”. Will they take one last shot at Trump?
I say yes.