I look like a fighter, but I'm a lover 
You can't judge a book by looking at the cover

"Goddamn you all, I told you." H.G.Wells.

"I'm not dirty, I'm thirsty." Frank Sinatra.

Hey

No summertime blues here, boys and girls, which is a good thing, as we all know there's no cure for 'em, Bill's feeling better than he has in many a newsletter. Why? I'm glad you asked . . .

I'm once again unemployed, no wait, I'M UNEMPLOYED, Bill's returned once again to his natural graceless state, and thank you Jesus. God bless me (for I've certainly sinned) I HATE work and all the time it takes away from important activities like reading and writing and watching old movies and working out and drinking and jerking off . . . well, on Wednesday, June 4 (five years to the day from my first encounter with him) I took Al to Quarry Manor (an assisted living residential placement), and for the most part, other than some visits and maybe taking him out to eat now and then, he and I are now quits.

Since I titled the first issue after starting with Al with one of his quotes, "Damn Those Gator People" (and yeah, those five years went fast for me, how about you?) I figured I'd close out the Al era with another one of his quotes. One of the few questions I could get him to respond to in his last few days at home was "How are you feeling, Al?", not so much that I gave a shit, but I was trying to keep him from falling asleep in his chair, one of the last times I asked him, he answered with "I feel like oblivion". I bet he does, and it couldn't happen to nicer guy. I've learned a lot of truly ugly shit about Al in his younger days over the past few months, things that if I'd known them five years ago I'd have walked away that first day and said "Let the little son of a bitch rot". Sort of like finding out that the little old geezer you've been taking care of for the past five years was really Stalin. Or Satan. Disappointing, yeah, really. Nothing to be done for it now, though.

Actually, I think the evil little bastard is getting off easy. The two things that might- and I emphasize might- scare me about dying, is serious pain, and knowing it's coming, and Al's not having to deal with either of those.

So . . . I've suddenly had 75-80 hours a week given back to me, and I couldn't be happier. Money? Fuck it. It'll take care of itself.

(AS LONG AS WE'VE GOT A PISTOL AND THE WILL TO USE IT)

Not sure it's wise to advertise that, but yeah.

The first thing I'm going to do is try and get my health back, catch up on all the sleep I've lost the past few years. Also need to resist the urge to just lay drunk all summer, now that I have the time, (I always have the inclination), been a good boy so far, but as we all know, that's day to day with Bill. Second also, I'm going to change my workouts around, being down at Al's for three days straight limited what I could do down there (I often thought about shot putting Al around the house, but I didn't think he'd hold up), and then I kind of lopsided what I did here, trying to compensate, now that I have every day to basically work out how I want, I can switch some stuff around and hopefully end up doing more while actually doing less.

(SOUNDS GOOD TO ME. HOW'S THAT PERPETUAL MOTION MACHINE COMING ALONG, BY THE WAY?)

Beats me. Ask Joe.

Want to get a nice tan this summer as well, not one of those gay tanning bed deals, but a manly outdoors type tan, I figure my Mom, the girls and I will head up to Gallipolis more than a few times to swim in Lori's pool- and if my Mom happens to miss her ride back and has to stay with Lori for a while . . .

Also plan to write my ass off this summer, (of course, when I mentioned that to Sarah, in front of my Mom, my Mom had to insert herself into the conversation to spout off and tell me why that was a bad idea- why it's a bad idea, other than that it was mine, I don't know, cos I quit listening to her) got one small paying project I have to have done by Monday, then it's . . . I don't know yet, not sure if I want to finish up a bunch of shorter projects, or start a longer one. When I do, you'll all be the first to know.

As for DFZ Vs. The Zombie Sluglords, all the illos are done and they are fantastic, the Brothers Fraim are the absolute shit. Looking at it coming out in September, the cover alone is worth the price of the book, seriously. M Is For Monster should also make it to the publisher this summer, so start saving up boys and girls, you have some books to buy this fall.

Even though I haven't received any complaints, other than my own, I'm going to quit bitching about my Mom in here, at least for a while, it's petty and pissy and worst of all, not very funny. Buit again, in my defense, it ain't just Bill. Sarah said to me one day last week, unsolicited, "I've been here two days and she's already driving me crazy." No shit. That's because my Mom had already told her repeatedly and at length, everything she should and shouldn't do this summer. It's not just my mother's demanding ways that will drive you over the cliff, its her constant nagging. She has no concept whatsoever of minding her own business because she very honestly believes that EVERYTHING genuinely IS her business, and since she always knows so much better than you do- in my fifty one tempestuous years so far on your planet (this go around, remind me some time to tell you what Cleopatra was REALLY like- fuck it, I'll tell you now, in a word she was tight) I have yet to hear my mother say she was wrong a single time- this is totally legit- while if I had a nickel for every time I've heard her say "If you/she/he/they would have only have listened to ME"- I'd be the richest motherfucker walking.

I'm certain I get my nigh pathological aversion to being "told what to do", and once having been, "not doing what I'm told" from being raised by someone who wants to direct your (and I had a "your" for "you're" in last issue, which went right through me when I caught it later, blind drunk or no, that shit's inexcusable) every waking moment, down to how you draw breath (I'm not kidding about that, either).

(THIS IS HOW YOU DON'T BITCH ABOUT YOUR MOM?)

Yeah, pretty much.

As for Bill Vs. The US Postal Service, like so many other things, it fizzled out before it got started. I'm getting ready that Monday to go down to the Post Office and show 'em what going postal really means, when my Mom comes walking in with the mail. What the fuck? Turns out, our old, cool mailman is back, and he's delivering to the box, killer mailbox birds notwithstanding. Why? I don't know cos I didn't ask, gift horse thing and all. Turns out it was for nothing anyway. I guess mailboxes don't get used more often for nests for a reason, a few days after the eggs hatched, something, I presume one of the neighborhood cats, got up in there and cleaned the wee hatchlings out, and the parent birds moved away. Yeah, I agree, it is kind of sad.

My Mom went up to Lowes and got a new mailbox with a door, but I haven't put it up yet.

(HELL, WE GOT TILL NEXT SPRING)

That's what I'm thinking.

What's Bill been doing? Well, lots. Went up to Martha's for dinner as scheduled, the food was insanely good, as always, only drank one great huge Bombay gin and tonic and a couple glasses of wine cos I didn't have anyone to drive me home, I brought a bottle of Rodney Strong 2003 cabernet, as previously admitted I don't know wine from shinola, I can't remember if Nikki (who's doing well, by the way, talked to her within the past couple weeks) bought it, or I bought it on her recommendation (the 2005 I replaced it with in my wine rack- yeah, I got a wine rack, thanks Steve and Geri) cost twenty two bucks. Anyway, it was quite good, and if I couldn't drink it with (and off of, and out of) Nikki as originally planned, Martha's was the next best place to do it.

Went up to Chris's for MC the next day, drinking Harpoon IPA and smoking cigars on the deck with the MC is, as always, as good as it gets with your pants still on. Watched the Justice League: The New Frontier and I thought it was excellent, Doug didn't like it as well as the rest of us did, it's very Green Lantern-centric, so I guess how much you like it depends on how much you like GL- Hal Jordan GL, of course. We worked out part of our MC/JLA transfers- Bill is Batman cos he's the meanest, Chris (I origianlly typed it Xhris, I think that looks cool as fuck, you ought to start spelling your name that way- I'm serious) is GL cos he's the bravest, Ron is The Flash cos he's the flashiest. We got stuck trying to decide if Joe or Doug was more Martiany. I think Joe probably is, but then that leaves Doug as Aquaman, which I think fits as he's the only scuba diver in the MC, but Aquaman ain't no Superman, and Doug was already unhappy about being Peter Lawford in the MC/Rat Pack transfer-

(NOT EVERYONE CAN BE FRANK SINATRA LIKE US, CAN THEY BATMAN?)

No, they can't. And being Aquaman, or Martian Manhunter, is still surely tons cooler than not being in the JLA (or the Rat Pack, OR The Movie Club) at all.

What else? Well, my Mom and I went to Baltimore the last weekend in May for Rachie's high school graduation. Two weeks before that however, the Tuesday after the last NL, some fucking retard, while FUCKING WITH HIS I-POD, ran a red light and T-boned Sarah and Rachel in Sarah's car, hitting them so hard it flipped Sarah's car onto its roof. If I ever had any doubts about either girl beng mine, which I never have, by the way, this would have lain them to rest. After this horrific accident- T-bones are notorious for being fatal- both girls come crawling out of the upside down and totaled Versa completely unharmed- and Sarah wants to fight the son of a bitch who hit them. Jesus- it's in the fucking blood.

I have no idea what higher power watches over Bitners in their cars. but I want to go on record right now as saying THANK YOU. I've been in eight brutal car wrecks in my life, four I was driving. four I wasn't, where all the vehicles involved were totaled, including one that flipped like Sarah's, although we ended up in a creek, not an intersection, and one that rolled, (the Saturn back in Jan. '05) and the only injury I've ever sustained in any of them was a cut on my palm from crawling from the Saturn's wreckage across broken glass (I'm not counting Joe's ditch trip that pulled that voodoo idol shaped plug of hair and scalp out of my head). And trust me, I'm not bragging here, I'm being humble, cos I know even a freak of fucking nature like myself, and his freak of nature spawn, could never walk away unscathed from so much vehicular carnage without help from somewhere. So, again, thank you, sincerely.

Rachel, finally, graduated May 31st from Perry Hall High School (not sure who was more relieved, her or Loretta)-

(I'M BETTING PERRY HALL HIGH SCHOOL)

- good one, along with 644 others- yeah, I said 644- and from Abaza to Zom, Bill sat through every one of 'em. However, it was a nice touch there at the end, they all stood up and sang a song to me, it went like this- "Loyalty and Honor/To our Ornery Master/Death Falcon, we pledge ourselves to thee/Thy great name we cherish/Thy great fame will never perish/We shall always stand by thee." Of course, my Mom said they weren't singing "Ornery Master", at all, but "Alma Mater", whatever the fuck that means, and it wasn't "Death Falcon", it was "Perry Hall", but hell, she's crazy.

Next day I went to Rachel's grad party/cook out there at Loretta and Paul's, again, no worries, they had it catered and the food was great, ribs and chicken, it was so good I actually ate a little bit, even with free beer available (I drank nine Negro Modellas, it was that or Corona, and Corona's for pussies and little girls, if that's not redundant), even had some "family" photos taken, some of me and Loretta with Rachel that I'll get to Joe for inclusion. Rachel is a pretty, pretty girl, and photographs well. Her mother on the other hand . . . if you haven't seen Loretta in a while, have something soft underneath you when you look at these photos, cos your jaw's gonna be hitting the floor. As I keep saying, these trips to Baltimore do me a world of good. When I think of Loretta, which I admit I still do (but not nearly as much as I used to), I tend to think of her as how I knew her, good looking, and in love with me, and being around her now, when she's neither, really helps to put the past into perspective.

While at the cook out I had a nice extended conversation with my former sister in law Denise, who as you'll recall turned on me like a goddamn snake after the divorce, which pissed me off mightily since I didn't deserve it, I was always damned good to Denise, in many ways, up to and including saving her from abusive boyfriends twice, once at considerable risk to myself- if I hadn't been able to back that big mother fucker down, one or both if us would have gotten hurt bad, cos he certainly wasn't averse to hurting me, and I'd have had to hurt him to stop him.

Anyway, Denise was being very pleasant to me, so much so that I was moved to ask her why she wasn't pissed at me anymore, and without going into detail here, she said that over the years she's come to find out a lot of things I was accused of doing at the time I didn't do, and a lot of things Loretta had denied doing, she did. Fair enough, and I'm glad the bad feelings are behind us, cos I always liked Denise.

Before we get into what's Bill been etc., in the obituary column we have NL icon Bo Diddley, aka Bo Jiggley if you're talking to my Dad. In fact, I'm sure this conversation took place in the afterlife-

Dad: Hey, it's Bo Jiggley! 
BD: That's Bo Diddley. 
D: Jiggley. 
BD: Diddley. 
D: Jiggley. 
BD: Diddley. 
D: Jiggley. 
BD: Jesus, can't you do something with him? 
Jesus: Not a damn thing.

Also sorry to report Dave Stevens died recently, at 52, briefly married to Brinke S. (hot stuff at the time), he's probably best known for creating the Rocketeer. Dave was also a hell of an artist, drew a lot of old school style pin up stuff that was just ace, even befriended Bettie Page, how cool is that, by all accounts I've read he was a hell of a nice guy, RIP, Dave.

What's Bill been reading?

Been into those old comics comps, Metal Men the most recent. This stuff is goofy as fuck, but I still love it. Read a lot out on Al's front porch those last few weeks I was there, that part of Al duty I will miss, it was very relaxing out there, and nostalgic, I originally read some of these same comics sitting out on my Grandma's front porch- it was hot out there, but hotter inside- during sweltering summer visits to Rock Hill. I'll also miss the hot girls who used to walk through Al's neighborhood.

And although they're goofy, these MM comics have also been educational. Where else could you learn the sounds an aroused robot makes (Beep Beep, Ding Ding, Beep!)?

(SOUNDS A LOT LIKE YOU WATCHING THE GIRLS FROM AL'S PORCH).

It does, doesn't it?

Also read an old noir (1949) that Xhris lent me, Plunder of the Sun, and a new one by Loren D. Estelman, Gas City, that the library lent me, both good, a couple nondescript mysteries and a weak SF novel that I'll let pass without review, plus The Mystery Chronicles, subtitled More Real Life X-Files.

It looked interesting, but it's not, this guy gets on my nerves with his believe nothing attitude as much as those "I was abducted by aliens at Bigfoot's seance" believe everything fuckers do. Mothman wasn't no owl, at least not the one Joe saw, there's one chapter about this Zanzibarian demon that likes to cornhole sleeping Zanzibarian males for sport, that the locals call "popobawa", Swahili for "Death-"

(VERY FUNNY)

- actually it's Swahili for batwing, I don't care much about that, or some sore Zanzibarian buttholes, but I do care about the fact that I never finished the Scourge Of Africa, and my brush with Zanzibar itself.

I never made it to Zanzibar- Danny and Robin did while Africa Mike, Doug the Lug and I were on safari- but our last day there in Dar we went to this outdoor club, the Sign Club, there on the beach next to where you could catch the ferry to Zanzibar. This is where Bill made his only foray, so far, into the Indian Ocean. I say foray cos I waded, not swam, for a couple of reasons.

For one, the water was filthy, this murky, muddy brown, and full of trash- not surprising, since one of the town of Dar es Salaam's main dumping sites was in the ocean only a couple hundred yards up the beach from us, I'd as soon have stuck my face down in a toilet, and two, this was fucking Africa, and even without all that goddamn trash in the water to draw them in, Africa means sharks.

Think this is just Bill being sharkaphobe Bill? Not this time. Our waiter (we had a nice table under some trees there just off the beach itself, one tree had a sign on it, "beware of monkey and coconut", okay, but since I alway do I didn't need the sign to tell me that, I drank a couple big Safaris that day but then switched to bottled water, it was just too damn HOT-walkng across that beach was like walking on the sun- and I didn't want to catch our flight out for that trip, hellish at the best of times, hungover) warned us before we went out to not go past, or even too near, the drop off, clearly marked where the water went from brown to green, maybe a hundred yards off shore.

"Current?" Danny asked, indicating how his mind works. "Sharks?" Bill asked, indicating the same. Sharks indeed, was the answer. Our waiter went on to tell us that a Brit tourist just a few weeks earlier had ignored all warnings and had swum out past the drop off. He wasn't out there two minutes before he simply disappeared. Forever. No body recovered, no nothing, just gone. I thought it might have been an apocryphal story they just told customers to keep them away from the drop off and any potential business damaging accidents, but one of the white locals was drinking at a table close to us, he came over and reinforced the waiter's words after he'd gone to get our drinks, said he'd been there the day the Brit guy was taken, and it was no fucking joke. Dude, I'm not laughing.

Doug and I waded out to about knee deep, and I wasn't too thrilled with that, at one point Doug looked out to where a bit of surf was kicking up farther out, and asked me if I was tempted to go out and hang ten. Brother, I hang ten wherever I go, but I sure as fuck wasn't doing it out past that drop off.

Before you accuse me 
Take a look at yourself

What's Bill listening to? Well, in honor of the Jiggley One, the Chess Bo Diddley "box set" (it's just two CDs- but in a big damn box). Classic shit, though, top to bottom. Actually, I was listening to it when I started this NL, but it's played through, and now I'm listening to the next best thing, the Tang Spoons CD.

Don't laugh, this isn't simply more Bill self promotion. Listening to it tonight I realized what a genuine tribute this CD (you all do have a copy, right, and if not, why not?) was to two of Bill's, and I would hope yours as well, gods, alcohol and Bo Diddley. I think most of the originals were written while I was drunk, every song on there, live and studio, was played while Bill was drunk, and on a couple of them he wasn't alone (was he, Joe?), three of the songs are ABOUT alcohol (talk about writing what you know), one of them is about Bo (BDMF doesn't stand for Big- or Bad- Damn Mother Fucker, as has been rumored more than once, but is the instrumental version of "Bo Diddley's Mustang Ford", sort of like what Agent Orange did with "Bite The Hand That Feeds"), plus both live covers are by Bo, from the sublime almost twenty minute "Who Do You Love", to the train wreck deconstruction of "Roadrunner"- although I still say Bill's mind melting guitar on that song- so played because my mind actually was melting, I passed out into Greg's drums at the conclusion, Greg noting, "Give him credit, he was still playing on his way down"- that makes Lou Reed's break on "I Heard Her Call My Name" sound like fucking Segovia- was some of the best shit I ever played. I've said it before and I'll say it again, why that CD didn't sell a million copies is beyond me. I hadn't listened to it for a while, and I swear, it still holds up really well.

(LOT BETTER THAN AL WOULD'VE UNDER THEM SHOT PUTTS).

Oh yeah.

What's Bill been watching? A couple of commercials have caught my eye, haven't seen either one of them recently, not since I left Al's, but then the only tv I've watched since leaving Al's has been Cubs games (and I don't want to jinx them, but those fuckers are on fire this year).

The first one is for Hanes (I think) comfort fit bras, got this really pretty, and very well built, young woman who can't keep her bra strap up till she gets some new bras, I like this commercial a LOT, I was gonna ask in here who the girl was, then decided to save time and just ask Sarah instead, she says it's Jennifer Love Hewitt. I've heard the name before, but this is the first thing I've ever seen JLH in that I know of. Hot stuff, man, for real.

And this one sort of embarasses me. I never was a big fan back in the day (although I went to high school with a guy who wanted to drink her bathwater) but I think Marie Osmond- there, I said it- looks pretty damn good in her- is it Nutri-system?- whatever, her weight loss commercials. And she's got like a billion kids, so you know she's not scared of the bedroom.

I didn't see the new Indiana Jones movie since the MC went on a night I couldn't go (danke), it got mixed reviews from them, Sarah, Doug and I did go see the new Narnia film at a matinee last Friday. It certainly looked good- Doug said it was the prettiest movie he'd ever seen- but overall I found it uninvolving (and I liked the first one). Never could get into it, and all the big battle scenes were like, the good guys yell a stupid slogan, usually "For something or other!" charge the bad guys, start to get their asses handed to them, holler "Run away!", then repeat. But it did look good.

What's Bill drinking? Rolling Rock right now, only on my fifth, speaking of the devil, as I was earlier, I went over to Africa Mike's earlier today to pic up some DFZ DVDs he'd made for me, I thought I was just popping in, but he'd obviously expected me to stay as he had one of those five liter Heineken mini kegs on ice, so I hung out there shooting the shit and smoking cigars (I happened to have a couple on me) while we drained the keg.

And truly speaking of the devil, DFZ continues his evil ways, the bullrope match with Wildcat turned out really well (although I ended up with a big damn knot in the middle of my forehead from a little too zealous whack with the cowbell), I told Greg, "You just channel Dusty Rhodes (big fat face that the crowd loves) and I'll channel Terry Funk (crazy mean heel that the crowd hates) and it'll be fine", and it was, better than fine in fact, we sold the Eagles out as main event and I guarantee you they all went home happy.

DFZ's also started working in Tennessee as part of that Association/Affiliates switch I'm too damn tired and full of drink right now to go into, but I'm supposed to pick up THAT Feds belt as well this summer (what can I say, right now DFZ is fucking money). Had a real good match with their current champ, Tony "The Dragon" Givens last Saturday, nice kid and a good worker, should be an enjoyable program with him. And for the same Fed Tuesday night, DFZ pinned some goof doing a Western gimmick with the unlikely double cowboy name of John Wayne Maverick.

Also worked a couple shows for Viper since last issue, he told me he's got the wrestling concession for a bunch of the state fair show in Ohio this summer, says DFZ can work as many of them as he wants, the money is excellent so I'll probably work some, but I'm wondering how the hell he got that deal, Barbed Wire Championship Wrestling, yeah, that really sounds like family friendly fair entertainment. Whatever.

That reminds me of a really good story about the only time Bill ever went to the WV State Fair, but it's late and I won't do it justice if I try to tell it now. Next time, boys and girls, I promise.

I'm done. You?

(DONE).

That's it, then. Next issue, Bill Vs. The State Fair.

Later,

Bill