SAVAGE SATURDAY

19)  Sunday, February 2nd – “SKINS WIN!  SKINS WIN!”

 

The other gang, the one in Miz Lottie’s livingroom in Purley, fell deathly silent as Green Bay, who’d won the overtime toss and, after punts by each side and a red zone wipeout resulting in a Packers’ field goal, completed a barrage of quick sideline passes to reach Washington’s thirty-five after the Football Team (nee Commanders, nee Football Team again, nee Redskins) had tied the score for the second time in overtime with a 51 yarder of their own...

        “Build us up, just to knock us down,” Uncle Raoul sighed.  “Just like what those Washington Insiders did to President Trump.  Not saying I voted for the man – well not in twenty twenty nor last November – not even saying that I liked him, although he was one damn good entertainer.  He just lied to all the people, said he would make their lives better, then he turned around and gave away the store to the rich folk, same as always.  Same as the others.  So what I’m saying… now he was a good entertainer, kept lots of us amused, but back in office again?”

          He shook his head as a Packer back plowed through the line and into the secondary, dragged down at the twenty seven.

          “Now boy,” Westy patronized him soberly, “there might just be a few things you may not be aware of.  This cowboy sort with his guns and cowboy clothes, ain’t been in the Congress for a month before getting raised up – he’s the one who cut the food stamps there in Wyoming when he was in that there Legislature there.  He introduced bills to use the death penalty on everybody from armed robbers to sex criminals…”

          “Well what’s wrong with that?” Raoul objected as Green Bay used its final time-out to regroup.

          Westy waved a hand in disagreement.  “Not saying I approve of armed robbery, but some of these so called sex criminals are seventeen year old boys, doing the nasty with consenting fifteen year old girls.  And they asked President Rivers if he was alright on that… right there on the CNN!... and he said that he was – meaning, you know, the boys like us, not them.  And another thing…”

          “Shush up with your politics,” Miz Lottie waved him down, “they’re going to play!

 

          “Second and short for the Pack with the score tied and just under a minute still left,  Puson Snead took the initiative… this time… “Washington’s giving Rodgers everything under, and they’ve hit three straight.”

          “It’s like an all-you-can-eat buffet,” Biff McLaine replied, with more jollity than most, back in the Metroplex, could stomach.  “Washington sure could use a sack…”

On her throne, Miz Lottie scrunched up her face, suddenly shaking all over, as with some terrible fever…

          “You sick, Mama?” Westy asked.  “Stopped up inside?  Want me to bring you some of them brown pills…”

          “Shush up, boy… I’m puttin’ a hex on those, those fudge-packers… that’s what they do, up there Green Bay, pack fudge?” she asked, the question belied by her determination.

          “Mama!  You go off on my language and you…” sputtered Uncle Raoul, “…they pack cheese, up there, meat… they pack meat, too, in cans…”

          Earline and Tyesha couldn’t help laughing out loud, but quit as soon as Lottie waved an angry fist, then shivered all over, staring...

I givin them boys the evil eye…”

          “Lean back, Gen’ral…” Raoul warned.  “Last sucka Auntie put her mojo on, he was that half-ass pimp wannabe had his eye on Earline…”

          Warn’t Mama,” Earline squealed.  “Valentine caught a cap from some Tribe up there in Nakonset, it was business…”

          “Punk business, you asked me?” Westy turned…

          “Weren’t askinyou!

          Rodgers handed off to Wells and it seems like every player on the field joined the pileup… but the chains were moved, again.

          “First down, Green Bay, and the visitors use their last timeout,” said Snead.

          “Good it’ll do ‘em.  Ball on the twenty-six, make it about a forty-five-yarder, at most, if they can’t advance,” Biff estimated, “… Packers need another of those short passes, then a run down the middle to set up, quick spike… plenty of time, even with that wasted challenge...

          “Back after these messages…”

          Puson Snead wavered onscreen, then somehow morphed into Big Sonny, surrounded by his girls, his wares and a baker’s dozen of admiring flunkeys.  He smiled and tipped his hat… seemed to be somewhere in Texas, probably, because there were steers and horses grazing in the scrub behind him; then again, might’ve been one of those computer animations that would put a man where he was not… as he began rattling off his spiel; images of high-end, luscious idiot-boxes apparating and disapparating to every side above like ghost riders in skies that would never be cloudy all day, nor ever shut up…

          Abraham, Martin and George were as absent as the proverbial discouraging word.

          “Two weeks to Super Sunday,” Big Sonny reminded the millions turned in.  “But, in only eleven days, the much-anticipated digital to modulated digital conversion will finally take place.  At Giga-Plex, we have MHDTVs for every taste and every budget, from personal five-inch portables to giant plasma models, and on Lincoln’s Birthday… I’m talking the real one, Wednesday the twelfth… the Dominator is coming to America; join us, live, from the nation’s capital, as a galaxy of stars is on hand for the unveiling and then follow the Giga-Team as we make the round of local outlets with prizes, balloons and, of course, Miss Dominator 2021 here, Effie Lou Wilson.”  A smiling blonde in a sequined gown that clung to her like a coat of paint waved and blew kisses to the unseen.  “We have hybrids… V-phones,” Sonnenschein continued, “V-pods and DiFi’s and plenty of smaller Mod-Def models for those of you on budgets.  We’ve got laptops and desktops, micro-DVRs for your lap dances and home and personal security accessories at our 007 Shop and, if you’re determined to hang on to that dependable old regular high-def set, we’ve even got plenty of converters…”

In Dempstertown, Stretch leaned forward again, tongue fairly hanging out at the flying vista of all those expensive toys…

          “We take FCC vouchers!  Se habla Español!… whatcha say to that, Effie Lou Wilson, Miss Dominator, 2021…”

       “Fan-tas-tic!”

          “Man-oh!” said Tom, pumped up after his eviction of Lenny… although not so far gone that he didn’t glance over his shoulder, in case Nan had wandered off her reservation… “I could go for a slice of that…”

          “Pinch me!” Stretch agreed.  “I’d settle for one of those sixty-threes… or even a forty-eight flat…”

          “He was talkin’ ‘bout the chick,” said Nat.  “Miss Dominator.  Bet she’s into the really kinky stuff…”

          “Well, her, too…”

          The long Giga-Plex commercial over, Biff resumed his running commentary.  “First down, Pack… eight men up for the Washington, they really need a sack.  Rodgers back, with time… a lot of time!… he’s got Mitchell on the sidelines, Mitchell has Claude Sammons beat, first and goal, Green Bay, on the six yard line and he got out of bounds with nine seconds to go…”

          “Green Bay on top again!” exhorted Puson Snead – the homies in Washington forgotten.  “The Packers are finally back in the Superbowl, goin’ to the Big Easy on the nineteenth and forget Tom Brady… the ageless comeback kid, Aaron Rodgers, he’s king of the hill!  Plague or no plague…”

          While, in Purley, Tyesha Hill threw down the rolled up comics page of the Maryland paper at Earline’s feet and glared at her grandmother, Earline’s great-grandmama

          “Fat lotta good that voodoo do…”

          “That voodoo doodoo…” Earline Ottinger agreed.

“I ain’t done wit’ them boys yet… you want a piece o’ this, you just keep cuttin’ up like that, you’ll see…”

          “We just goofin’,” Tyesha said, warily, “so don’t be hatin now…”

          “But ‘cept those Green Bays,” Earline corrected, “you go put that hex on them!”

“For all the good it’ll do,” scoffed Uncle Raoul.  Seein’ as there’s still… uh… nine seconds to go…”

          “Looks like Washington’s miraculous run is about over.  Rodgers and Mitchell have punched their ticket to Bourbon Street and Jose Jimenez is on the field to make it thirty-three to thirty…”

          “Uh… that’s Javier, Javier Jimenez…” Snead corrected, laconically, “…little fellow’s got the strongest leg since Garo Yepremian back in Miami’s glory days, Holmgren has a nickel’s worth of sense, he’ll have Jay Jay kick the ball as deep into the Washington endzone as he can, soon as he converts… without risking a runback or another squib…

          “Snap, Jimenez up and… it’s blocked!  Holy… holy Toledo!” Biff McLaine exploded, “Avery Washington blocked the chip shot field goal… one of the defenders even picked up the ball and the tub o’lard’s started running…”

       “He can do that!” Puson informed his civilian co-commentator…

       “He can?”

“It’s Austin…” Snead bailed out the clueless McLaine, “Ray Bob Austin, backup defensive tackle got a hand up and batted the kick to himself… he’s six-eight, officially three-forty but more like three-eighty… rumbling down Lambeau field like a snowplow with the brakes busted…”

       “But he’s got blockers trailing him, four Skins ahead of the pursuing Pack…”

Comman... er, Team, Biff!  Austin to the thirty, to the twenty-five,” Snead marveled, “…he’s plumb out of gas and here comes everybody… Gaithers is closing fast…”

“Ray Bob turns,” Biff blurted out, “…he’s down, no… before he collapsed he’d handed off the ball!… Austin has handed off to Marone, and Marone’s got speed.  Austin is bent over, he’s…

       Ohh… nobody needs to see that!…

          Marone with the ball, now,” Snead took over.  “And… Gaithers is down, Gaithers is down, sports fans… Marone’s in for the touchdown; did Gaithers slip in what I think he slipped in…”

          “Un-fuckin’-believable…” McLaine exclaimed.

          “Uh oh!” Puson warned, “somebody’s gonna catch a sanction from the FCC…”

          “Catch something from those idiots, letting the government take people’s Super Sunday up to the brink of confiscation.  Sorry, folks…” McLaine recovered, “if you missed that, I don’t know what to say.  We can’t replay that… can we?”

          “It’ll be up there on the Internet til’ the end of time,” said Snead, “right next to former President Trump’s tirade and cerebral malfunction after Thad Burke bamboozled him by appointing Sam Rivers, or to Janet Jackson’s left breast wardrobe malfunction…”

          “Right tittie,” McLaine corrected him…

          “Players out on the field, coaches out, fans erupting from the stands like… well… like that stuff on the twenty; fighting everywhere… a referee is down, we’ve got chaos in Cheese City with flags everywhere but, unless there was a flag thrown down before Marone crossed the goal line, somewhere, Marone is in and Washington’s up thirty-six to thirty.  Let’s try to hear what the referee has to say…”

          The zebra’s statement couldn’t be heard over the din in Wisconsin, but when he pointed towards the Washington end zone, then raised both arms over his head, the meaning of the gesture rippled across Lambeau field like a wave of nausea, an even more terrible howling ensued and hundreds more crazed Cheeseheads stormed the field, vaulting from the bleachers, even rappelling or flat-out dropping from the upper boxes.

“Time’s expired,” Biff McLaine shouted above the din.  “Skins win!  Skins win!”

“Washington is going to the big dance…” Puson agreed with a pained face…

          And suddenly, as if a sleepy giant slapped in the face, the nation’s capital exploded.  Tom Eppert vaulted out of his chair, spilling chips and beer, while Stretch and Nat did an impromptu, despicable Macarena or something on the carpet.  Lenny Witcher toasted his new friends at the Chevalier Room, a joint out on the highway between the carwash and a boarded-up Blockbuster… three blocks from Tom’s.  The stoners in Nakonset Park listening to the game through earpieces… Tribe and Nation alike… grinned at each other, turf war momentarily forgotten.  In the Giga-Plex, staff and customers… even the resolute Mark Tenison… stared slack-jawed as the network did replay the blocked field goal and touchdown, even Ray Bob Austin’s scrofulous purging.  Back in Green Bay, Puson Snead shook his head, as if this topped, even, that infamous kickoff return in California with the marching band.

          “Folks, it’s a little out-of-control here, out of control and raining cheese.  The referee is being beaten, the fans still in their seats are throwing cheese onto the field…”

          “At least I hope it’s only cheese,” McLaine groaned.

          “And now I am being informed that we are going to cut away to the White House, where President Rivers has scheduled a short appearance.  This is not a scene appropriate for young children…” Puson Snead shook his head, again… “I mean the spectacle, here, not the President...”

          “Look at all those idiots pulling off their pants,” Biff marveled, just before the camera cut away to the Oval Office.

 

           

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