Slow around Varmint County for the past few weeks everything but the weather, that is. Typical of late winter and early spring in these here parts, we've gone from snow and 20 degrees to sunshine and 80 degrees then back to 20 with snow and sleet again.
Half the county has been laid up with the crud while the other half has been busy taking care of the sick. Poor old Doc Filstrup has been putting in 16-hour days down at his clinic and even had to cancel his weekly poker game, which was just as well since most of the regulars were at home being nursed by their wives.
Squire Hiram Pennywell came in yesterday and his visit is pretty typical of the way Doc's week has gone.
"Doc, I'm sick. I'm a snortin' and blowin' so much I cain't sleep at night."
"Hiram, it's just a common cold. Tell you what, go home, drink lots of fluids and get plenty of rest and just outlast it."
"Doc, I jest tode you, I god a hed code and cain't sleep. How am I sposed to get plenty of rest?"
"Well, I guess that depends on the fluids you drink. Here, I'll give you something that will take care of that cough."
With that, Doc handed Hiram a bottle of his special cough elixir.
"Wheeew. What's in this stuff?"
"Nothing much. I melt down four or five packs of those mentholyptus cough drops in a sauce pan on the stove, then mix in a little alcohol to keep the cough drops from hardening after they cool. Makes a thick syrup."
"What kinda alcohol?"
"Varies. Sometimes I use peach or apricot brandy. That gives it a good flavor. For variety I sometimes use cherry vodka. For especially nasty coughs like yours, I use a bit of Haig Hollow spring run moonshine. That's what you've got there."
"Ain't that the stuff Elijah Haig bottles and sells to the Air Force for jet fuel?"
"Yep. He lets me have a few pints for my medicine cabinet each year,"
"What's dat floatin'on top dere?" Hiram asked.
"That would be feathers. I have to cook up the Haig stuff outside in a big kettle. Too dangerous to heat in the house on the stove.Anyway, when I add the spring run liquor to the cough drops, the fumes usually bring down any birds that happen to be flying overhead. Sometimes they land in the kettle.
"So the feathers are what's left of the birds?"
"Yep. I leave them in as a kind of signature, like that Mexican tequila with a worm in the bottom of the bottle.You see feathers, you know you got the real thing."
"You shore dis will cure my cough?"
"Absolutely. I'll see you in a week when you wake up."
Of course not everything in the county comes to a stop during the spring cold & flu season. It seems that criminals never get too sick to commit crimes. Sheriff Hiram Potts and his deputies are busier than ever, since half the force is out sick, and the various judges, lawyers and other cogs in the wheel of justice continue to turn despite the bugs floating around.
Last week, Lawyer Philbert McSwine was defendingToadyAslinger, who is the son ofArchie Aslinger's cousin Cody, on various charges when Judge Hobert "Hard Time" Harwell had to interrupt proceedings.
"Philbert, during the last twenty minutes of testimony you've sneezed nine times and objected twelve times and the witness has only been asked two questions. At that rate we'll be here until the Fourth of July," the Judge pointed out.
"Actually your honor, I've objected fifteen times. Three of those sneezes were actually objections."
Lawyer McSwine was in fact objecting to the entire trial of his client in Judge Harwell's courtroom, since the Judge was a material witness in the case.
The previous week, the Judge had been walking across the courthouse parking lot when he noticed a beat-up pickup truck surrounded by a mound of garbage. What's more, the mound of garbage was growing as the truck's occupant busied himself dumping everything from empty feed sacks and Wimpy Burger wrappers to an old tire from the bed of his pickup onto the parking lot.
"Young man, can I ask you what exactly you're doing?" the Judge asked in his best "Do-you-haveany-last-words-before-I-sentence-you" voice. But remember, Hard Time Harwell is a country boy judge who sometimes likes to wear overalls and plaid shirts under his robes, coming straight from his farm to the courtroom. He was in overalls on this occasion, looking not the least bit judicial.
"None of yore bizzness, old geezer," Toady Aslinger replied. Toady had just come out of child custody court, where his ex-wife Geraldine had obtained a restraining order along with a child support judgment against his wages down at Black Cat Tire Exchange & Turbo Wash.
On top of that, Toady returned to his truck to find a ticket for littering stuck on the windshield, as a result of his having dumped his ashtray and two breakfast burrito wrappers in the parking lot on his way inside. Being a logical person,Toady concluded that if he was going to be cited for littering, he should just do it right.
Billy Carter, infamous brother of President Jimmy Carter, once said that the difference between a "Redneck" and a "Good Ole Boy" was that a redneck would toss his beer cans out on the highway while a good ole boy would toss them into the bed of his pickup truck.
Toady Aslinger had apparently been a good ole boy, at least until he arrived at the courthouse that day. Judge Harwell watched open-mouthed, as Toady dumped burger wrappers, old roofing shingles, soiled diapers and, something that really disturbed the Judge, half a dozen crumpled-up speeding tickets on the ground.
"Young man, you can't dump that trash here," Hard Time insisted.
Toady said nothing ≠ just reached over and draped a brown-stained disposable diaper on the Judge's shoulder. Totally clueless about the identity of the old man in overalls, he added, "Get out of my face you old %#@!* or you'll eat the next one of these I dig out."
Hard Time said nothing, despite the fact that he carries a loaded .44 caliber Smith & Wesson. He simply left and returned in a few minutes with two deputies, a litter control officer and a court bailiff. He needed all of them. Toady, in no mood to be friendly after a session in court with his ex-wife, put up a good scrap before the bailiff landed a lucky groin shot with a taser.
Toady's resistance suited Judge Harwell just fine. In addition to littering, Toady could also be charged with resisting arrest, along with felonious assault, creating a disturbance, defacing public property, assault with a deadly weapon (the soiled diaper), public profanity, indecent exposure (after being tasered in the groin), assault on an officer, and disposal of untreated sewage without a permit.
Lawyer McSwine argued that since Judge Harwell had witnessed the altercation and had, in fact, been the citizen who filed the complaint and been the victim in at least two of the charges, he should step down from the bench and let another judge preside over the case.
"I'll take it under advisement," the Judge told McSwine.
"I request a jury trial," McSwine countered.
"Are you sure? His ex-wife is Caleb Hockmeyer's granddaughter. Where will you find twelve jurors in this county not related to the Hockmeyer clan?"
"I'll request a jury trial in another county."
"Most of these charges are misdemeanors.You'll not get a change of venue for misdemeanor cases, Lawyer McSwine."
Philbert knew when he was whipped. He kept objecting as one by one, the four officers testified, along with several others who witnessed the melee. Judge Harwell didn't even bother to testify, deciding that there was sufficient testimony to hang him.
McSwine called one witness for his client, exwife GeraldineAslinger, who would testify that her former husband was in an unsound frame of mind on the day in question.
"Geraldine, would you say that Toady was in a disturbed frame of mind? That he wasn't himself that day?"
"Yessir, I would say so. He was mighty disturbed after the judge ordered his wages garnisheed to pay child support."
"Why could you tell he wasn't in control of himself?"
"Well, right after he took a swing at me. . ."
"He tried to assault you?" the Judge asked.
"Yes, yer honor. But that weren't what convinced me he weren't normal. He's always taking swings at me. It was the pop machine."
"The courthouse soft drink machine? What about it?"
"Well, after he got done arguing with me, he went over and put some money in the machine and it wouldn't give him a soda, so he started ranting and raving and kicking it."
"You're saying that's not normal for Toady to act like that?"
"Nah. Ever since he stole a key to the machine from his cousin Archie, he never puts money in them. He just opens it and helps himself."
"No more questions for this witness, your honor," McSwine quickly interjected.
Needless to say, Toady was convicted. Considering the nature of Judge Hard Time Harwell, the sentence was miraculously light. Harwell informed Toady that he stood convicted on all misdemeanor counts but that he had decided be lenient and to drop the felony charge of assault with a deadly weapon.
"You understand that under these convictions, I could still sentence you to a total of seventeen years?"
Toady just nodded, prepared for the worst.
"Well, I'm going to sentence you instead to twelve months of community service. You will be on supervised litter pickup twenty-five hours a week. You can do it after work and on weekends, so you can continue paying child support. If you fail to show, we will bring you in to serve your full sentence behind bars.
"Oh, and one more thing.You will return that key to the courthouse soft drink machine." After a relieved Toady was led away, Lawyer McSwine commented, "Judge you surprised me, considering everything. I was sure you'd throw the book at him."
"Well, I thought about it. Then I recalled how upset I could get with my ex-wives, all three of them. Then I realized that Toady's ex is related to Varmint County's most notorious criminal and I thought that maybe that's punishment enough. Locking him up safely behind bars would be letting him off too easy."
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