Memoirs of a Worldly Guy
Bill is able to wangle the old Dodge coupe from his mother in about 1959 and he and I take off, presumably to investigate New Orleans. We make it as far as Salt Lake City before we meet a couple of L.A. sweethearts we decide to cook dinner for. They end up with all of our food in their car trunk. We are convinced that the folks in St. Louis are extremely friendly. They are waving at us for a different reason.
We pass many pickaninny chidren as we head north from Louisiana. Things haven't changed much since the Civil War as far as we can see. The black neighborhoods in St. Louis are as surly as before. The young men call us 'honkies'.
I make the rounds of companies in search of legitmate income but have difficulty restraining myself from telling the sometimes arrogant managers what I think of them. The immediate assistants are hugely amused , no doubt, by my assessments but I am refused employment, presumably as a result of my comments.
Dutch has purchased a bunch of rubber molds with part of his veteran's allowance. We decided to make Plaster of Paris objects for sale, primarily to the carnivals, who gave them away as prizes. Dutch kept his job with Dr. Ballard or whoever his employer was at the time. I had no job.
Dave is an excellent skier. Since I have delusions of being a competent skier he has no difficulty in convincing me we should take a trip to Sun Valley. I manage to become a member of the would-be skiers who have been both carried up and carried down the mountain at Sun Valley. I still carry scar tissue in my right leg.
'Bumpus' Woody qualifies as the most interesting individual I have ever known. He walked into the Brazeau country before the railway was built. He is not a professional guide and rounds up his horses andassists Gunner and me on occasion. He does everything contrary to the methods of most guides. He removes his shoes and socks after he has forded a mountain stream.
'Bumpus' and his son try to get Gunner and me out of our 'mummy' bags in the morning. It doesn't work. It's a reversal of the boy who cried wolf one morning when we are told by 'Bumpus' that we could shoot a moose without leaving the tent.
Drunk driving was mere bagatelle compared to the stunt Jackie pulled. He was a bit unhappy one night after a night of boozing at the Flying Club. He stole an aircraft and flew it at extremely low level, forcing cars off the road on the Centre Street bridge before crashing into the home of a little old lady. She survived, he didn't.
I suppose the members of the Buffalo association would have shown up once a month even if the cold beer and cold cuts weren't free. Most of them were supporters of junior hockey. The behaviour of my group one evening before Christmas we blame on having broached the booze purchased for the Christmas party.
My lack of fluency in the German language nearly results in my spending the day in a remote German town. I am astonished when I have a chauffeur supplied by one of the major companies who actually clicked his heels!
The meetings with the Hartmanns from Austrian days are redemptive but my Parisian contacts are virtually useless. I left the following day.
I return to England in order to fly to South Africa. The man called Fergie Hamel intercepted me at the airport In Johannesburg and took me to his home. His wife and daughter w>ere vacationing in England. I lie in bed for half an hour trying to figure out where I am. Fergie is well connected in South Africa so I am invited to a business lunch, asked about descending in a gold mine and have a visit to Soweto, where I am treated to a gallon pail of Kaffir beer.
[Read]I am battling from day one against the Indians attempting to beat me out of what they refer to as baksheesh. My visit to the Taj Mahal beggars belief. Bearing in mind that I was suffering most of the time from dysentery I feel that I was justified for a heroic award of some type. Whenever my taxi driver was searching the area for someone who would sell him a tin of oil I would be out in the weeds emptying my eager bowels. Persons reading about the events surrounding my visit to the Taj Mahal would claim that my description was merely a figment of my imagination. I swear that it is all true.
Suneeta, the beautiful singer at the hotel, took me and her young sister for ice cream at a popular bar via a horse-drawn carriage. She also gave me some useful advice about the way to deal with the many mendicants that followed me.
The Blue Mountain people sent me pasha-like to Mahabalipuram in their company car. They were obviously tired of me.
I met a young man on the plane who had been hunting for a snow leopard for him and his father’s game farm in Ohio. He has no room reservation so I generously offer him a cot in my room. I am not amused when he ends up offering me a cot in my room. He leaves the follwing morning. A stroll in the evening leads me to a bizarre adventure.