Conversation With An Okie

Summer 2000

Chapter 1: Prelude to Disaster
Dear Diary,
I haven’t had a chance to write for a while. It has been indescribably busy at work here in Phoenix and I simply haven’t had much time to languish idly at the computer. I won’t go into all of the tedious details of why it has been busy, but part of the reason is due to being short-staffed, most notably in the mechanic department.
While I was away on holiday a short time ago, I left the office in the charge of one of my assistants. The sudden, though temporary increase in responsibilities brought to light a character trait in this particular individual which had heretofore escaped my notice. In short, he became crazed with power.
The office itself remained largely unscathed from his attentions, but he managed the mechanic’s shop like a Gestapo Storm Trooper amok during a Hitlerian economy drive. No detail was small enough to escape his notice. The shop was too much of a mess, trailers were not being repaired quickly enough, completed repair orders did not flow into the office in a timely fashion, parts were not being ordered in sufficient quantities, and, Heaven forbid, food and drink were being consumed in the work areas. The final straw came when he removed a tub of bubble gum from one of the mechanic’s tool chests. The resultant effect of all of this was that both mechanics quit.
I congratulated my assistant on this accomplishment when I returned. I pointed out to him that there should now be no more trouble with untidy premises, late or incomplete paperwork, infrequent repairs or any of the other problems he encountered simply because there was now no one there to cause them. I also added that I had ordered mechanic’s uniforms for him and frog-marched him into the shop to fill in while I attempted to repair the damage.
Magnanimously, I replaced the shop water-cooler he had removed in my absence. According to him, he had removed this in strict accordance with company rules regarding the placement of beverage dispensers in work areas. When the temperature in the middle of the Sonoran Desert reaches 110 degrees Fahrenheit, it is my firm belief that the company would turn a blind eye to the presence of such dispensers. It would be considered cheaper to provide water for the mechanics within easy reach than it would be to replace them on a daily basis due to heatstroke.
I called the first mechanic and half-heartedly asked him if he would like his job back. He indicated that he had found work elsewhere on a nightshift and this allowed his wife to work during the day while he looked after their children. No real loss. He had a tendency to whine about everything anyway and this had become tiresome. It also forestalled his periodic forays into my office trying to sponge money from me to tide him over until payday - payday being three days before in one instance - or attempting to have me co-sign some massive loan which he had no hope of ever repaying. He was a hick from Wyoming whom we had nicknamed Dokie.
Next I called Dokie’s former partner in intransigence, Okie. Sparing no effort to hide this individual’s true identity, I’ll name him Carl Cannedy. Aged 47, Carl hailed most recently from the grasslands outside Paris, Texas, whence he had fled at the age of 17 after his father had threatened him with a gun. Until his hasty migration to East Texas, Carl had spent his youth in the rural parts of Oklahoma, where residents breed their own stock. Carl indicated that he’d like to come in and discuss the issue of his departure, but not when my assistant was present. I agreed to this.
He arrived at the office at approximately 5 p.m. looking much like he always did; that is to say, much like a disheveled garden gnome. Standing at 5’2" inches tall, Okie possessed one of the most unkempt beards this side of the Mississippi and a pot belly that preceded his appearance by a goodly distance whenever he rounded a corner. He generally wore suspenders of a multi-colored hue and when these were not covered in grime they were the brightest part of him. I beckoned him into my office and bade him take a seat. I could always clean the upholstery afterwards but a good mechanic is hard to find.
Grinning in his usual toothless fashion, Okie asked how I was doin’ and sat hisself down. I began the conversation by asking if he would like to come back to work. Previous experience had taught me that any other preamble to a conversation with Okie, other than getting right to the point, would result in confusion. He tended to ramble on and at times I found it difficult to understand his version of the English language.
"Ah’ll tell ya somethin’", he drawled.
Perhaps ‘drooled’ is more appropriate because he paused for a moment to wipe away with his sleeve a rivulet of tobacco juice flowing from his mouth into his beard. This rivulet had its headwaters somewhere in the region of a chaw lodged in his lower lip. "It was fine workin’ here when you was here, but when you went off on vacation, man that other guy was a sumbitch."
The ‘sumbitch’ referred to was my assistant Jeff. "Yes, well I’ve had a word with Jeff and he won’t be quite so, shall we say ‘enterprising’ in the future. In any case, I was gone only for two weeks. In all honesty, I find it difficult to believe that you couldn’t have waited until I returned to discuss any issues you may have had.
"Ah cain’t work with someone like thet aroun’. Ah cain’t. He gotta go before ah come back. The second yous was gone, he come into the shop wavin’ a buncha papers aroun’ sayin’ they weren’t filled in right. Hell, you know ah cain’t write good, but you never had no problem with me fillin’ out repair orders. On top of that, he was tellin’ me to move all them damn trailers aroun’ the yard. Ever since my accident, ah ain’t been right in the back an’ it hurts if ah’m in the damn truck too damn long. An’ of course the shop was a mess. He kep comin’ out sayin’ to fix this and then fix that an’ sheeit, we ain’t finished one job an’ then he wants us to start on another one. How’s we s’posed to keep up with sheeit like thet? An’ then he took out the cooler ‘cause he said we was havin’ water fights in the shop an’ thet was dangerous. We weren’t havin’ no water fights me an’ Eddie (the aforementioned Dokie). We’s just throwin’ water at each other to cool off ‘cause it got so hot. An’ then he took my gum away. You won’t lemme smoke in the shop so ah gotta do sumthin’ to keep my jaws busy, ‘part from my chaw. Said the gum’d attract bugs’re some sheeit and ah couldn’ have it."
Okie’s octave level had risen noticeably toward the end of his rant to the point where I was about to interrupt and tell him to calm down. He is an excitable fellow and tends to shout and to gesticulate a great deal when he has a long thought he needs to express. What he lacks in vocabulary though, he more than compensates for in volume.
Matters aren’t helped by the fact he possesses two hearing aids, both of which are normally turned off. This serves two purposes, according to Okie. Firstly, it saves on battery life. Secondly, he needn’t wear hearing protection as required by company safety mandates while conducting repairs that are loud by nature - buck riveting for instance. Unfortunately, he doesn’t realize that everyone else can hear quite well and that his fervent discourses tend to make everyone else within earshot wish that they too had hearing aids that could be turned off.
"Look, Carl. I am not about to get rid of Jeff. Despite some problems you and he may have had - yes I know, Eddie too, please don’t interrupt - he is a valuable employee. Despite his overzealous approach to certain matters which you have outlined so eloquently, he was in charge during my absence and at those times what he says goes. Problems you had with him could have been addressed when I returned and addressed, I hope, to everyone’s satisfaction. Perhaps the issue of the gum removal was a bit extreme, but he was within his rights as was his concern about the water-cooler. You and Eddie could have found a different way to cool off other than hurling cups of water at one another. That is dangerous. You could have slipped and fallen as the floor was bound to get wet. As you intimated, you have already been hurt once here and you don’t wish to get hurt again now do you? No, please don’t interrupt. Of course you don’t. Perhaps it would have been best for Jeff to have explained the dangers of slippery floors instead of removing the cooler, but there was no reason to quit now was there?"
"Whet does intymated mean?"
"It’s the past tense of a verb, meaning ‘To hint or to indicate; to announce."
"Oh."

Chapter 2: Zen and the Art of Semi-Trailer Repairs
It might be worth a sidebar here to explain the accident alluded to. Several months ago Okie and Dokie were working together on a trailer in an attempt to replace a bushing, which kept one of two axles in place. The axle was supported by means of jack-stands and a porta-power unit, which kept the axle - and the trailer - suspended from the floor of the shop during the repair proceedings. Due to inattention - or stupidity - Dokie applied air to the trailer brake system to inflate the air-ride suspension and thus raise the axle a bit higher so Okie could access the bushing more readily. In order to maintain a safe work environment, a readjustment of the jack-stands immediately afterwards was necessary. This never occurred. Now de-stabilized and supported by only the porta-power unit up its backside, the 17,000 lb. trailer shifted position and collapsed, the axle striking Okie in the guts as he lay underneath wiggling things with a 4 lb. sledge hammer. The hollow boom that marked the moment when the trailer collapsed resounded into the office, raising a few eyebrows, as did Dokie’s panicked screams to call for an ambulance. Miraculously, using one arm to drag himself along, Okie crawled into the office clutching his stomach and collapsed himself. This was ghastly. You have no idea the amount of paperwork I was now obliged to fill out. Reams of the stuff, but first things first. We called an ambulance.
The paramedics began to attend to Okie by asking him some questions while preparing an IV. "What happened?" asked one.
"Huh?" responded Okie, grimacing.
The question was repeated three times and each time Okie failed to respond. The paramedic, probably believing Okie to have fallen into a state of shock, leaned closer to him and asked rather loudly if he knew where he was.
"Course ah know where ah am. Ah’m at work. Where the f#%& do you think ah am?" came the reply.
"Okay, okay", said the paramedic. "Calm down. You didn’t say anything when I asked what had happened."
"Well ah ain’t got my f#%&*$# hearin’ aids turned on do I?" Okie turned his hearing aids on. "You wanna know whet happened? I had a goddamn trailer fall on me, thet’s whet happened. Whet’s thet ya got there?"
"This is an IV," said another paramedic hovering ghoulishly over the scene, brandishing a plastic, liquid filled bag and several tubes. "We’re going to insert an IV into you in case you have internal bleeding. You don’t want your veins to deflate from blood loss do you?"
"Ah don’t want no drugs. Ah’ll git fired if ah take drugs." He began to thrash about in an attempt to get away from the IV.
Time for me to step in. "Um, Carl. I won’t fire you if you take drugs in this particular instance. Okay? This is simply a saline fluid anyway. No drugs." Despite the injury, it was all any of us could do to stop from laughing. Paramedics included.
"Whet’s saline?" Someone laughed. I think it was Jeff.
"Salt water. Don’t worry about it."
More thrashing about at the sight of the needle. "No needles, no damn needles. Ah’m goin’ home fer a rest. Ah’m okay".
"Let me get this straight. You just had a semi-trailer fall on you and you’re going home for a rest? I won’t put the needle in if you don’t want me to, but I think that after what has happened a needle is best. It won’t hurt." This from the paramedic.
Time for me to step in again as the thrashing about increased. "CARL! Let them put the damn needle in your arm and stop making such a fuss!"
"Okay, boss." The needle was inserted and off went the paramedics with Carl secured tightly to a stretcher. And yes, when you ram the back of the ambulance with the stretcher, the legs fold up just like on TV and in goes the hapless victim just like that.
Okie’s wife called later on in the day to thank us for getting the paramedics to attend to her husband so promptly. She mentioned also that the hospital had had to operate on Okie for a lacerated artery in his abdominal region - Okie later referred to this as a laced arty - and that the operation had been a success. It transpired too that Okie’s appendix wasn’t in first rate condition either and that this had been removed as a precautionary measure. Two operations for the price of one. Evidently there was a fuss afterwards when Okie discovered what had happened.
"You removed my appendix?"
"Yes," replied the doctor. "Although unrelated to your injury, it appeared as though your appendix would rupture soon so we took it out when we operated on you for the lacerated artery."
"Ain’t an appendix an organ?"
"Yes."
"An organ? You took out a f#%&*$#’ organ? Don’t ah need all my organs?" Beginnings of panic and some thrashing about commenced.
"Well you don’t need your appendix."
"What does it do?"
"Nobody really knows."
"What the f#%& kinda doctors are you? You don’t know what my organ does so yuh take it out anyway?" Panic then set in decisively and a sedative was provided promptly and free of charge.
Later on my boss flew in from L.A. to conduct a comprehensive accident report as is required by the company. Okie was back at work by this time and we all stood outside next to a trailer similar to the one that had collapsed in order to attempt to reconstruct as closely as possible the causes of the accident. My boss has done many reports like this over the years and is very detailed and precise. Everything must be just so.
"Tell me again why you were replacing the axle bushing," my boss asked Okie.
"Cause it was wallered."
"Wallered?" My boss looked confused.
"Yep." There was no elaboration. Just "Yep."
In a rare moment of indecision, my boss stood there in the bright Phoenix sunshine unable to decide whether to write the word ‘wallered’ into the report. His pen touched the paper, then rose, then dropped and then rose again. It was easy to see what was running through his mind. He couldn’t write ‘wallered’ into the report because he didn’t know what it meant. Or in fact if he had even heard the word correctly. He didn’t want to ask Okie for an explanation of the word because Okie probably didn’t have one. The bushing was wallered and that, simply, was that. If he tried to badger Okie for an explanation, this would add stress to an already stressful situation. In fact, Okie believed this report was preliminary to having him fired. So my boss engaged another tactic.
"That’s quite the accent you have there. Where are you from?" This approach was designed as a roundabout method of discovering if he had heard the word wallered correctly. It was going to be a long day.
"Paris."
"Presumably Paris, Texas?" A slight chuckle from my boss in this sly attempt to lighten the somber mood.
Okie looked puzzled. "Yep, its in Texas." He gave me a look, which indicated he believed my boss to be insane. I doubt Okie had ever heard of France.
Chagrined that his attempt at humour had fallen on deaf ears, my boss gave up. "Wallered, you say?"
I sighed. There were better things to be doing than wasting time in conversational circles "For the purposes of this report, it might be advantageous to substitute the word ‘worn’ for ‘wallered.’ By doing so, one may avoid rustic nomenclature and come to understand the true meaning of the sentence."
"Gotcha" said my boss looking grateful. He placed pen to paper. Okie looked lost, which was the point.
A month or so later my boss held a meeting at my office on an unrelated matter with other employees who flew in from various out of state locations. During the course of the meeting the overhead projector packed it in at a critical juncture. My boss glared at me across the conference table to indicate his disapproval of my choice of overheads. I merely shrugged my shoulders and told him it appeared the bulb had wallered. That was the first time any of us in the room had seen him laugh so hard he actually cried.

Chapter 3: Grapes of Wrath
Whenever I engaged in conversation with Carl, it always seemed to me that the strains of ‘Dueling Banjos’ crept into my subconscious. I have seen "Deliverance" with Burt Reynolds only once, but I was always reminded of the scene with the young toothless hillbilly trying to outplay the city slicker whenever Okie began to speak. Carl was that toothless hillbilly all growed up and set loose on an unsuspecting world.
He employed words like ‘yonder’ and ‘wallered’ in general conversation without knowing either that they were archaic or beyond the comprehension of those brought up with electricity and running water. It wasn’t that Okie was particularly stupid, he could be surprisingly shrewd when the occasion warranted, yet he came from a completely different environment. His was a sheltered, rural upbringing where his father had ruled the roost with an iron fist and kept strangers at bay with a shotgun. He had had virtually no schooling and to a great degree was ignorant of most of those things everyone else takes for granted. He may never have heard of France, but once enlightened and given a fistful of Francs he could have figured out the exchange rate lickety split. Moreover, he was a good mechanic and had learned his trade the hard way. Which is why he had objected so strenuously to my assistant’s high handed supervisory machinations.
"When thet boy of yorn come out into the shop, he reminded me of my daddy after he warshed a jug of ‘shine down hisself. An’ ah promised myself ah’d never take thet sheeit from anyone agin. It was like he was drunk on power an’ nothin’ me or Eddie could do was good enough."
"Well, as I mentioned, I don’t think Jeff will be quite so…."
"Did ah ever tell ya ‘bout whah ah left home when ah was a kid?"
I settled back into my chair. The night was still young. "Can’t say you ever did Carl."
"My daddy was a hard man, yes he was. I had eight brothers an’ we all had to work when we was eight or nine. We was sharecroppers. You know whet thet is?"
"Vaguely, I’ve read Steinbeck."
"Well I ain’t never heard of him, but we hep’d farmers take in their crop an’ git some in exchange which we’d eat or sell. An’ we had a patch of land ourself an’ we grew our own sheeit on there as well. But we was allus hungry and we didn’ have no money an’ cause we didn’ have no money, daddy’d send us out to work doin’ whetever we could.. Which is why ah’m a good mechanic see. I can fix anythin’ with bailin’wire or whetever ‘cause ah had to. Then Daddy got some money from somewheres, ah don’t know from where, and we set up a lumber mill. You know whet a lumber mill is?"
"Vaguely, I’ve read Paul Bunyan."
"Oh. Yeah, well anyway we worked that mill fer a long time but we felled all the trees on our property an’ so we had to git more from somewheres else. At first we’d clear land from the neighbors an’ git to keep the wood fer the mill, but then they wanted to sell us the wood an’ so we didn’t make no money. My daddy tried to sell the mill so’s we could do somethin’ else but nobody’d buy it. By this time my older brothers had gone to the city ‘cause my daddy was too hard on ‘em and anyhow there weren’t food enough fer us all. We’d be workin’ before dark and stop after dark and when they lef’ ah had to do more an’ more me an’ my brother. Man ah’ll tell ya. And daddy got meaner and meaner and drunker and drunker. Then my brother lef’ in the middle of the night an’ when he woke up my daddy was so mad. He said the next one to leave would be goin’ in a pine box if he lef’ at all. I was the only one lef’ so yous know whet thet meant?"
"Presumably it meant you weren’t devoid of wood to the extent that you couldn’t make a coffin?"
A long and puzzled silence ensued terminating abruptly in convulsions and tears of laughter. A particularly large and gruesome wad of chaw splattered onto my desk. Okie swept this onto the floor and ground it underfoot. "Heh Heh Heh! Yeah, I guess we had thet much lef’. Man thet’s funny. Sheeit I never thought of thet."
"Where was your ‘maw’ during all of this?"
"Oh she lef’ years ago with some guy thet came aroun’. Yep, thet didn’ last though an’ she was livin’ with my brother inside of Paris ‘til she died. Anyhow, daddy got up and went fer his shotgun. I don’t know whet he planned to do, mebbe jes’ scare me a little but ah weren’t havin’ none of thet so I hit ‘im an’ ran off. I ain’t never seen him since, but I heard he died in ’72. Sumbitch! Hope he’s in hell!"

Chapter 4: Let Them Eat Cake
Marx believed that democratic government was essentially unviable in a capitalist society. The democratic regulation of life, he believed, could not be realized under constraints imposed by the necessities of profitable production. Marx was right. Generally speaking, most places of employment tend to lean toward the right of the democratic spectrum in order to get things done profitably. In many cases, one person has the final decision on how things will operate. These decisions may sometimes seem arbitrary or totalitarian in nature, but are often taken for the benefit of the company and, with any luck, for the benefit of the employee as well. Having said that, from time to time it is wise to ask employees’ opinions on certain matters and to make decisions with the benefit of having weighed all the alternatives. In this manner, the workplace will run more smoothly and productively and a greater sense of democratic involvement in the decision-making process will prevail. This keeps employees happy and, thus, one may avoid the introduction of Karl Marx posters glaring down at one from the walls of the workplace.
It was obvious to me that my assistant had not studied comparative politics at any time in his life and this was what had led us into difficulty. Had he done so, he would have learned that many revolutions occur due to the pangs inherent with the onset of hunger. Of course there may be underlying factors as well - the arbitrary prevention of water fights and subsequent removal of water coolers for example - but if the Okies and Dokies of this world have full stomachs, they are generally content. At the very least they are less likely to foment rebellion. Had my assistant explained the dangers of slippery floors in a repair facility -though anyone with a working brain cell should have realized these dangers - he could have avoided the first stirrings of discontent. Unfortunately, he had been too totalitarian and it was painfully obvious now that the removal of the tub of bubble gum had been the flash point of the whole affair and this was what was now keeping me at work and away from my own supper. The whole matter could have been avoided by the simple expedient of allowing Okie to retain a few pieces of bubble gum in his pockets while explaining to him the health hazards of exposing an entire tub of the stuff to the multitudinous insect life of central Arizona.
"Well, as I said Carl, I am not going to get rid of Jeff for being a bit harsh on you and Eddie. I have spoken to Jeff about this and am satisfied with his responses. You, on the other hand, could have called in sick until I returned. You could have stuck it out until you had an opportunity to discuss matters with me. You could even have tried to discuss things with Jeff himself or another member of staff. There are many things you could have done, but you chose to leave instead. I understand that you are averse to working in an environment, even for a short period of time, which may or may not have resembled your upbringing, but quitting is rather extreme don’t you think?"
"Mebbe, but I jes’ couldn’ take it workin’ fer him."
"Okay. Are you willing to return to work though? I can say with certainty that Jeff will not be on your case as he was when I was away."
"Yep."
"Good man! Knew I could count on you to do the right thing."
"S’long as Jeff’s gone, you gimme a $2.00 an hour raise and hold mah job open fer a month ‘til I try this other place. If ah don’ like it there, ah’ll come back here. If Jeff’s gone an’ I git a $2.00 an hour raise thet is." Okie smiled his toothless smile as though he was catching fish in a barrel. The look on his face told it all. We had no mechanics and he believed we were between a rock and a hard place. This be negotiatin’ time!
Well, I admit that this was a turn up of the plus fours! Right out of left field in fact! Yet, I couldn’t decide if Okie was trying to be shrewd or just being incredibly stupid. Utterly perplexed, I knew somehow there was more to this than met the eye. "I take it that you are working now?"
"Yep."
"May I ask where?"
"I ain’t tellin’."
"It wouldn’t be at Motor Cargo would it?"
"Now how in hell you know thet?" Okie was as dumbfounded as I had been moments before. "You readin’ my mind’re whet?"
"No, my first clue was the Motor Cargo uniform shirt you are wearing."
"Oh."
"Are they paying you well over there?"
"Same as here."
"Benefits the same?"
"Yep."
"Have a nice day."
"Huh?"
"The answer is no."
"Jes’ like thet. You ain’t gonna gimme whet ah want."
"Nope. Your ‘requests’ are tantamount to holding the company and me for ransom and I’ll have no part of it. You made a rather hasty decision to leave without thinking it through and if your pay and benefits are the same at Motor Cargo as they are here, then I’ll wish you the best of luck and no hard feelings. In actual fact, I have a couple of replacements lined up for your job as well as Eddie’s. Just make sure the benefits at Motor Cargo are the same as they are here. I don’t think they are you know. I keep getting their mechanics in here looking for work, so be warned. If you want your job back, I’ll hold it open until end of day tomorrow and that’s it. No raise and Jeff remains."
"Oh." Okie sported a rather forlorn look, which didn’t quite mask his previous look of triumph. "Thet don’ seem right though. Mah wife tol’ me thet a lotta times if you quit a comp’ny and git asked back like yer doin’ now you git more money when you’re hired back on agin."
"Your wife is incorrect."
"Naw, mah wife’s right. She allus is. Yous know where ah’m at. Gimme a call when you change yer mind. I ain’t changin’ mine."
Okie went home, as did I. Now we were playing the waiting game. Or, rather Okie was. I was indescribably busy.

Chapter 5: End Games
Three days later I received a call from Okie. "You an’ me we’re goin’ fer lunch. Ah’m buyin." This was more of a demand than an invitation.
"Sorry Carl, I can’t. I am indescribably busy and I simply haven’t the time to sit idly at a greasy spoon with you. I’m processing the paperwork for your replacement."
"You, you, you mean you hired someone?" His tone of voice altered from demanding to faltering.
"Indeed."
"Oh". Now there was definite note of disappointment.
"How’s things going for you at Motor Cargos?" I asked, knowing full well how things were going for him at Motor Cargo.
I held the phone away from my ear, as an audible increase in octave level wailed across the line. "Ah cain’t take it. Ah cain’t. You ain’t got no idea. Ah gotta fill out all kinds of paperwork with part numbers fer parts ah use. I keep getting in sheeit fer not fillin’ in paperwork right, they ain’t got no water out in the shop an’ this ain’t no shop. It’s a damn tin roof and there ain’t no fans’re nothin’. Ah have to use a computer to log sheeit in fer repairs and ah ain’t no good at thet. Hell you know thet. Yous did all thet fer me. An’, an’ an’ ah don’ git no sick time or paid holidays or nothin’. Ah gotta move trailers aroun’ the yard and mah back hurts since the accident still. An’ this place is such a mess if you slopped the floor a pig wouldn’ eat off it. This is the worst place ah ever worked at. An’ ah have to supply mah own air lines. That ain’t right."
The strains of dueling banjos began to hum in my subconscious. "Hmmm. Unfortunately I filled your job here so there isn’t much I can do. I have to ask though how it took so long for you to determine that Motor Cargo is less beneficent than you had initially been led to believe. You've been there a few days since our little chat."
"Whet does bennyficent mean?"
"It’s an adjective meaning ‘kind’ or ‘bountiful’."
"Oh. Well, ah got sick next day an’ took some time off which is how ah found out ah don’ git sick days here. Plus ah’s helpin’ Eddie out. He got into a car accident and had to go to the hospital so me and the wife were helpin’ out Eddie’s wife and sheeit."
"What about Jeff being here? What about the raise you wanted?"
"Oh hell. Thet ain’t nothin’" Okie’s tone became conciliatory. "We’s can work thet out me an’ Jeff. An’ benefits is better than money sometimes."
"Well Carl. As I said, I have no position open here. I can hardly rescind the job offer to the new mechanic. However, if he quits and returns to work at Motor Cargo then I’ll give you a call. Okay?"
"He come over from Motor Cargo?"
"Yep. He sho ‘nuff did" I replied. I replaced the telephone receiver into its cradle, leaned back in my chair and propped my feet up on the desk. Figured ah’d take fahve minits from bein’ indeescribably busy and enjoy life fer a bit.