Tonight, I abandoned my short lens digital camera and dug out my trusty Nikon EM 35mm with its long 200 mm telephoto.  Determined to get a hawk picture, I waited as storm clouds passed overhead, turning briefly red before darkness began fading the colors.  Then one of my hawks appeared, landing in the branches of the pinoak tree beside me.  I could not see her through the branches.  Shortly, another bigger hawk landed in full view on the highest branch of my tallest oak.  I pointed the camera and focused the lens.

Alas, the sky had already grown too dark for anything other than a blob of blurry gray.  It didn't matter.  I watched the hawk through my binoculars until it finally dive-bombed at something in my front yard and then disappeared into the darkness.

Tomorrow I try again.

http://www.ericwilder.com   http://energyissues.blogharbor.com http://gondwanapress.blogspot.com

This evening, just before dusk, Marilyn and I lazed by the pool behind my house, watching the sky as six hawks did an aerial dance in the mid-summer thermals.  The birds are large and gorgeous.  One landed on a high branch in a tree in my front yard.  I tried to record a movie with my digital camera, but quickly realized that my point and shoot Nikon is grossly inadequate for the task.  I'm resigned to buying a digital movie camera with a suitably long, telephoto lens.

http://www.ericwilder.com

Name of the Game is the opening short story in my first published collection of short stories by the same name.  The book is available at http://www.gondwanapress.com.

 

                                            NAME OF THE GAME

                                                               by

                                                         Eric Wilder

 

Rita would wait for me at the door of the building where she worked.  I would drive up close to the door and wait until she came out.  Our routine was always the same.  That day, a powder-blue Mercedes had taken my usual parking spot.  The car's anxious driver, a prepped-out lawyer type with moussed hair, turned halfway around in his bucket seat to watch Rita leave the office complex.

 

      "Who was that?”  I asked.

 

      Rita leaned across the seat to plant a sultry kiss full on my lips.  "I didn't see anyone."

 

            The man in the Mercedes watched us with interest and continued staring as we pulled away from the curb.

 

            "Today I want it hot and fast," Rita said, turning the rearview mirror and using it to touch up her lipstick.

 

            "Whatever.  How have you been?"

 

            Rita crossed her legs, revealing much more than a momentary peek at her shapely thighs.

 

            "Beyond irritation," she said.  "Russell came home late after leaving me alone with Jessica.  Ever try communicating with a blonde teen-aged cheerleader with tits bigger than her mom's."

 

            "What happened when Russell got home?"

 

            "Nothing, absolutely nothing.  I even paraded around in my stretch-lace teddy to show him what he was missing."

 

            Talk of Rita's husband always made me uncomfortable.  Sensing my discomfort, she leaned across the console and squeezed my leg.  It was late Autumn, a beautiful clear-blue day, and Rita’s grin was wicked when I braked hard to avoid a squirrel scurrying across the road.

 

            We barely spoke during the short distance to my apartment.  I found the parking lot empty and a spot near the stairs.  Just the way Rita liked it.  She had her arms around my neck almost before I shut the apartment door behind us.

 

            "Miss me?" she said.

 

            "You know I did."

 

            "Miss these?"

She unbuttoned her frocked blouse to the waist and cupped her breasts.  I traced a narrow path up her smooth belly with my fingers but Rita was having none of it.  Grabbing my wrist, she pulled me down the narrow hallway to the bedroom in back.

 

"Let's not waste it."  Releasing my hand beside the bed, she dropped her dress, slip, and bra in one practiced motion and fell back onto the covers.  "Now, I want it hard and fast."

 

            I had left the air conditioner on high before leaving for work that morning and the room was dark and cold.  Rita was already hot, immersed in all the foreplay she had needed during our torrid stroll from the front door.  For the next five minutes, she clawed painful Xs in my back, yanked handfuls of hair, moaned loudly, and squirmed like a woman possessed.  When we finished she rolled off the bed, went into the bathroom, and closed the door behind her, returning five minutes later, quite naked but with a can of hair spray in her hand.

 

            "Hurry," she said.  I have a prospective employee to interview at one."

 

            "But we just got here."

 

            "And did what we came to do.  Now be a sweetie.  You know my job is important to me."

 

            As I got out of bed and pulled on my pants, Rita returned to the bathroom to fix her hair.  This time she emerged looking ready for an important business meeting and tapped her shoe as she waited for me to knot my tie.  Grasping my hand when I finished, she squeezed it tightly and hurried me to the car.

 

            Because of lunch hour traffic, we found the return trip to her office much slower and Rita remained silent most of the way.  When we were almost there, she said, "I have a question and I need an answer."

 

            "Something wrong?"

 

            "Does there have to be?"

 

            "It's just the sound of your voice."

 

            Rita ignored my psychoanalysis, folded her arms and turned her knees toward the door.

 

            "Tell me.  What's the name of the game?"

 

            "Game?"

 

            "The one we're playing."

            I did not understand the question and paused before answering, "Infidelity, maybe?"

 

            Rita closed her eyes.  "This isn't a joke."

 

            A blaring horn distracted me from the unexpected direction our conversation had taken.  “Have I done something wrong?"

 

            "You've done everything just right and I've enjoyed every minute of it.  Cool drinks in smoky bars, peanut butter picnics in vacant lots and steamy sex in ways I love.  I'd just like to know what it all means to you."

 

            "Something exciting and very special.  I can't remember having so much fun since I went skinny dipping with the homecoming queen in the Principal's pool."

 

            Rita's strained smile flickered briefly.  "Now what?  It's almost winter and the pool is empty."

 

            "You're shooting over my head.  Is this about Russell?  Are you thinking of divorce?"

 

            "Russell's not the problem."

 

            "But isn't Russell part of the equation?  And Jessica?"

 

            "That's not what we're discussing here," Rita said, her voice rising.

 

            "Then please tell me what we are discussing."

 

            By now, Rita's demeanor had diminished from silent composure to barely suppressed rage and I still was not sure why.

 

            "Just let me off in front of the building," she said.

 

            I coasted into the slow lane and let several irritated motorists stream past on the left.  "First explain why you're angry with me."

 

            She had neither a frown nor a smile on her face, only the blank expression of muted frustration as she pointed at the curb in front of her building.

 

            Sounding deadly serious, she said, "Pull in and let me out.  I never play the game with someone who doesn't understand the rules.  You don't even know we're playing."

 

            She hurried across the busy street without a backwards glance.  When I phoned to apologize, she refused my call.

            Three days passed, and then a week, without a word from Rita.  Finally, no longer able to contain my curiosity and hurt feelings, I drove to our old rendezvous spot beside her building and parked at the curb.  From there I watched, aware of a sudden wave of deja vu as she walked out the door at exactly our usual time.  I quickly realized why.

 

            Even though she recognized my car as she hurried across the sidewalk, she did not look my way or acknowledge my presence.  Instead, she focused her smiling attention on a young man in a red Corvette as he opened the passenger door to let her in.  Once inside, she wrapped herself around him and administered a sultry kiss.  As they disappeared down the street, I watched him cast a curious glance in his rear-view mirror.

 

 

END

 

http://www.ericwilder.com

 

This is the wettest year in Oklahoma history, following on the tail end of a five-year drought.  Yes, we needed the rain but I am ready for a stretch of dry weather.  Yesterday, I put a picture of my house's rain gutter on the blog.  There are seven corn plants growing in the gutter and two of them already have sizeable ears of corn on them.

My dogs have houses but they also have a lean-to that they like lying under.  The cedar shavings beneath it are all soaked and moldy.  I noticed when Lucky and Patch both developed red, runny eyes.  Eyewash has taken care of their optical problems and this weekend, if it stays dry until then, I'm going to rake out the remainder of the shavings (Velvet has already gotten rid of most of it) and replace them with a fresh batch.

All is not bad and I'm looking forward to sinking my teeth into my own homegrown gutter corn.  Eat your heart out, gardeners of the world.

http://www.gondwanapress.com

We are on the way to record yearly rainfall in much of Oklahoma.  The most successive days without rain all year so far is seven, while we had one stretch of twenty straight days of rain.  The grass is green and flowers blooming.  Yesterday, I noticed that everything is so lush around my house that I have corn growing in my rain gutter.  One ear is almost ready to eat.

The corn seeds got into the gutter from the multitude of birds in my backyard.  Marilyn feeds them daily.  Here is a pic of the corn growing in my gutter, in case you don’t believe me.

http://www.ericwilder.com

Please check out my A Gathering of Diamonds book video on YouTube:

 

I was just updating my website http://www.ericwilder.com when I realized that it is Friday the 13th.  I'm not frightened because how could things get any worse than waking up last Tuesday to a flooded living room?  Today, Oklahoma exceeded it's normal annual rainfall and there is a storm approaching the City as I write this that is reportedly bigger than Tuesday's storm.  Maybe I should find some wood to knock on because, hey, it is Friday the 13th.

Please check out my website’s new video page featuring trailers from my books.  Also, there is a vid I did of the book signing that I had last month at Kang's Asian Bistro.

http://www.gondwanapress.com

I was up late last night making final changes on a video titled Katrina’s Blues.  The video is a slideshow of New Orleans, before, during and after Hurricane Katrina and features the poignant lyrics of Randy Newman’s Louisiana 1927.  As if to herald the production, Oklahoma’s weather grew rainy as I turned off the last light and went to sleep.

 

Heavy rain continued throughout the night.  This morning, two inches of water awaited me as I walked onto my sunken living room floor.  The water had pooled up from six or seven inches of standing water in my sloping back yard, high enough to flood my living room.  When I called a water damage-restoration company to help me, I learned that my insurance does not cover flood damage.

 

Unlike many of the residents of New Orleans, I didn’t suffer a complete loss, in my case probably only a few thousand dollars or so (yes, even a little water can do lots of damage).  Still, it gives me pause to consider the harm done by hurricanes Katrina and Rita and what hardships the inhabitants of New Orleans endured and continue to endure almost a year and a half later.

 

Please check out my video on YouTube and say a prayer for the people of south Louisiana.  While you’re at it, you might add a few words for all the people ravished by recent and continuing flooding in Texas, Oklahoma and Kansas, and many of the farmers that have lost all their crops this year.

 

http://www.ericwilder.com

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SnzY_Kmz0Uc 

Please check out my newest video for my book Prairie Sunset.

http://www.livevideo.com/video/299CEDC7531E4E0AB2DD7075DFCC28C2/prairie-sunset-book-video.aspx

Earlier this month, I had a book signing for my new murder mystery Big Easy.  It was on the patio of Kang’s Asian Bistro in Edmond, here in Oklahoma, and about a hundred people attended.  Here is a link to the video on YouTube.  Please check it out.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JL-E9a5i-rw 

Growing up in Vivian, days ran the gamut from boring to even more boring.  Nothing ever seemed to happen much in the sleepy bayou town.  At least that's how we excitement-hungry teens usually felt.  I recall only one murder in Vivian - maybe the only one ever.  It involved the parents of one of my high school classmates.  The mother was going out every night to Mrs. Ray's, one of the local honky tonks, and carousing until the wee hours.  Supposedly, when her husband found her undies in the glove compartment of their car he went berserk and killed her with a ball peen hammer.

He tossed the murder weapon into the Myrtis Mill Pond (not a smart move as the pond is less than ten feet deep.)  When confronted, he readily confessed the killing.

The Myrtis Mill Pond lies on the west side of town, about five miles from the Texas border, and became an important destination for Vivianites, on dates with little else to see or do.  Whenever I visit, I have to pass the location, and my psyche never fails to overflow with poignant memories.

The pond plays an important role in my short story Southern Fried Murder.

P.S. – The sheriff and his deputy in Southern Fried Murder became the models for the sheriff and deputy in my first novel Ghost of a Chance.  For those of you that may have missed it, here is a link to the YouTube video for Ghost.  While there, please check out my other book trailer videos.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QdOBGlCBVGc

Here is a link to my new trailer for Ghost of a Chance.  Please check it out.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QdOBGlCBVGc 

Immortal song stylist Billy Holiday is credited with writing and performing the first anti-racist song called Strange Fruit.  The song is about lynching, more particularly the lynching of black men, sometimes in the south, but not always.  This haunting song is still as powerful as it was during its first performance.  Here is a link to a YouTube video (mostly audio).  Please check it out.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bXdnD39GYVU

http://www.ericwilder.com

Here is a link to the book trailer for A Gathering of Diamonds, soon to be available in hard cover.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3DLdvE6prJ0

I believe in fantasy.

As I mentioned in my last post, my camera is fritzing.  Here are a few pics that I took of the full moon the other night.  They turned out rather strange and I thought I would share them with you.

   

Here is the link to my Monday book signing video at Kang’s (great place) in Edmond, OK.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JL-E9a5i-rw

After working on some little gas wells in Noble County today, I had lunch at the Kumback Café in Perry.  The little café is across the street from the county courthouse, the centerpiece of the town square.  Many if not most of the shops and stores are closed – lack of business I suppose.  It is a pity because the little town has the ambience and uniqueness of such places as Eureka Springs, Arkansas and Branson, Missouri.

 

I digress.  The Kumback Café, I learned, started business in 1926 and has had only three owners.  I had the barbecue platter (ribs, brisket, and Polish sausage).  The baked beans were wonderful and the potato salad the best I have ever tasted.  I am not kidding!

 

Full beyond the point of bursting, I was unable to resist one of the twelve different kinds of homemade pie.  I had butterscotch pie.  Matt, the person with me had strawberry.  His looked as good as mine tasted but he didn’t offer to share.  Come to think of it neither did I.

 

My digital camera malfunctioned so I have no pics to show you.  That’s all right because I’ll be back!  Meantime, here’s a link to my Monday booksigning at Kang’s in Edmond, OK.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JL-E9a5i-rw

 

Earlier this year I posted a story called Summer of Bologna, about my misadventures at geology summer field camp in Arkansas.  As I read through the story again tonight, I remembered a couple of other things that happened to me that summer.  Although funny now, they were not so funny then.

 

The man that taught the course, Dr. D, had brought along his wife and two children, and his two-year-old son Tommy was quite a handful.  You may remember my mapping partner Roy.  Our friendship went from good, to bad, to even worse before finally turning in the right direction.  We were friends again by the end of our project and had borrowed the D’s tiny barbecue pit to grill a couple of steaks.  It was the weekend; we had time off and a few extra bucks to purchase steaks, bakes and two six-packs of beer in a plastic cooler.

 

Dr. D had offered the use of his barbecue pit with the proviso that we would return it cleaner than we got it.  No problem, we thought.  That was before we began drinking beer and eating watermelon – yes we had also purchased a watermelon and had chilled it to perfection in the very chilly White River.

 

Our beer was half gone by the time we had eaten our steaks and started on the icy watermelon.  It was about then that Dr. Ds son Tommy came running down the stairs.  Feeling giddy, Roy spat a watermelon seed at him and it stuck on his bare chest.  Maybe it doesn’t sound so funny now, but Roy and I had drunk just enough beer to think so.  Between hysterical laughter, we both began spitting seeds at the kid.

 

At first, Tommy joined in the joke but soon realized that he was the butt of it.  Covered with sticky watermelon seeds, he rushed back up the stairs, wailing like a banshee as he did.  He soon returned with Dr. D.  The Professor was not happy.

 

“Having a good time, boys?” he asked.

 

Dr. D’s question sent us both into a belly-rolling fit of laughter.  Grabbing his tattle-tale kid by the hand, Dr. D did an angry about face and huffed away up the stairs.  Too inebriated to clean the barbecue pit, we left it outside with the intention of cleaning it the next day.  It rained that night, making a mess of the little stove.  Tommy found it the next morning before Roy and I, getting soot and barbecue sauce all over his best Sunday church clothes.

 

Our good grades were already pretty much beyond hope.  That is true, but one more incident occurred the last week of field camp that further sealed my fate.  I had a cheap typewriter and I was using it to prepare my final report.  It was so hot in the basement that I took the machine outside to a picnic table.  After trying unsuccessfully to correctly seat the ribbon, I ripped it off the reel and threw it down the hill.  Yes, you got it.  Tommy found the ribbon.  Covered with ink and wrapped in the inky tape, he was in a full-blown crying snit when he finally found his father.

 

Well, I passed the course anyway, albeit with a cee.  Years later, I realize none of this story so.

http://www.ericwilder.com

Please check out the Big Easy video on YouTube.  Just follow the link below.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gqpIqaHJUBE 

Kang's Asian Kitchen and Eric Wilder are hosting a book signing of Wilder's latest thriller, Big Easy. Set in Post-Katrina New Orleans, the book features a spicy taste of the venerable city.   more »

All the recent rainy weather in Oklahoma has produced some spectacular cloud formations.  Here are a couple.

http://www.ericwilder.com  http://www.gondwanapress.com 

 

Eric will be signing his new book Big Easy, Monday, June 4th at Kang’s in Edmond, Oklahoma.  Please join us. http://www.ericwilder.com  http://www.gondwanapress.com

Caddo Lake, in East Texas and Northwest Louisiana, is the location of Eric Wilder's new novel, Ghost of a Chance. Protagonist Buck McDivit leaves his home in Oklahoma and travels to East Texas. Someone has murdered his newly found Aunt Emma Fitzgerald. Buck is apparently the sole heir to Fitzgerald Island, and the marina and fishing lodge on it. Here is an excerpt from Ghost, describing what Buck saw when he first arrived:

"James T. "Buck" McDivit had come to Texas for answers. What he found was a giant lake amid a maze of vines, creepers and lily pads. A place that seemed more like Louisiana than Texas. He quickly realized it was different from both states. Cypress trees grew in abundance, both in the water and out, and Spanish moss, wafting in slow-motion waves, hung from their limbs, caressing the lake's coffee-colored surface. Only the head of a slow-swimming snake disrupted the lake's tranquility.

East Texas is a place far different from Buck's own home on the flat plains of central Oklahoma – a mysterious locale that seemed like a virtual botanical garden replete with subtropical greenery and a climate to match. Buck felt a thousand miles from home.

Interstate highway, replaced by rural Texas blacktop, had long since disappeared in his rearview mirror. Untended hollyhocks, blooming in lavender flower falls that saturated humid air with their cloying fragrances, grew wild beside the road. Damp pathways, none leading anywhere in particular, pierced the tangle of vegetation as a flock of cattle egrets winged high overhead.

Egrets weren't the only wildlife in abundance, nor were oak, cypress and hollyhock the only plants bordering the road. Cascades of blue impatiens, crimson-blossomed rosebushes and clumps of green willow painted the terrain from a diverse palette of color.”

East Texas is indeed an exotic and mysterious area. Buck meets Pearl and Raymond Johnson, caretakers of Fitzgerald Marina, and their two sons, Ray and Wiley. He soon learns that someone has designs on the islands and is intent upon wresting it from him. Could it be relentless land developer Hogg Nation? Maybe it's Colonel Clayton Richardson, bank and ultra-wealthy plantation owner that has a mortgage on the island. Possibly it's Jefferson Travis, racist judge that leads the New Southern Right, a local hate group, or Bones Malone, amateur archeologist and relic hunter, and former lover of Emma Fitzgerald. And, there are the two recently released recidivists, Deacon John and Humpback. These skinheads are after lost Confederate gold from a sunken riverboat and don't care who they have to kill to find it.

Buck meets beautiful Lila Richardson, local antiquities expert and daughter of Clayton Richardson, and is instantly smitten. Is she as complicit as her father and racist uncle, Judge Jefferson Travis? Can Buck really trust her?

Many interesting characters inhabit Fitzgerald Island and the touristy village of Deception. Will Buck get the girl? Will he save the island? Will he save himself? Read Ghost of a Chance and find out. It is available at many places on the web and at http://www.gondwanapress.com .

I am hesitant to say that rain has plagued central Oklahoma for the past two months.  This year, we have already had more than 14" of rainfall in Edmond.  Last year, we were in the throes of a world-class drought.  Still, toadstools are popping up in my front yard, joined by mold, mildew and giant mosquitoes.

It's not all bad.  Tonight, I saw something I've seen only once or twice, and then only in the tropics:  strange lights.  At dusk, the sky looked like something from a filter-crazy Adobe Photoshop artist, high on hallucigenic drugs.  The colors were all violets, mauves and strange shades of blue.  I took a few pics with my digital camera, but I will be surprised to see in pixels what I saw tonight.  The sky, in short, was quiet spectacular, and it reminded me of my hippy days in the sixties, this time without the pot and LSD.

http://www.gondwanapress.com  http://www.ericwilder.com

For those of you that follow this blog, you know everything about the subsurface interests me.  The New Madrid Fault caused the mighty Mississippi River to change its direction from south to north for a day or so.  Legend says that it was responsible for creating Caddo Lake in northwest Louisiana and east Texas.  If a quake of the same magnitude occurred today, it would result in death and devastation beyond what anyone in this country has ever experienced.  http://www.ericwilder.com

Source of Major Earthquakes Discovered Beneath U.S. Heartland - Yahoo! News

Here is a pic I took of my cousin Skip and his wife Connie during a 1998 trip.

 http://www.gondwanapress.com  http://www.ericwilder.com

The downtown Oklahoma City annual art's festival, now going through Sunday, started out as a great idea.  Years ago, when the City held the event in front of the courthouse, they reserved space for ticky-tacky artists and craftspeople that sold things like cedar bird houses, wind chimes and ornamental belt buckles.  It always seemed there were more people browsing this part of the show than the "fine" art booths across the street.

The ticky-tack portion of the old Art's Festival was a little like exploring a thrift store.  You never knew what treasure you might find.  And there was food to taste.  My favorite, and just about everyone else's, was the Indian Taco, a treat that was available no where else in the world.

Now, the Festival has moved down the street and the ticky-tacky artists and craftspeople are gone.  Only the "fine" art remains and it is pretty much the same, year-after-year.  Still, there is the food court which offers a little taste of just about every restaurant in OKC.  Everyone's favorite, though, remains the Indian Taco, still around after all these years.

Next weekend is the Edmond Art's Festival, just up the street.  Growing larger every year, this event still offers a little ticky-tack.  The best ticky-tack festival of all, however, is the Paseo Arts Festival held in May.  As for the festival in downtown OKC, I say bring back the ticky-tack.

http://www.ericwilder.com  http://www.gondwanapress.com

   

http://www.gondwanapress.com  http://www.ericwilder.com

My daughter Kate turned 14 today and she, Marilyn and I celebrated at Junior’s.  Junior’s is a nightclub and restaurant in the basement of Oklahoma City’s Oil Center.  Two books written after the Penn Square Bank debacle of the 80s, Belly Up and Funny Money both immortalized Junior’s.

Junior Simon opened the restaurant in the 70s as an exclusive club for the City’s wealthy and newly-rich oil millionaires.  His menu consisted of steak, chicken or lobster.  His food was always expensive but he always divided the bill between food and drinks.  You guessed it.  Drinks always cost more than dinner.

Junior Simon was one of the best persons that I’ve ever met.  After the oil bust, I was left dead broke and still owing Junior more than $3000.

“Junior,” I told him.  “I’m broke and I don’t have a pot to pee in, but if you’ll bear with me, I’ll pay you back, I promise.”

“Eric, I know you will,” he said, giving my shoulder a fatherly pat.

Yes, I finally paid Junior back, a hundred bucks at a time.  Still, I knew that if I had never given him a penny, he would have forgiven me just as I’m sure that he did many of his customers not as fortunate as I.

I have enough stories about Junior’s and my adventures there over the years to fill a fairly thick book.  I knew, or know, all the players in Funny Money and Belly Up personally.  Hell! I was a player in the last oil boom and a victim in the last oil bust.  Yes, there are stories, untold stories, that are almost unbelievable, even to myself, even to myself and I lived them.

Well, tonight Kate, Marilyn and I revisited the scene of the crime and here are a few pics from the visit.

http://www.gondwanapress.com  http://www.ericwilder.com

 

 

What a difference a year makes.  This time last year, we were in the midst of a five year drought and had less than 4” of rain.  We had already had almost 13” this morning and it poured hard and heavy all day long.  Hey, I’m glad that I cut my grass this weekend.

http://www.ericwilder.com  http://www.gondwanapress.com

http://www.gondwanapress.com  http://www.ericwilder.com