Sample Sunday 2/26/12

Stand-Up Guy: Recruited

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I went in for a period of two, three hours at first, working with the bartenders. I started out cleaning up the glasses but I was paying attention, analyzing how to make the drinks. The Brandy Alexanders, the Tom Collins, the Whiskey Sours, the Martinis, the Zombies and all the rest of the stuff that was popular in them days. I learned it all and I loved it. The place held lots of people and was full of single women. I was eighteen or nineteen at the time. It was in the sixties and it was wide open, I had women lined up. At first, when I wasn’t making much money, I hustled the women. They used to put their names and phone numbers on napkins and wrap it around the glass for me. Sometimes I would go home with two or three girls. We’d have orgies, switch women, yeah. Six, eight, ten sometimes we had twelve people. Depended on where we went, what we were doing. The less guys the better. Sometimes I’d have four, five women a day, gorgeous women and they had a lot of money. Rich women from the club. Suits, cars, they’d buy for me. All these women were older than me, in their mid to late twenties. I was strong, I was healthy and I was good at what I did, you know. So they came back for more. I got spoiled at an early age."

US: http://www.amazon.com/Stand-Up-Guy-ebook/dp/B0068RPDF6/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1330230584&sr=8-1

UK: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Stand-Up-Guy-ebook/dp/B0068RPDF6/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1330316682&sr=1-1

Prologue - STAND-UP GUY - A True Crime Gangster Memoir

I was always good at the salesmanship of drugs, okay? I just had a knack for it and made  a lot of people a lot of money. I also had a knack for the bar business. I’d go into places that weren’t making money and I’d make money for them. I had a huge following and people loved me. Some people followed me for years and years, from place to place to place. Not when I went down to Florida too much but definitely in New York. A couple of people did come down to see me in Florida for business, you know, street business. That kind of business? Always.
 
What’s funny is that my grandfather had a street business too, in the old days. An installment business, which was before credit cards, that he ran out of the trunk of his car. If you wanted a coat or jewelry or anything he would get it for you and you would make payments like a credit card. He had certain sections that he worked, he worked the Bronx, he worked Brooklyn, you know. Out of the trunk of his car and he made lots of money. He had special customers, usually blacks, Hispanics and whites. That’s why I’m basically not prejudiced because I met these people and found out they were human beings. And my grandfather was never prejudiced because he did business with all of them. When he died most of his funeral was black and Hispanic. I mean, they came. He was good to their kids, used to bring them lollipops, stuff like that.
 
My grandfather wanted my father in the installment business but my father didn’t like it so it didn’t work out. I always wanted to be in that business because at an early age he used to take me along with him and I saw how it worked, how he did it. He had cards, each person was a card with little lines on it. He’d write down the payments and make his totals and my grandmother kept the books. They made a great living. He had a brand new car every year.  He used to take me and my brother every year and buy us a brand new wardrobe. Of course we were growing so we needed it but a new wardrobe and there would always be a suit involved. He’d buy me a new suit every year, yep. And I always had sports jackets and ties, stuff like that because my family went to a lot of events.
 
My grandfather never owned a house, he rented apartments. He never owned or rented a house. He was born in the Bronx and lived in Brooklyn. I always thought he was brought up in Brooklyn but my aunt told me that he was born in the Bronx and my father was born in the Bronx too. My grandfather never worked for anybody else as long as I knew. My two grandfathers never worked for anybody in those days. They worked on their own, had their own things. A little butcher shop for the one and the installment business for the other. My grandfather knew a bunch of Jewish gangsters, he was brought up with them. He was bought up in the Bronx so he knew, okay?
 
My aunt and uncle, my father’s sister and her husband, they don’t like me. They claim I aggravated my grandfather to death. They knew everything about my life, my life as a gangster. How could they not know? My name was in the freakin’ papers. My name was in the papers in Florida where all their Jewish friends were from when I got popped in Fort Lauderdale. And my name was in the papers quite a few times in New York too. At least two or three times.
 
My parents tried to talk me out of this life, sure, but I loved the lifestyle. They did think it was kind of exciting when I got my first bartendering gig though my father always said that this is all going to catch up with you at a later age because you work off the books. No social security. No retirement. And he was right. Being in the game I was in, with the bars and everything else, and I was a great bartender and a great club manager and I dedicated my life to every place that I worked, I got paid in cash. All the time. Some places I got paid every night. I demanded that, you know. I didn’t even get a checking account until I was fifty-five. Before that I paid all my bills with money orders. Never had a bank account. Money I put away, I’d stash with friends of mine that had businesses, in their safes, I hid it. I had a regular bank account when I was a kid but nothing later. Never. No checking account. No savings account. Everything I had was in other people’s names, so I’d give them the cash and they’d write a check out. My utilities were in one person’s name, my house was in another person’s name, so there was no paperwork on me except from when I got arrested. Other than that, no one even really knew my last name.
 
I should’ve went to college but I didn’t, I got involved in this mess. I could have been whatever I wanted to be. I could have been a doctor. I could have been a lawyer. It was all paid for, the money was there. My grandfather saved for years for my college education. He started a savings account the day I was born, September 19, 1944. By the time I was eighteen he had enough money in that savings account to pay for anything I wanted to do but I never even considered it.
 
When I had to leave New York I was running these clubs, The Gaslight and The Circus, both at the same time. I was making at least fifteen hundred a week between the two places. Fifteen hundred a week and I was broke because I was paying all these people off, people I owed at the time. And I was selling coke and I was still broke. Coke ruined me, using it, abusing it. So I left New York owing some people some money and when I got where I was going my main intentions were to try to hustle enough money and work my ass off and maybe score something to pay back the people that I owe. I’d lose sleep every night of the week because I don’t like owing people money. I don’t owe nobody nothing now. Nobody. If I borrowed money I paid it right back. It was just a small portion of my life that fucked me up with money. I mean I could have hustled some rich women I met but I didn’t, I let it go. My record now, you could check it out, is absolutely squeaky fucking clean. Nothing. Not even a traffic ticket. And that’s the way I want it, you know. 
 
So my main thing was to write this book because number one I thought it was kind of interesting. I did hang out with all these people. I did do all the things I said I did in this book. Everything’s true. And to tell you the truth, I got no other shots left. If the book hits I’ll be able to, maybe, pay these people off I owe and have a few left over for my retirement, that would be it. Let’s face it my life is almost over. I have maybe ten more years.

Stand-Up Guy

Amazon US: http://www.amazon.com/Stand-Up-Guy-ebook/dp/B0068RPDF6/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1330230584&sr=8-1

Amazon UK: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Stand-Up-Guy-ebook/dp/B0068RPDF6/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1332262694&sr=8-1

Nook: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/stand-up-guy-laurie-brown/1109393156?ean=2940013925977&itm=1&usri=stand-up+guy

Standing Up For The Rams

I'm very protective of my team. I know where they stand right now. I went to every home game last year. I watched every away game on TV. I'm well aware.

The other night was 40 cent wing night at Culpepper's, a local bar and grill type place here in St. Louis. Normally wing night is very popular and Culpepper's is packed both in the restaurant and at the bar where you pick up the to-go orders, but this night it was freezing outside, I think it was 14 degrees or something insane like that, and people were staying home. Not me though. I didn't want to cook that night.

So I walk in to pick up my order and there are two other people at the bar, a woman doing some sort of paperwork which seemed odd and a guy obviously waiting for his order wearing a Denver Broncos jacket. This makes me crazy. If you are from out of town and you are wearing your team's jacket, fine. But if you're waiting for an order at Culpepper's, on wing night, in icy cold weather where you have to walk carefully so you won't slip, you live here and you should be wearing a Rams jacket. Period.

So, I sidle up to the guy and say kind of sideways, "You know, we have an NFL team in this city too". He turns and he looks at me kind of sheepishly and says that yeah, he likes the Rams but they were so hard to watch and he really likes Tim Tebow and thus the jacket. He seems like a nice guy and he does have a point about the Rams being hard to watch but that does not excuse the jacket. So we start to talk about the team and how we're worried about Sam Bradford because he took such a beating this year and hope he's not been permanently psychologically damaged. We talk about what a treasure Steven Jackson is and will be. I plugged Craig Dahl because he's my favorite Ram. We talk about the Edward Jones Dome and where we like to sit and we agree that it's fun to sit in the end zone even though it seems like it wouldn't be. I tell him how I met Torry Holt and how nice he was to me and how we hugged. (Yep, I hugged Torry Holt.) We talked about the Rams, we talked about the Rams, we wondered where our wings were and we talked about the Rams some more.

Finally Steve the bartender appeared with our respective orders. As we made our way out the door and shuffled carefully to our cars I suggested he buy himself a Rams jacket and helpfully mentioned that they should be pretty cheap right now. He said he thought he might. We parted ways and I stepped cautiously the last few feet to my car. It was very cold but I felt warm because I had wings for dinner and felt I had brought a fan back into the fold.

Home by 9:30pm. Into pajamas. Had fun.

Apparently this is third in an unintentional series about St. Louis Mardi Gras. Last night we went to the night-time parade downtown. Some people are afraid of downtown St. Louis at night (that whole murder capital of the nation thing) but that's ridiculous when there's an event going on. There were plenty of cops. The crowd was about one-tenth the size of the Saturday parade and the parade itself was much shorter too which was actually nice. I caught some awesome beads including one magnificent strand with very large beads and a heavy resin medallion that had I missed the catch would have surely blackened my eye. The Shriners were back in their fez's and mini-cars, sometimes driving on two-wheels which alarms me. One of the Shriner's decided to forego the fez and had his hair in a dramatic red, white and blue Mohawk with lights embedded in it somehow. He stood out but not as much as the large, regal dog walking nobly along wearing a very real looking crown. The crowd parted to let this dog go by. There were full bars in tents on every block. We shared one $4 beer.

After the parade we were going to go party at the Lumiere Casino who had sponsored this parade. They promised showgirls and balloon boys (whatever they are) and green, gold and purple pizza. It was enticing but we decided to go elsewhere instead and ended up at Hodak's, a St. Louis fried chicken institution. (Roadfood people take note.) Hodak's is usually pretty busy but last night it was quiet although we were not the only people wearing beads there. I had the sticky wing dinner with a baked potato and applesauce and two glasses of Pinot Grigio from unknown origins. It was delicious. Mike had a beer and the Half A Golden Fried Chicken dinner which is their speciality. The chicken pieces are served on top of white bread. The bill before tip was $29.59.

We walked in the house at 9:30pm. Five minutes later we were both in our pajamas. Five minutes after that I was snuggled on the couch in front of the TV making my next move in Words With Friends with my friend Michelle. Michelle knew of my Fat Tuesday plans and I used the chat function to inform her that I was home, in my pjs and had fun. She wrote back "fun and early is good". Michelle was right. Fun and early is good.

Laissez Les Bon Temps Roulez!!!

Happy Fat Tuesday! It's time to have some fun!

It's the pinnacle of Mardi Gras season today. THE Fat Tuesday of Fat Tuesday. It's time to throw on some beads, put some Advil in your pocket and go out and have a good time. Here in St. Louis my husband Mike and I are swapping email trying to figure out exactly what we want to do. We're in agreement we want to go out. We're pretty sure we want to go to the "adult" parade downtown tonight. We're also pretty sure we can get drinks, at least beer, at that parade. Because that's how St. Louis rolls.

I spent two frightful years living in Utah and was saddened and depressed when I went to my first community event and there wasn't a single beer tent in sight. Ice cream, yes. Beer, no. I've NEVER been to ANY event in St. Louis where there wasn't a half-dozen beer tents. Boat show? Of course! Greek Festival? Duh. Oktoberfest? That's the whole point! True story: I watched the priest from our local parish gamble, red-faced, with money for money with a beer in his hand at the parish picnic. I immediately wanted to convert! The point is St. Louis is a party town and tonight is one of the biggest party nights of the year.

The trouble is, I'm a middle-aged party girl now. My back sort of hurts today. Do I really want to stand on a cold, cement sidewalk, watching a parade on a chilly night? Do I really want to get semi-drunk on a Tuesday? Can I eat a bucketful of crawdads without puking? Maybe we should make a quiet dinner reservation at a nice restaurant and have a single cocktail before the meal and say no butter or sour creme on our baked potatoes. We could wear our nice but comfortable clothes and we wouldn't dance any awkward rumbas on our way in or out. We would wake-up tomorrow headache and stomach-ache free. We would have nothing to repent for on Wednesday.

The thought of that makes me want to cry.

Hell no! I'm going to go out and party all night or at least until 10pm. I'm going to yell for beads until my throat is sore and then I'm going to drink beer to make it feel better. Look out crawdads I'm coming for you and I will dunk you in butter and hot sauce. I will repent tomorrow. And feel sort of crappy. And in the back of my foggy mind I will be looking forward to St. Patrick's Day.

Mardi Gras St. Louis

Mardi Gras in St. Louis is a moderate big deal. No, we're not New Orleans, but St. Louis likes to party almost as much. Saturday morning was the main Mardi Gras parade and even though the temp was hovering around 30, my husband Mike and I bundled up and headed downtown.

This was not our first Mardi Gras parade. We knew just where to park ($5) and just where to stand. The parade starts right across the street from Busch Stadium (home of the St. Louis Cardinals) and the first corner past is the best place to watch the festivities. We got there early and positioned ourselves behind a short man and his shorter daughter. Yes, begging for and catching beads is part of the main objective and you don't want to find yourself in the middle of a bunch of tall people. Across the street music was blasting and people were dancing. Most everyone was already wearing beads, boas, masks or hats. Across the way every time someone would walk by the crowd in any type of crown everyone would bow down. Some people were drinking and the beer and margarita tents were booming even though it was 10:30 in the morning. Even the various parade officials had beers in their hands. It was a fun crowd and everyone was happy and excited. About five minutes before the parade started a freight train came by on elevated tracks and when the engineer saw the crowd gathered he sounded the horn loud and long. The crowd cheered.

Then it was time. First up is always the motorcycles, a million of them, black leather clad people looking exactly like bikers should. They threw some beads and a baggie of beads landed right in my hand. I opened it up and there was a strand of green and a strand of gold and then a strand of purple with a medallion. Specialty beads...with medallions or made of peace signs or smiley faces or with any sort of liquor advertising are hot items. This biker thrown medallion was well-worn and for Busch Gardens in Tampa, Florida. Odd. (The year before a woman walking the route put a real pearl and gold necklace around my neck and then vanished.) The bikers passed and then came the floats. The parade theme was Famous Threesomes and the first float held the local team mascots: Fredbird (Cardinals), Rampage (Rams) and Louie (Blues). The crowd went nuts. Louie is a blue bear and he was wearing a Mardi Gras mask. Good job, Blues!

There were two different floats of Three Blind Mice. There was Three's Company with all dude Chrissys. There was Rub-A-Dub-Dub Three Men in a Tub. There was Huey, Dewey and Louie. There was no Three Stooges which seemed like an obvious choice to me. There were also floats that went by that either I couldn't figure out what they were representing or I wasn't paying attention because I was too busy trying to catch beads. At some points the beads come so fast and furious that you have to be on your game or you can easily get smacked in the face with some line-drive speed beads. Last year I had fun watching a young Japanese couple standing sort of behind us who had clearly wandered into this scene not knowing what the hell was going on. At first they were ducking the beads that came flying at them. Then Mike gave the woman a string of red beads and she took them graciously but then stood there holding them awkwardly. Her husband took a pic and she held them in her hands awhile longer before she put them around her neck. By the end of that parade they were into and both were wearing multiple strings of beads.

Saturday no one was showing their boobs for beads. It was way too cold for that. In fact, two hours into the parade and despite all the excitement grabbing beads and bopping to the music I was frozen. There were still floats lined up to hit the parade route as we made our way back to the car. We stopped briefly at one of the portable bead stands set up on the street but didn't buy any. We had enough beads. We needed food and coffee. We drove to Uncle Bill's. Uncle Bill's Pancakes and Cocktails the sign says but we didn't have any cocktails, just pancakes and hot coffee. I had taken off all my beads except for one string of blue and one string of gold - Rams colors. As we were leaving the restaurant I took those off and put them around the neck of a small boy wearing a Cardinals cap turned sideways. I wished him a Happy Mardi Gras and we went on our way.

Sample Sunday - Ebbets Field

"I was a Brooklyn Dodger fan and I went to games at Ebbets. My whole family was Dodger fans. Anybody that lived in Brooklyn or the vicinity was a Brooklyn Dodger Fan. Believe me, I was shocked when they moved. Everybody was shocked. Everybody."

Stand-Up Guy

US: http://www.amazon.com/Stand-Up-Guy-ebook/dp/B0068RPDF6/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1329604571&sr=8-1

UK: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Stand-Up-Guy-ebook/dp/B0068RPDF6/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1329607952&sr=1-1