fun read

Hulk and the NFL

STEVE BIERSDORF

Sports talkers fixated on Hulk for a time, which is to say they obsessed about him. Which is to say that all day and late into the evening, turn on the TV and Hulk’s prospects as a professional football player were being contemplated, conjectured, mulled, kneaded, pulverized, tenderized, or bitterly disputed. To intrigued and fascinated conjecturers the subject of Hulk ranging from “good stuff” to “great stuff, compelling stuff, outstanding stuff,” even “amazing stuff,” any kind of stuff putting a capper on the segment before going to commercial. When Hulk became part of the daily sports lexicon he was hard to quit, a nagging, ringing addiction, Hulk the equivalent of two or three packs of cigarettes a day, the subject of Hulk chain-smoked from pre-dawn until late into the night on sports talk programs.

A rumor began, more than likely started by a producer of one of these sports talk programs, out of fresh material, nothing new or breaking, in the dead zone following the previous scandal with nothing probative on the horizon, the middle of baseball season and not far along enough yet for pennant races, past the conclusions of the NBA and NHL seasons and weeks after the NFL draft, weeks before training camp. Everyone in agreement Hulk would make an amazing football player, the conjecture centering on where Hulk would play. Quarterback was out of the question. Or was it? He might have a cannon for an arm, and he could nullify any team’s pass rush. Imagine, you might not even need blockers with Hulk at QB, line up with a center and nine receivers. Hulk would set the West Coast Offense back a hundred years. Why not Hulk as fullback, who couldn’t he block? Opening holes for the team’s tailback to run through, but then why not give the football to Hulk and let him run over anyone foolish enough to try and bring him down? Or Hulk on defense. How about at nose tackle? Forget about running the football against any defense with Hulk anchoring the nose. And how much salary could he command? Imagine the signing bonus, the guaranteed money. Worthy of Croesus, or that modern-day Croesus, Jeff Bezos.

Turn on ESPN and it was Hulk all the time. It got so sports bars began sponsoring drinking games, turn on ESPN and drink whenever they say Hulk, beers served with shot glasses for these occasions and Hulk to thank for brisk bar sales, Hulk also to thank for a spike in summer OWIs.

And how it snowballed from there, someone in player personnel from one team assuming these sports talkers had gotten the rumor from someone in player personnel from another team, possibly a division rival. The focus turned to which team would take the plunge, NFL insiders probing the front offices of various teams and the New York Jets was to be the consensus “best fit,” ample room under the salary cap, a major media market, holes along their defensive front, no running game to speak of, and question marks at the quarterback position. The rumor propagating like snails in a fish tank, after the requisite no comment from the team’s coach and front office, from the general manager and director of pro player personnel on down to the PR flaks, nobody confirming or denying the rumor, by not denying it confirming it in the minds of the many.

Until early on into training camp, a late July morning and the Jets arranging a scrimmage to see exactly what Hulk could do, how he’d fit in, a closed scrimmage with no media until the Jets could get a handle on what they were dealing with.

Hulk lined up at nose tackle, Hulk the only player on the field not in helmet and pads. Hulk shirtless and barefoot in stretch pants past the knee like culottes from a big-and-tall men’s store, Hulk like a big green cartoon in the middle of the defensive front, a man playing with puffy children. Hulk down in a three-point stance, the quarterback barking signals, the ball snapped, the center surging into Hulk as though to move him off the line of scrimmage.

With his large right hand Hulk grabbing a handful of the center’s jersey and front of his pads, pivoting on his back foot as he tossed the center effortlessly behind him, the 300-pound center like a missile fired diagonally across the field and crashing into several tubs of Gatorade, a Gatorade explosion, a tsunami of red Gatorade.

A few holy shits, a Jesus, and several players doubled over, gasping, unable to inhale enough to maintain laughing so hard. They would recall the sound of the big center projectile whistling by, speculating that if he hadn’t been obstructed he might have broken the sound barrier. Said one player: “From when he turned and flung him, when Hulk released the guy from his hand to when the guy slammed into the Gatorade seemed like it was instantaneous. And we’re talking about a distance of 30 to 40 yards and a 300-pound offensive lineman.” 

Before he could say it was fun while it lasted it was over, Hulk’s professional football career relegated to a single play in a training camp scrimmage. The NFL needed a legitimate reason why Hulk couldn’t play other than he was too powerful, and so gamma radiation was quickly added to the league’s list of banned substances.   

Trixie

STEVE BIERSDORF

Trixie’s Mani Pedis is a reality show with local sway, Trixie being the star, her nail salon here in the ‘burb with the rest of us plain folk. Everyone around here loves the show, proud as we all are of the local affiliation. I keep expecting to recognize one of her clients, women exclusively, they sit in a chair and Trixie does the manicure or the pedicure while they kvetch. About traffic, weather, bills, their health, their significant others, kids, jobs, the price of things, celebrities, politics, religion, fabric, food, air travel, fashion, hygiene. Sometimes the cameras follow her clients back to their cushy lives and they have beautiful homes, drive nice cars, have good jobs or they don’t work because they can not to, but there’s still plenty to repine about. Like perfection is still a reasonable expectation.

Trixie is an artist. Her nails are exotic, playful, colorful blends, sometimes with little logos or glittery or with French tips or tips of distinct colors sprinkled with diamond dust, a Trixie invention. When Trixie’s cuticles are dry, she brushes them with polish she keeps in the center console of her jeep.

Trixie tries to get her clients to hold their hands still so she can work her magic. The women need to lay their hands flat on a portable table so she can apply the gel polish. Keeping their hands still is problematic for her clients, they’re fidgety and distracted, which upsets and frustrates Trixie. To the point where it’s really fucking with her humanity. 

Cell phones are another problem. Trixie’s on a tight schedule, but the women take calls or stop to respond to texts and Trixie gets behind and has to rush. Sometimes the women are short with her. I wonder if the show’s producers tell the clients to be intentionally difficult, create a little tension, makes for more interesting viewing. Her clients must watch the show, especially if they’re on. They must see the mockumentary-style kvetching Trixie does with the camera. And yet they persist. 

Sometimes after they leave Trixie holds her osteoarthritic left hand. Sometimes her hand hurts so much she goes into a janitor’s closet and cries. She turns away from the camera. I can see the heaving of her shoulders and when she’s done, when it’s time to compose herself, she dabs beneath her eyes with a tissue to wipe away eyeliner trickles or smears. On one episode she goes to a hand specialist. The hand specialist prescribes a hand cream and unrestrictive bandage. Trixie doesn’t try the hand cream because it’s a free sample and otherwise expensive, and she’s concerned that if she uses it she’ll become dependent on it and her insurance doesn’t cover the scrip. She has private insurance. Her annual deductible is $16,000, so she pays out of pocket for everything, visits, prescriptions, consultations, treatment. If the manufacturers of this cream were on top of their game, they’d give her a free supply to promote their product, unless they’re concerned it might be ineffective in front of several million viewers.

Abruptly, Trixie decides to move on, though maybe not abrupt to anyone paying attention. The show’s a hit, and with her name recognition Trixie wants to franchise her nails business. Because of her painfully arthritic left hand she can’t do it anymore. There are legal repercussions. They play out on her show, interesting in a conflict-of-interest kind of way. The Trixie’s Mani Pedis executive producer calls Trixie into her office and tells her she can’t do this. She won’t be able to use the name of the show or the logo. Trixie listens, crossing her legs, nodding pensively, cucumber cool. The Trixie’s Mani Pedis executive producer smiles tensely before laying out her case, expecting defiance. When the meeting ends and there’s been no outward resistance, the executive producer is pleased, walking around her desk and extends her hand and arm straight out and they shake hands.

Later in the same episode Trixie meets with an attorney, a referral from one of her well-connected clients. The attorney is an older paisano, mid-sixties with slammed-back hair, hyperactively thin. He seems shell-shocked to be meeting her, at being on a reality show. He has a manila folder on his desk. He asks questions as he flips through a document. He sits back in his creaky leather chair and turns devil’s advocate, grinning confrontationally. Is she sure she’s got the stomach for this? It could get ugly. She’s famous now, she’s a reality TV star. Why mess with success? He has big glasses that catch the backlighting and the glare obscures his eyes, giving him a zany look, zany or devilish. He ignores her answers and meanders off topic. He tells Trixie he’d have retired if it weren’t for his fucking kids and their fucking student loans. He pushes a button on the phone on his desk and asks for two bottled waters. A pear-shaped woman shows up a moment later and hurriedly sets the bottled waters down on his desk and leaves, careful to keep her back to the camera, terrified of it.

Okay, so here’s what I think, he says. The TV show, production company, studio, whatever, they’re full of shit. It’s your name, your business. It was an established business before they came along. Did the TV show enhance your business? Sure. So what? They can go after some of what you make selling the franchises, licensing your methods and any proprietary products and whatever. If they do we’ll go viral, make them out to be a greedy entertainment conglomerate bullying a small business entrepreneur and woman to boot. You’re a sympathetic figure. You’re a person people feel like they know. People like you, not the production company. They’ll be sensitive to public opinion, mostly because their advertisers are.

Trixie smiles gratefully. The attorney holds up his hands with a cocky grin and his big gleaming glasses.

The Trixie’s Mani Pedis producers meet with their attorneys. Their attorneys look young to be established attorneys. They look like actors playing attorneys. The TV show’s attorneys banter back and forth like the producers aren’t there and conclude that the TV show might get a percentage of Trixie’s franchise profits, but it isn’t likely the TV show can prevent her from moving ahead with her plans. There’s no relevant language in her contract. The possibility of Trixie franchising her business was never anticipated, much less safeguarded against. Filing injunctions or bringing an action could be interpreted as restraint of trade. Trixie could counter-sue and have a compelling argument.

The executive producer glares at them. Isn’t that their job? Isn’t that what they’re paid for? To anticipate every contingency? Having iron-clad contracts to prevent this sort of thing from happening? Shouldn’t they have had broader language that would have precluded Trixie from doing this? Isn’t that what attorneys are for? To anticipate bad things happening? 

The show’s attorneys arrange a meet with Trixie’s attorney. The show’s three kid attorneys on one side of a conference table with a big window with a cityscape view behind them, Trixie’s attorney on the other, choosing a seat near the entrance. The two flanking attorneys have opened laptops in front of them, Trixie’s attorney has nothing, no briefcase or satchel or attaché, not even a notepad. He crosses his legs, liver-spotted hands resting calmly in his lap. After exchanging pleasantries they get right to it.

Your client will have to share her profits from franchising her business, that’s a given, says the kid attorney in the middle. The TV show will be her silent partner, siphoning off re-investable profits while she’s trying to get the expansion off the ground. Without the show, her brand will depreciate. There won’t be any syndication of the reruns. The show would rather keep going. Ratings are strong. The show has a following. They’re willing to revisit Trixie’s compensation. The smart move is for her to renegotiate rather than move ahead with her expansion plans. No one can argue Trixie’s Mani Pedis hasn’t enhanced her brand. That’s an easy case to make. Franchising wouldn’t be possible without the show.

Trixie’s attorney listens with his confrontational grin and big glasses that catch the backlighting and corresponding glare where his eyes would be, zany-looking as all get out. Fuck off, he says, grinning expansively. Trixie’s quitting. Three more episodes and her contract is up and she’s under no obligation to continue. He stands, smoothing his trousers, buttoning the top button of his suit coat and departing. The kid attorneys sit in silence for a half-minute before they go to commercial.

On the last show Trixie’s having lunch with her boyfriend, then drinks with a friend/client, there’s a bon voyage celebration at her store, balloons and champagne and cake. At the end, out in the parking lot with a sunset beyond trees and shadowy bungalows in the working-class neighborhood where her store is, Trixie takes off the thumb bandage, carefully, and throws it in a dumpster, turning to beam at the camera a last time.

Rackheads

STEVE BIERSDORF

Hunting licenses are down again, despite the DNR’s insistence that the whitetail population is as robust as ever. They release data to the local newspapers and media outlets, and there are articles to spur the harvest. Whitetail deer have been migrating to the suburbs to avoid the harvest and traffic accidents are on the upswing.

Mr. Dixon is back for two more snowmobiles. He writes a check, the idea that he would need to finance the purchase is comedic, never mention financing options to him unless zero percent is available. When Mr. Dixon arrives for his new Ski-Doos, the owner is there for the occasion and the GM, they make sure he feels sufficiently fawned over, Mr. Dixon magnanimous enough to spare them a few moments. It’s a sign of respect if Mr. Dixon takes the time to jaw with you on the showroom floor, in full view of everyone. The GM gives Mr. Dixon our very best price and checks on the prep of his machines. We make very little money when Mr. Dixon buys something. When he grinds us on price, we appreciate this firsthand opportunity to negotiate with a fabulously wealthy, highly successful businessman and cheap fuck that he is, he’ll take his business elsewhere if we don’t meet his price. Where he spends his money and who he does business with is an exclusive club. We always comment on how “down to earth” or “cool” he is when he blows through and graces us with his unprofitable business. Mr. Dixon isn’t a person who likes to “fiddle-fuck around,” like the GM says, and he appreciates that we respect how valuable his time is, because he is the sun and we are blades of grass.       

Deer farms stocked with genetically enhanced male deer, bucks with freakish racks of antlers, if you hunt deer this is the ultimate prestige that you stuff and mount for posterity. Used to be if you shot an 8-point buck people were impressed. If you buy a genetically-enhanced deer you can set it loose somewhere, shoot it and have yourself a 16- or 20-pointer, mount that shit over your fireplace and invite your homies over to ooh and ah. The better the deer farm’s product the more points per rack, farms with the pricier deer buying semen, ova and embryos from Mr. Dixon who sits atop this food chain, the unrivaled king of deer eugenics. Mr. Dixon uses only the best bloodlines of whitetail doe or buck, including superstars in whitetail breeder lore like Rumpelstiltskin (23-pointer), Superseed (28-pointer), Goldeneye, 747, Deerstar, legends all, residents of Mr. Dixon’s own deer farm. The big money is in their semen.

The success of his eugenics business spawned a subsidiary manufacturing mechanical deer, robot decoys. His sole customer is the DNR and he is their sole supplier. The DNR places these robot decoys in the woods along country trunk highways to northern woods hunting destinations, to coax hunters driving by into taking a shot, which is a big fine. As the company slogan asks, who can resist a trophy buck? The deer are available in different poses and are lifelike (although only their ears and tails move), encased in actual deer hides with a dry preservative, tanning to make the hide last longer is an extra $200.

Knowing Mr. Dixon, having him as a customer gives us a glimpse from the penthouse. It’s as close as we’ll get, unless we win the lottery, which we don’t expect to but don’t entirely rule out. Even if we don’t make any money on him, and I mean any, not a red cent or copper one. He’s royalty here in whitetail country, where it’s all about the rack.

Because imagining the absolute worst-case scenario is my default setting

STEVE BIERSDORF

Beach and the Gulf of Mexico on this side of the island, waterways on the other, walled off by an impenetrable mangrove thicket infested with things that bite and constrict, uncompromising, vicious, camouflaged things. I see how the island could be taken, overrun then fortified with only the beach side to defend. Not much potential for resistance or insurgency here, where aggression is getting up at sunrise to find the good shells before anyone else does. The local police cruise the beach in jeeps, looking for open containers or enough nudity to offend public decency statutes.

In quick succession take out the local cell tower wherever it is, inland somewhere, easy to find because its exact location can be googled, detonate the concrete stanchions that prop up the causeway so it buckles and keels over into the bay. There aren’t two, the only way on or off the island if you’re driving. An amphibious assault from the ocean in the new moon cycle, storm the condos and resorts, evacuate the residents top floor to lobby, set up MANPADS with SAMs on the roofs of the taller complexes, heat-seekers.

I’m well acquainted with the view from the balcony, the beach and ocean and our building’s identical twin across the way, its pool, green tennis courts and driveway on the grounds in between. Almost straight down to the crown of a several-stories-tall royal palm, with its full head of yellowish fronds and branchless beneath, fronds like dying plants in a pottered vase, its trunk like a cylindrical sculpture hewn by the elements, steady inbound breeze, torrential downpours, rain delivered sideways, glazed by the tropical sun. I estimate the top of this royal palm to be slightly more than halfway to the ground from the tenth story balcony I peer down on it from. I wonder if it could be possible to land atop the crown, but suspect only with a running start. It looks like a step off the rail and I’d be able to hit the mark. What I can’t know is if the crown is substantial enough to impede my fall or if I would tear through it, two hundred pounds hurtling down and the fronds a matador’s cape.  

The invasion force overrunning the twin tower to our north, lining up on opposite balconies and systematically clearing the condos in this building by unleashing automatic weapons fire covering every square inch of visibility into these condo apartments in the southern tower. These condos are glass-walled facing out but there are two obstructed views, on the other side of the kitchen and the full bathroom by the guest bedroom and not the master. Everything else is in the line of fire. Behind the kitchen wall as the torrent of automatic weapons fire swarms every inch, shredding glass, chewing up the plaster walls, splintering wood, devouring furniture and creating flurries of lighter material, foam rubber, feathers, dust, dismembered bits of cloth, pieces of everything scattered under a deafening rain of hellfire. Systematic shock and awe, floor by floor, so by the time the invasion force moves in behind the covering fire, any resistance has been obliterated.

When the unleashing ends my ears ring with it, what’s left of a cabinet door dropping to the floor, a piece of glass table falling and breaking in half. I make a break for it, straight out and over the balcony, bits of glass crunching under every step, jumping the rail, realizing I’ve overestimated how far out the royal palm is, I won’t land dead center in the crown, crashing through the fronds and I grab desperately as I come ripping past, I feel a sharp pain in my upper chest and my arm feels like something’s tried to remove it from its socket with a violent tug. The momentum of my fall disrupted enough to blunt the impact. Landing in a blink. One of my arms is useless. I slither. It feels like something’s been threaded through my pelvis so I can stand properly only with the assistance of fishing line at the behest of a manipulating hand. I spit out teeth. My jaw barely opens so that when I spit blood and broken teeth tumble reluctantly out, blood, saliva and teeth fragments coating my chin. On the left side of my mouth are gums or broken teeth, same side as the useless arm. I blink blood from my eyes, drops on my eyelashes. I make for the nearby dumpster, not walking but partially erect, dragging what doesn’t work and over-relying on what does, lean over and fall in and close the lid over me with a hollow, metallic boom, hoping no one saw.  

At the Ballpark

STEVE BIERSDORF

The ballpark has a retractable roof with a giant glass greenhouse façade, giving it the look of a massive, self-contained biosphere. Our team is in the early stages of a rebuild, so if they lose today we can chalk it up to better days ahead. Every twenty seconds or so they play a short blurb of a song, “Wild Thing,” “Let’s Get It Started,” “Plush.” “Day-O,” daylight come and me want to go home. Turns out (google search) they have a forty-song playlist.  

Between innings a group of young men and women down on the field shimmy laterally to centerfield with a huge inflated sombrero upside down, with writing on it, presumably some local restaurant or restaurant chain. The inflatable sombrero and the sideways-moving legs of those carrying it resemble an immense and deformed crustacean scrambling desperately in search of a return to the sea, stuck and enclosed by the walls around the field and the leering, hollering masses.

Beneath mammoth ads for Southwest Airlines, Bud Light and Larry’s Shoes, above the Target bullseye logo plastered to the outfield wall, someone walks to the edge of the outfield stands with a much smaller inflated object I take for a replica of a pillow-sized taco, throws it in the general direction of the upside-down sombrero, the taco bounding off the brim of the sombrero and falling to the outfield grass, to the collective, unconvincing “awwww” of the stadium crowd. The leftfielder jogs out to his position, observing it all, pounding his glove with his fist with what can only be disdain.

A left-handed batter stands in and swings at a pitch like a blur, redirecting the blur, slower-moving and looping and askew and high into the glowing stadium lights. The ball is a small darkening object, a tiny pin-prick eclipse of the candlepower, rising impossibly high and on its descent angled straight for where we’re sitting. A man in the team regalia stands and the ball falls to him as if hit to him intentionally, or at him. He lifts his hands together to catch it, but it bounces off his hands with a meat-slap and skips to the row directly in front of us. As if the baseball is a priceless trinket dropped from the sky, something that if procured would inexorably alter the life of its new possessor, as one body and then another and another hurtle directly over us, diving headfirst, knocking us from our seats to our knees, spilling beverages. A pile of bodies in the row in front of us, a scrum, a compilation of legs and arms and torsos and grunts and jostling, and a woman walks up to the scrum, reaches in and magically produces the fouled-off baseball, holding it aloft, triumphantly, and the entire section erupts, as she turns and curtsies to the rows higher up.

Phone Scammers

STEVE BIERSDORF

They were working an old IRS scam. Googling phone scams you could find out what people were hip to, so he invented his own messages. The women quickly copied him when they saw his results.  

“You are hereby notified that we need to speak with you or your attorney immediately regarding an ongoing investigation. In the event we do not speak with you in our office today, we will document that you waived your rights to counsel and submit your file to the state.”

“This telephone number is linked to a questionable financial transaction that is now under investigation. It is possible that your name and social security number could be involved. I need you to call me or one of my associates immediately.”

He would make two hundred calls by lunch. Rarely, if ever, talking with anyone on the initial call. The calls were local but came from scrambled numbers with Ohio area codes. He’d eat lunch, take a solid forty-five minutes and peruse shit on the Internet. The women hammered the phones nonstop trying to get someone, skipping lunch or eating at their cubicles between calls. You had to scare people with the messages you left. They had to call you.

Early afternoon the callbacks started in earnest. Sometimes he couldn’t keep up, the women gladly handling his overflow. Mary Stewart took the inbound calls. From the number on caller ID she would know which agent had placed the call, confirm the caller’s name and social security number and transfer the call to him if it was his, or if he wasn’t on another call. He’d reconfirm the social security number with the caller. Knowing their social security numbers was like holding their babies out a window ten stories over a sidewalk.

They purchased call lists from payday lenders, storefront or online. It was the afraid callers with sketchy credit histories who gave up their card numbers. The standard charge was payback of the fictitious loan for $400 and a $35 processing fee. He went for more. Sometimes he’d say the loan was for $1,500 or $2,000 and they’d want to mail him a check, he’d tell them if they gave him a credit card number he would waive the processing fee and come down $300 to settle. Sometimes with the bigger amounts the card number wouldn’t go through, and Mary Stewart or Mr. Anderson would send it through for less, whatever they could get.

The women were using his scripts, but they didn’t have his deep, resonant voice. They had weird accents. Sometimes they would go out into the empty warehouse together, Denise Meyers, Susan Jones, Ann Johnson and Mary Stewart. Susan Jones and Ann Johnson smoked. They would converse in a foreign language. After five minutes of his standing there awkwardly with his hands buried in his pockets, Mary Stewart smiled apologetically and gave abridged translations. When Mary would translate, the other women would stop talking in the strange language, looking at him by turns. The next time he followed them out into the empty warehouse they spoke English.     

They could hear each other. They had earbuds and weren’t right on top of each other, but the offices were tight, formerly the administrative offices of a defunct propane gas concern. The women would threaten the callers if the callers weren’t taking the bait or were confrontational, “get a good lawyer,” “I’m forwarding this information to the three credit reporting agencies.” They took the confrontational calls personally. You couldn’t. If there wasn’t any money in it get off the call quickly, hang up if necessary.  

Denise Meyers was the most egregious. If Denise Meyers called a blocked number, she would continue to call using all twenty-nine scrambled numbers with Ohio area codes and leave her message, or her version of one of his messages. She would call the same cell number from all thirty scrambled lines until she was completely blocked, each time leaving increasingly menacing versions of the original message. If she knew where the owner of the blocked cell phone number worked she would call that person’s work and leave messages with a receptionist that the owner of the blocked cell number was facing a grand jury indictment for embezzlement. She would look up family members and call them, telling the family members their brother, sister, son or daughter was facing fraud charges. He would listen to her being awful in her weird accent and disaffected tone. He’d listen to her and want to fuck her. Fuck her hard.