May 22, 2024
The Powder Blue Tuxedo Boys, Fleet Week, Los Angeles
May 22, 2024
The Powder Blue Tuxedo Boys are down in San Pedro looking at the huge USS Carl Vinson aircraft carrier that has docked at Berth 46. The Vinson is there for Fleet Week in Los Angeles.
Timothy and Patrick are both wearing jeans, leather Navy jackets, and caps that say “USS Carl Vinson”. They are also wearing aviator sunglasses.
The boys are standing on the dock, looking at the ship’s immensity.
Timothy: I feel like Senile Joe wearing these stupid aviator sunglasses.
Patrick: It’s all part of our disguise. We are supposed to look like Navy veterans from the Carl Vinson. We are here to find the sailor who spilled the beans.
Timothy: Remind me. What beans?
Patrick: The burial of Origami Sinbadin in May of 2011. Remember the Navy Seals captured Origami in some big house and flew him to the Vinson to be dumped into the Arabian Sea.
Timothy: Nobody bought that story.
Patrick: But there was no proof. All the sailors on the Vinson were confined to quarters and no one on the ship ever talked about what happened.
Timothy: Until now?
Patrick: Right. Some gob is making anonymous posts on Tik Tok that he has video footage of Origami’s body being put into cryogenics and then flown off the carrier.
Timothy: Cryogenics? You mean they froze Sinbadin?
Patrick: Probably. Origami is no doubt in a freezer under the White House.
Timothy: I hope Senile Joe doesn’t open it looking for ice cream.
Patrick: I hope he does.
Timothy: So we schmooze with the sailors who were on the Vinson in 2011.
Patrick: I have a list and some photos. They always go to Godmother’s Saloon in San Pedro.
Timothy: Is that one of the bars Charles Bukowski went to?
Patrick: Maybe. He went to all the bars in San Pedro.
Timothy: Who would name a bar after their godmother?
Patrick: An Italian or an Irishman.
…
The PBTB go to the Godmother’s Saloon and check it out. Over at the pool table, a group of older sailors are drinking Beck’s beer and playing pool.
Patrick and Timothy walk up to the pool table.
Patrick: You gobs from the Vinson?
Sailor One: We call it the Carl’s Junior.
Timothy: Why? Does the galley have good hamburgers?
Patrick looks at Timothy like he’s an idiot.
Patrick: What my friend means is that the hamburgers were total shit when we were on the Carl.
Sailor Two: They still are total shit. Only the officers get good food.
Sailor Three: The homeless at the St. Vincent DePaul shelter get better food than we got on the Carlie.
Timothy: This is a cool bar. Charles Bukowski used to drink here all the time.
Sailor One: I always liked Chuck’s writings. The Post Office he wrote about was about the same as the Navy but stationery.
Patrick: Legend says that Bukowski was frozen in a cryogenic tube and buried right here under the pool table.
The three sailors exchange nervous looks.
Sailor Two: Bukowski isn’t buried under the pool table.
Sailor Three: No. A certain Arab Origami is frozen and buried under the pool table.
Sailor One: We always come to Godmother’s to play pool atop his frozen carcass.
Sailor Two: We like to think the banging of the balls drives him nuts.
Sailor Three: We also spill a little beer on him.
Sailor One: And when we get really drunk, we micturate on his head.
Patrick: Ahhh.
Timothy: We’ll buy the next round.
The doors to the bar burst open with CIA agents dressed in Shore Patrol uniforms. The sailors all run for the exits.
The three older sailors go through a hidden door in the wall and escape.
Patrick and Timothy also go through the hidden door. They go down a darkened passageway into the basement. Patrick uses his Glow-In-The-Dark decoder ring to show the way.
The boys come into a chamber with fog coming off of the liquid nitrogen flowing into the tubes and sarcophagus in the center of the room.
Patrick and Timothy walk up to the frozen casket and see Origami Sinbadin. He was as frozen as a carp and probably just as bony.
Timothy: Why do I feel like I’m in that frozen eye lab in “Bladerunner”?
Patrick: Look out for a mad Asian scientist dressed up in furs.
Timothy calls in the find to Kamalatoe.
Kamalatoe: Good work, boys! The money has been wired to your account in the Caymans.
Timothy and Patrick: Kaching!
Patrick: I think we need a hot toddy.
Timothy: Or ten.
TJM
Timmy Tae's Thoughts 