12:34 p.m.
The other afternoon I decided to swing through the drive-thru of Dairy Queen to get a strawberry-kiwi frozen drink. As I pulled up to the window I noticed a huge puddle of red liquid on the ground.
Now, I'm pretty sure this was probably just a melted Brazier treat, but it got me to thinking about a story I once heard regarding a different puddle of red liquid...
Back in the fall of 2005 I moved down to Miami,FL. This was a far cry from the mountain life I had grown accustomed to. Instead of breathing in the crisp mountain air from the deck of my mountain cottage (yes, I actually lived in a mountain cottage) each morning, I would suck in the thick, luscious smog from the balcony of my motel apartment.
(not my mountain cottage))
But even though my new living situation was completely different from the life I'd been living, it definitely was not boring...
One night my boss and I went out to dinner with a co-worker and his girlfriend who was visiting all the way from Flora, MS. (If any of you readers know anyone from Flora or have ever visited there yourself, you will immediately know what kind of person this woman is.) We were dining outdoors on the strip in the center of South Beach, so all kinds of interesting characters were passing by our table.
Vendors would try to get the gentlemen to buy a rose for their beautiful ladies, or perhaps you would like an after dinner cigar. One man stopped by and caught Cindy (I can't remember what the woman from Flora was named, so Cindy will suffice) hook, line and sinker with his magical ability to transform palm fronds into exotic creatures such as fish and birds.
And being a female Mississippian, you know she had to talk about how amazing his skills were and find out all about him. However, all she learned in her pre-dinner conversation was that he just moved to Miami and was currently without residence (a.k.a. a bum). Fantastic. Now on to our dinner...
After dinner and a few cocktails we headed back to our visitor's hotel. Because we are the ballers that we are, we were chilling at one of the more happening hotels, The Chesterfield, where all the A-List stars such as Kevin Federline and Tara Reid stay when they're in town.
While we lounged on the front porch, we checked out the passerbys to see who had the best tans, biggest breasts and whitest leather sneakers. And who should happen to pass by while we were enjoying our after dinner adult beverages? Mr. Palms himself. Of course Cindy nearly wet her pants and demanded that he stop and talk to her.
So, as she's getting to know Mr. Palms, she finds out quite a bit of interesting information about her new friend. Mr. Palms had recently relocated to Miami from New York and was currently dwelling on the sandy shores of South Beach. Mr. Palms had recently been released from prison and was trying to start a new life for himself in a new city.
While living in New York, Mr. Palms and his brother were employed by the mob. The two of them ran a "waste management" company and used their trucks to carry out the wishes of their boss. Occasionally they would be asked to drive their truck into someone's house as a scare tactic or warning sign. While other times they would simply run over someone.
But the main use of their waste management vehicles was to transport bodies to the nearest landfill. Well, not so much the entire body, but body parts. Trying to dump whole corpses would be too obvious. Instead, they would put the bodies through an incinerator and whatever was left - bones, bodily fluids, etc. - they would freeze. The human popsicles were then placed in the back of the trucks and hauled to the landfill.
One hot summer day, Mr. Palms was making his typical run to the landfill when he decided to stop off at a bar for a quick happy hour beverage. Well, like any sane person who stops into a bar for happy hour on a hot summer day, he couldn't have just one drink. One beer turned into two beers and so on and so forth. Time quickly passed and the blocks of bloody ice soon began to suffer the effects of the summer heat.
Since no one was getting mugged or shot at the time, a police car was cruising by and noticed a sizeable puddle of red beneath the garabage truck.
Upon closer inspection, they noticed that this liquid was flowing from the back of the truck. Uh oh. The officers then went inside the bar to find the owner of the truck. Forgetting about the cargo of the truck and thinking he had merely parked improperly, Mr. Palms raised his hand when the officers asked who the vehicle belonged too. "Please come with us," the officers said. And as soon as Mr. Palms exited the building, the cops threw him against the wall and promptly arrested him.
Not wanting to rat out his employer and face the wrath of an angry mob boss, Mr. Palms accepted his fate and spent the next decade in prison. And as soon as he was released, he left New York and headed far away from the life of crime he had lived for so long. Because as we all know, there is no crime and no mob in Miami. Right...
So if you ever see a man walking the strip in South Beach making palm fish, go to the nearest ice cream truck or vendor, buy a strawberry popsicle and see if Mr. Palms is in need of a frosty treat.
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