Chapter 41

When I awoke Sunday, I had an urgent need to sit on the toilet. I did that off and on all day. Most of the time nothing happened. I had no memory of what caused my problem, but I did know that I had gone to a party for broad minded people. My guess was that it had something to do with that.

I knew that only because I had an entry in my journal, explaining that I was planning to attend the party. I had no memory of having done so. I had a pretty good idea that if I kept my mind open to it, someone would give me enough hints to figure it all out. I had learned a lot about figuring out what happened by other people's reaction to events.

Since I knew that it wasn't anything serious, and I had nothing planned for the day, none of the secondary effects of the party were of any real significance. I did a lot of thinking and research. I was trying hard to find something to occupy my mind without the office. The office, since the boat ramp thing, hadn't really been mine. Sam was really the one who did everything, I just parachuted in to put a rubber stamp on things. I wanted more than that. I wanted to look back at what I had done the day before, and know that it was something real. It was well after lunch before I picked up the sheath of papers from the 2nd Chance Thrift store, I took them into the bathroom for something to do, rather than just sit and wonder if I had fun the previous night.

I found a section of the hand written book that was more worn than the rest of it. It was all about how to make homemade liquors. There were instructions and recipes. I got up long enough to find my laptop, so that I could do Internet searches of related information. I found that if I wanted to test the antique recipes, I could but it was illegal. I also found that the penalty would be minor, as long as the output was minimal.

I gave serious thought to becoming a moonshiner. The war on drugs and tobacco seemed to be the most important items on the government's list in those days, so it sounded like a fun thing for me to do. Even on the small scale it could be easy to get caught, so I needed to be careful.

First of all I needed to buy or make a distilling machine. A water distiller could be used to distill anything. It was my first choice, but it was also easier for the ABC agents to track. So My second choice was to build a small still. A still seemed to be basically a large pot in which to boil the ingredients. The vapor from the boiling contained alcohol and water. The trick was to capture the vapor and let it condense. The condensed vapor would be both alcohol and water.

If I understood it correctly the first vapor contained the highest percentage of alcohol. It became less and less alcohol and more water as it boiled. It was going to require some trial and error to figure out exactly how to do it. I could really use the advice of a real moonshiner. The notes were fine, but talking to someone would be much better.

I couldn't leave the house all day. Every ten minutes I had the urge to sit on the toilet and it was undeniable. Since that was the case I ordered pizza and stayed in doing my homework. I drew a plan for a still then put it into a folder called, Moonglow. I know not very original but there you go I'm pretty boring.

My design called for an pressure cooker. I planned to use an electric hotplate for heat at first. The whole idea was to experiment, not produce enough liquor to sell. The pressure cooker I chose was a small home canning type that held up to two gallons. I placed the order on line through one of those shopping sites. It would arrive before the end of the week for sure.

The mad mechanic, who built my trike would be my first field trip, just as soon as it arrived, I needed the pressure valve on top removed. That needed to be replaced with something to condense the vapor from the boiling mash. I decided that I would call it my canning mixture.

Sam was definitely cool and not friendly at all, but he was pleasant enough. I continued to check out the things I would need to substitute for things no longer available. Well they might be, if I were living on a Virginia plantation. Sam left the cruiser in the parking lot, since he had already decided that he was no longer part of the firm, At the moment the firm didn't need it either. I didn't want to sell it since anything was possible.

I got a call from an unfamiliar voice that said he had been told to say Mercury first thing. I quickly did a search for a folder called Mercury. The folder had one file, so far, and it was a summary of the encounter with Bobby Ashe the artist.

"Sure Bobby, how are you?" I asked.

"I am fine, I wondered if you would let me draw you again?" he asked.

"If you do me a favor in return," I suggested.

"I don't see why not, what can I do for you?" he asked.

"I'll explain later. Trust me it is all legal. You won't get into any trouble," I admitted.

"So would you come meet me somewhere?" he asked.

"You are the boss, I'm just the model," I replied.

"Then why don't you meet me at the Avery Theater lobby? They have some beautiful spaces there," he suggested.

"When and what should I wear?' I asked.

"How about 5 PM and wear a dress," he requested.

"That's fine," I said in agreement. It was a short ride on the trike from the office to the downtown theater. When we finished it would be only two blocks back to my condo.

"Since we don't have anything that I need to be present to handle, I am going to leave at four. I wanted to stop for dinner before I met with Bobby. I chose to grab a quick bowl of soup at the downtown cafe. The soup of the day that afternoon was a cream potato soup. I had never heard of it, but it was possible that it was the most popular soup in the country and I still wouldn't know what it was.