Cracker Jack

We didn't know his real name, so Mahmood and I referred to him as Cracker Jack. A box of Cracker Jack and an Orange Crush: that’s what he got every day for lunch at Jiffy Nifty. Between noon and 1:00 pm, Cracker Jack sauntered into Jiffy Nifty and, with barely a word, put his money on the counter (exact change) and headed off on foot. I spoke to him several times and, once, offered some culinary advice regarding the mixing of Cracker Jack and Hot Nuts, a celebrated recipe popular with Spanish merchant seamen. But, as he did to Mahmood, the clerk and proprietor of Jiffy Nifty, he merely nodded a polite recognition and walked out the door, never speaking a word.

Mahmood and I discussed Cracker Jack in great length and were vexed as to the mystery surrounding his presence. He wore the same outfit every day: a white sailors cap and a dark blue P-coat buttoned up to the top, a timeless wrap that spoke to the under-appreciated sailors who've kept ships traversing the seas for hundreds of years. And given his advanced years and scraggly greyish beard, he could have been an aged-advanced image of the young sailor on the box of Cracker Jack.

While sharing some of Jiffy Nifty's best turkey-jerky, Mahmood and I mulled over the possibility that Cracker Jack might not be a real sailor, seeing as how the nearest naval base was 30 miles from the gas station.  Among the things we considered: he never used the word "ahoy" or any other nautical terms as in, "Ahoy, mates, I'll be droppin' anchor at Jiffy Nifty."

It was a mystery, and though some might say it was none of our business, Mahmood and I consider ourselves to be curious types, inquisitive minds who seek answers, not only to the authenticity of Cracker Jack, the person, but to other cultural mysteries, like, for instance, why aren't nut-flavored drinks more popular with the risk-taking, pierced and tattooed crowd. So we hatched a plan to engage Cracker Jack in an extended conversation, and like most plans fueled by gas station snack food, it had all the moxie of Lewis and Clark prior to embarking on their quest for the Northwest Passage.

The setup unfolded with the precision of a Swiss watch as Cracker Jack was paying for his signature lunch. Mahmood told him it was taken care of by me, the guy standing to his starboard, a concept that caused a considerable amount of discussion and practice and, honestly, confused the both of us, especially when stage-starboard and stage-port were thrown into the mix. When Cracker Jack began speaking, phase two of the plan, which involved a complimentary giant pretzel, fumbled its way towards implementation. "Thanks for the lunch. I suppose that makes us even."
"Even?" I replied, hoping to steer the nautical junket away from a sandbar.
"Yes, even. In the third grade, I was the new kid and the first day, you sat with me at lunch and I gave you my box of Cracker Jack." As he reached for the door, he said matter-of-factually, "Now we're square," and the door closed behind him.

I reflected on his lunchtime manifesto while watching him depart across the parking lot, not looking back, a ship embarking on schedule with a curious wake. Mahmood shrugged his shoulders, "What was that about? Could it be, my friend, that once upon a time the two of you crossed paths?"

Like a long dormant volcano with decades full of lava rising to the surface, the third grade connection nudged my otherwise peeve-laden memory and in a flash, flew out in an uncontrolled screech, "It's Futterman!" In my ebullience, I turned to Mahmood, "It's Dukie Futterman from the third grade. We were in Mrs. Stansfield's class together. He used to eat Cracker Jack every day for lunch. His collection of Cracker Jack prizes was the talk of the school; they were lined up on shelves in his parent's rumpus room!" I paused to catch my breath, "Mahmood, this case is closed. He's not Cracker Jack, not a landlocked sailor lost among landlubbers; he's the grownup Dukie." 

Mahmood, always the one to see the larger picture, pondered the air above his cash register, "Imagine, after all these years, the size of his Cracker Jack prize collection. One prize per day for so many years." He closed his eyes for a moment while conjuring up an image. "Think of it, if displayed properly, with tastefully placed accent lighting, the collection could eclipse the grandeur of the PEZ museum. It might be a modern-day marvel, the likes of which we have never seen." Mahmood waved his hands back and forth, punctuating his proclamation. "No, my friend, this case is not closed, not by any means." And he offered some courtesy turkey-jerky while we began hashing through a concoction of schemes to somehow gather a peek at Dukie Futterman's rumpus room.

Garbanzo's Misfortune

As crashes go, it wasn’t all that big, not like on one of those TV interviews where they say it sounded like a freight train. This was more like being hit from behind by an out-of-balance washing machine. The driver was, as I was to quickly discover, my new best friend, Humberto, from El Salvador.  When he piled into the back of my car, he confessed to having too much cerveza and was distracted with worry for Garbanzo, the pet goat he reluctantly left back home in Central America. In the late night darkness of Chicago's Clark Street, Humberto made a promise to pay for any damage: “I give you my word, señor, and a word is all a poor El Salvadorian has to give. On my honor, this misfortune will be set straight, and I apologize for the trouble my Garbanzo has caused this evening.”                               
At the shake of a hand, a deal was made. Humberto was to drop off a payment every Sunday afternoon at my house. The total amount of the damage was a little over a thousand dollars, to which Humberto, on his first visit, exclaimed, while handing me a ten dollar bill, “It will take some time, my friend, but we will travel this road together, and we will have a drink about it at the end.”  He liked to remind me that he, as owner of Garbanzo, is responsible for any damage caused by the troublesome goat (even if the goat resides two thousand miles away in a place cloaked by a blanket of humidity). Humberto always looked to the horizon while saying these things. He had an earnest practicality along with a vision of the future.

During each of Humberto’s visits, he gladly accepted an offer of an ice cold cerveza. “Three’s my limit,” he cautiously reminded himself after downing the third one. Every payment was placed in a cigar box, labeled, “Garbanzo’s Misfortune,” and after three months of Sundays, the total cash payments amounted to $97.87. But that was not all. In addition to the money, Humberto unloaded what he called “valuable mementos to help us reach our destination.” He began by stacking the items in a pile that started in a corner of my garage and gradually spread toward the center, much like an ominous town-eating lava flow. He said it is his dream that one day we will have the king of all garage sales; people will come from miles around, and once they realize the value of the collection, money will flow from their wallets, and Garbanzo’s debt will be paid.

Some highlights of  Humberto’s mementos:
--Tony Orlando and Dawn’s greatest hits album.
--Electric rooster clock.
--Game of Twister
--Three buckets of plastic geraniums.
--Swizzle sticks from El Toro Tap.
--Four red vinyl chairs.
--One stuffed armadillo.
--Eric Estrada poster.
--Toreador lamp.
--Spice Girls candelabra.
--Banana-shaped comb.
--Antless ant farm.

As if fueled by movements of unstoppable, underground tectonic plates, the pile burgeons and includes many yard ornaments: the ample-bottomed wooden lady bending over, two small windmills, and numerous yard signs, one of which says, "Shit's Creek Survivor." Once, I questioned Humberto as to the origin of the items, as some seemed very well-used. Again, he looked toward the horizon while replying, “They come to me while I’m driving, praying to the Virgin Guadalupe and hoping for an end to my hardship. Wait and see, my friend. Destiny has brought us together on this journey, and every day I dream of the time when my collection of mementos brings an end to this burden, the burden brought upon me by the curse of the reckless Garbanzo.”

As the lava pile expands, threatening my prized collection of North American pine cones, Humberto and I share the same dream.

Hawaiian Time

In the 1960's, Paulene Helsper lived in Hawaii for three years. She camped on the beach with her boyfriend, Lyndle, and only returned to the Midwest because they thought he developed a severe coconut allergy. As it turned out, Lyndle was allergic to the straw in the Panama hat he sported, but it wasn't discovered until they migrated back to Chicago and established new lives. As Paulene tells it, "That  goddamned hat ruined my life."

Stranded in the Midwest, Paulene began converting her attached garage into her "Hawaiian room," complete with tiki lights (electric, since the tiki-fire incident), a six-inch-deep layer of sand on the floor, and a wicker lazy boy where she sits most days, sipping a piña colada while imagining Hawaii. There's a mural of Mt. Kilauea on one wall and the surf crashing on a Maui beach on another, along with two large kentia palms that require a daily spritzing. She keeps an apparel trunk full of Hawaiian shirts and island attire for visitors; no one is allowed in the Hawaiian room without a dose of island garb. Even the meter-reader dons one of her emergency leis while reading her gas meter.

Paulene gives ukelele lessons and lives on Hawaiian time. Every one of her clocks are set to Hawaii-Aleutian Standard Time. If it's midnight in Chicago, it's usually seven o'clock in the evening in Paulene's world. I say "usually" because Hawaii doesn't bother with daylight savings time, so sometimes Paulene is only four hours behind. She's late to everything; she celebrates New Years Eve at 4am Chicago time. And if you make a date with her, it gets all jumbly due to the time zone calculations.

Paulene greets everyone with "aloha." She knows lots of Hawaiian phrases and rarely misses an opportunity to slip one into a conversation. It's nearly impossible to get her to leave the Hawaiian room unless it's to attend the Tradewind Buffet at Club Waikiki. When I asked her to accompany me to the Bowl 'n Roll for a sandwich, her reply was, "Is it Hawaii outside?"
"No," I said, "It's Chicago outside."
"Well then, forget it."

I've been taking ukelele lessons from Paulene. She’s a ukelele virtuoso and gets steamed when the instrument is pronounced incorrectly. As she's reminded me a thousand times in her raspy voice, “It's 'OOK-a-lay-lee,' not 'YOUKE-a-lay-lee.'" She can play any Beatle song on the uke, and her rendition of The McCoys' "Hang on Sloopy" is as enchanting as an ocean breeze.

Sometimes the piña coladas reveal Paulene's indelicate undercurrent. During my last lesson, she stopped in the middle of our duet, a spirited version of Sonny and Cher’s "I Got You, Babe."

–Paulene:  Hold it one minute.
–Me:  What's wrong?
–Paulene:  You play like a goddamn freight train. Wikiwiki..... too fast.
–Me:  I was imagining I was Sonny.
–Paulene:  Find a gentle rhythm, like the waves lapping up on Waimea beach.
–Me:  I was wondering, did Cher break up with Sonny or was it the other way round.
–Paulene:  Grab yourself one of those grass skirts from the apparel trunk.
–Me: Keep in mind, I’m Sonny, not Cher.
–Paulene:  Strip down, put on the skirt, and sway your hips. The motion of the grass against your skin’ll dictate the rhythm.
–Me:  But what if Mr. Happy peeks out from the grass.
–Paulene:  Me and Lyndle used to spend every day, naked on the beach.
–Me:  Instead, how about I play air uke and sort of follow you.
–Paulene: Nobody plays air uke.
–Me: I’ve been practicing to a Yanni video.
–Paulene: Are you going to slip into the skirt?
–Me: Not without a matching coconut bra.
–Paulene: Lots of men wear grass skirts.
–Me: Not around here.
–Paulene: We’re not around here; we’re in Hawaii.
–Me: What if there’s a fire and I have to dash out in the street.
–Paulene: Suit up, buster, and follow the flow of the grass.
–Me: When did I become your Ken Doll?
–Paulene:  If Sonny was as much trouble as you, Cher made the break.
–Me: Thought so.
–Paulene: Oh hell, put on the goddamn skirt.
–Me: Oh...look at the time. It’s past 4am; I have to run.
–Paulene: Okole.
–Me: I’m going to look that up.
–Paulene: When you do, put a “big” in front of it.

It’s a time-worn trick, but sometimes a quick glance at a clock can turn a thing around and, despite some offshore name-calling, offer a graceful exit, especially when the clock is set to Hawaiian Standard Time.

The Summer of Laskie

The summer of Laskie was a season unlike all those that came before and after it. Laskie was a collie, a dead ringer for Lassie, the star of the much beloved TV series. There was a time when Lassie was perhaps the most recognizable character on television. She was courageous, encouraging, loyal, could warn a person if gramps fell down the well, and knew a hundred tricks. Lassie maintained all the characteristics of what a person hoped their best friend possessed. Of course, we were always let down by our friends in one way or another, but not by Lassie; she would always be there, barking her encouragement.

Laskie was Duane Noddin's dog. Duane worked with Laskie til she knew a hundred and one tricks, one more, he claimed, than Lassie. He liked to tell people that Laskie was the dog who showed Lassie everything. After making a few successful appearances with Laskie at local Chicago schools and shopping centers, Duane decided to capitalize on the heels of the Lassie craze and take Laskie on the road. I, of course, the owner of a faded-red Dodge van nicknamed "The Eraser," was chosen as driver, assistant, and general dog walker. The profits from the venture were to be split fifty-fifty; he had the dog, I had the van, an unmitigated, symbiotic relationship if there ever was one.

Laskie loved to travel. Her favorite spot was the passenger seat where she could stick her head out the window and sniff the subtleties of the road. Whenever we started the van, she'd bark as if calling "shotgun!" and hop into her seat. We drove back and forth across America, stopping in cities and small towns everywhere. Laskie performed her many tricks for gatherings of appreciative crowds at store openings, car dealerships, roadside diners; anywhere that would have us. Sometimes the establishment paid us to attract business and other times we passed the hat. We sold eight-by-ten glossy photos of Laskie with a stamped, paw-print autograph. It quickly became apparent that people heard and saw what they wanted; most people ignored the "k" in Laskie's name and walked away thinking they actually witnessed the TV Lassie. Invariably, upon leaving, children and adults alike would wave goodbye while shouting, "Goodbye Lassie!"

During Laskie's performance, it was my job to work the crowd, telling people all sorts of fantastic stories of Laskie's exploits and rescues. And the more outlandish the story, the more entranced the crowd became. Throughout the summer, Laskie chalked up a remarkable resume: rescuing people from burning barns, wrecked cars, swimming out to stranded boaters, and pushing teenagers out of the way of oncoming trains.

They say that behind every great celebrity, there's a prevaricator of humongous proportions. And that was me, the Titanic of liars. It seemed my duty to make up more and more stuff heralding our sweet wonder dog. While driving between towns I spent most of my time thinking of different scenarios that would further Laskie's status as the heroine she'd become. It was an adventure not to be forgotten.

The other night I was at a dinner party where all twelve guests were discussing their travels to Venice. They conversed in a restrained, but emphatic, manner about the Venetian experience. Apparently, Venice brings out the transcendental National Geographic in people. A few even presented pictures of their trips, and one couple had a photo book made of themselves posing in front of every significant landmark in Venice. The one-upping of Venice was a never-ending crescendo of expository fawning. I sat silent for an hour or more, listening patiently to the testimonials. I'd never been to Venice as its never been ballyhooed as a van-friendly city.

Towards the end of the evening, after running out of saucy gondolier anecdotes, someone asked if I'd ever been to Venice. "No," I said, "But long ago I spent a summer with a certain celebrity collie, Laskie, traveling the country as her handler."
A rare silence bloomed over the Venetians. "Oh, I loved that show as a child," agreed a few. Clearly, they heard "Lassie," as had those who'd gone before them.
"Yes," I went on, the lies pouring out of me as they had so many years ago, "I saw that remarkable dog pull someone out of the water in the rapids above Niagara Falls, and once, on the Golden Gate bridge, she stopped a woman from jumping to her death. She understood five hundred words of English and could place an order at any Mexican restaurant by planting her paw on the menu near the word "burrito." And she had her own barking language that only a few people knew about. There was no dog like her."

"And," I added, "I asked her once if she wanted to see Venice, and she barked twice, very loudly, which meant a definite 'no!' So that was that and the subject was never brought up again, unless you count the time she chewed up the venetian blinds in a motel room in Biloxi, adding a distinct punctuation to the question."

Switching gears during the puzzled silence, I complimented the hostess, "The custard pie is terrific. If you don't mind, I think I'll have another piece in honor of Laskie. She couldn't make pies, of course, but custard was her favorite." It's difficult to put on the brakes when the room is finally yours, even if only for a moment. Laskie knew all too well about the ephemeral spotlight, her season of notoriety, or as I like to call it, "The Summer of Laskie."

The Elm Street Busybody

I ride a bicycle everywhere, from Happy Foods to The Nut Barn and, occasionally, for that special gift, to Kitty's Kandle Nook. Almost all my errands are done by bike, inching my carbon footprint into the tiptoe territory. Should the need arise to appear as an extra in a remake of "Bonnie and Clyde, the Overlooked Bicycle Years,” I could be there, in costume, in minutes.

My daytime bicycle trips to the store are met with smiles and polite "hellos" from everyone, including Ted Wang of Wang's Health Foods, who always calls out, "Ten percent discount for bike rider!"  It's all very lighthearted and uplifting except for the Elm Street Busybody. Blessed with scowl marks, etched in her face from a lifetime of self-righteous indignation, she appears out of nowhere. Every time our paths cross, she screams the same thing, "Helmet!" It doesn't matter where she is, from her car window or standing on her front lawn, it's always, "Helmet!" shouted like a drill sergeant at a bunch of new recruits.

I'll admit, I'm the kind of bad seed that mothers warn their children not to emulate; an outlaw living on the fringe who once toted eleven items into the ten-items-or-less checkout lane at the grocery store, a crime that's had me looking over my shoulder for twenty years. When it comes to the helmet issue, I'm pro-choice, and, as I've said at many a Thanksgiving toast, "That turkey looks delicious. I'll darned well do with my head what I want."  I'm pretty sure Davy Crockett, if he were alive today, would scoff at the helmet, despite the fact that he fancied the furry head-gear. I suppose I live by the Katherine Hepburn quote, "If you obey all the rules, you miss all the fun."

When I see a guy with a helmet, I think the poor bastard must've been the guy who actually wore those rubber boots his mother sent him to school with instead of tossing them in the weeds like any other self-respecting kid. But I would never dream of yelling, "Hey pal, ditch the helmet, your mom will never know!" It's his choice and not mine in which to meddle.

If this was two hundred years ago, I'm almost certain the Elm Street Busybody and her brethren would be leading a potpourri of lynch mobs, burning witches and ridding society of the colorful miscreants who challenge their moral superiority. If the Elm Street Busybody had her way, incorrigible renegades like me would do serious jail time for not wearing a helmet. I can imagine the conversation between my cellmate and me:

--Me:  What are you in for?
--Cellmate:  Killed two cops in a bank holdup; left two more wounded and trashed three squad cars in a high-speed chase. How 'bout you, what'd they get you for?
--Me:  No helmet while riding my bicycle.
--Cellmate: You're one of those, huh. Well, back off, man; I don't want no trouble.

As fate would have it, the other day, my doorbell rang, and who was standing on my porch, none other than the Elm Street Busybody with an armful of envelopes, pamphlets, and a clipboard. "Hello," she said, "I'm collecting for the American Heart Association. Heart disease is the nation's number one killer."
I interrupted her,"You live on Elm Street and carp at me like a banshee when I'm on my bicycle."
"Well," she said, "You should wear a helmet. It's for your own good."
"If you feel it necessary to be so sanctimonious, why don't you hike over to Carl's Fireside Fondue and holler "cheese!" at all the cheese-eaters? You just told me heart disease is the nation's number one killer."

Then I fetched my checkbook and wrote a check for one hundred dollars to the American Heart Association. I showed it to her and said I would deliver it to her personally if, for the next three times I pass her on my bike, she politely waves and doesn't scream anything about a helmet. I waved the check in the air. "Three times," I said, "That's all I ask. Three times."
She continued from her imaginary soapbox, "Don't think you're so god-damned special. I yell at bigger people than you. Big-shots, I give 'em the full whammy."
As she began her descent down the middle of my front porch stairs, I mustered up my inner Stanley Kowalski and bellowed, as he would've at Stella, the one word to punctuate our feud, "Railing!"
I'm guessing this is not over.....not by a long-shot.
A reservation has been made in my future for the full whammy.       

Making Life a Breeze

"What the hell is this crap," is not the way most book reviews begin. But it's the response doled out in no uncertain terms by the person for whom my latest book was written. It's really more of a booklet, an easy read, inspired by those helpful household handbooks with their wellspring of tips, shortcuts, and prudent advice. Aside from the occasional resourceful Aborigine, it’s a rare person who manages to get along without them. The most frequently used books on my bookshelf are helpful manuals, authored with the intent to make life easy as pie. There’s even my old "Boy Scout Handbook," with its Morse code, smoke signals, fire starting, and snake bite treatments, standing by, ready to be mobilized in case of an emergency. Should society suffer a breakdown in electronic communications, I'll be ready, johnny-on-the-spot, handbook in hand, on call, as director of smoke signals, deciphering and dispatching important messages for the betterment of mankind.

In the spirit of those authors of handbooks who have gone before me, I embarked on an enthusiastic manual for living comfortably and getting along together under the roof that covers our house. I call it "Tips for Making Life a Breeze Around Here." Meredith Baxter-Birney may never star in a movie-of-the-week derived from the work, but it’s an ambitious, though small book, with plenty of easy-to-follow directions. Its intent is to offer guidelines that bring harmony to an otherwise discordant living arrangement. According to Dollar-Store-Dave, the unheralded literary critic who's opinions flow freely for the price of an uplifting beverage, some of the most intriguing chapter headings are:

--Stop doing that.
--What’s the deal with that funny-smellin’ soap.
--Where’s the scissors.
--Cutting lemons: slice or wedge.
--Where's the tape.
--The protocol of the last cookie.
--Does "I got dibs" really count for anything.
--Why do I get all the jobs that involve crawling under stuff.
--Why is the phrase "way to go" always directed towards me.
--Are you still mad.
--There's no need to strip-search the meter-reader.
--Your pillow smells like pigeons.
--Why is that in the garbage.
--This is a perfectly good shirt.
--Pants are sometimes an option.

The chapters speak for themselves; it's a recipe for living in veritable connubial bliss, but when presented to the woman who signed up for this carnival ride, it was met with the type of disdain normally reserved for finding a centipede in a seldom-used corner of the broom closet (which, incidentally, is the heading of another chapter on tidiness).

"What the hell is this crap," were the exact words spoken before tossing the book in the trashcan (completely overlooking the chapter, "Why is That in the Garbage," which clearly emphasizes the concept of thinking twice before discarding unique or otherwise valuable items). She says the title of her book will be "Who Died and Left You in Charge of Crap." Again, with the word "crap," (making me think she barely skimmed the chapter on annoying, repetitive descriptors).

Rummaging through the trash to retrieve the only copy of  "Tips for Making Life a Breeze Around Here," it dawned on me how Aldous Huxley and George Orwell must have felt when their books were banned, burned, discounted, and discarded. It's an elite group whose ranks I've inauspiciously joined, and following their exalted paths, offers hope that history will vindicate me, and "Tips for Making Life a Breeze Around Here" will rise from its desecration. It's almost intoxicating to anticipate the hoopla when Banned Books Week rolls around, and the cautionary reminders at libraries across the country feature a display of Maya Angelou's "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings," J.D. Salinger's "The Catcher in the Rye," Mark Twain's "Huckleberry Finn," along with the newest addition to the list, "Tips for Making Life a Breeze Around Here."
But, to quote an old ants-in-the-pants adage, "The waiting is the hardest part."

The Shrinking Man....

"It's a matter of routine," says my doctor while she measures my height. Then she says, "Five-feet, ten inches."
"Hold your horses; stop the music," I protest. "I was five-feet-eleven and some change when I graduated from high school." I remember quite clearly because, on the rare occasion when the situation called for a young man's boasting, I used to throw my shoulders back, stand up real tall, and round-up to six feet.
She says, matter-of-factly, "These things happen; we shrink as we get older."

I ask when her measuring gizmo was last calibrated, and question whether her medical school provided the latest height-measuring techniques, or was that one of those seminars she skipped during the summer she followed the Grateful Dead. At my request, after some unnecessary, but noticeable, eye-rolling, she double checks her measurement and comes up with five-feet-nine and seven eighths. So I ask if we couldn't round-up to her original figure, five-feet-ten. "Let's go with that," I say, "It's even, and fractions are for complaining nit-pickers."

Then she hands me a cup, points to Mr. happy, and says, "Fill it halfway, big guy," putting emphasis on "big guy." Just for the not-so-subtle mocking placation, which contained implications beyond medical propriety, I fill it almost to the brim, the same amount of pee I estimate would flow from a healthy six-footer. I throw my shoulders back, walk real tall, and very carefully, with a slight swagger and a renewed sense of pride, return the bountiful cup.

I'm not certain what, exactly, she writes in her notes, but I think of calling my insurance company and ask if they wouldn't mind springing for a second opinion regarding this medically significant matter. Perhaps they could recommend a non-flippant height specialist who enjoyed the less-distractible sounds of England Dan and John Ford Coley during medical school. A nose to the grindstone seems to be an increasingly rare attribute these days.

On the way home, all I can think of is that if this shrinking thing continues, how long will it be before I'm living, lost and unnoticed, in a corner of the basement, battling a spider for some tiny crumbs of cake. Maybe I should buy a set of tiny doll furniture, complete with quilts, a tiny sink, and tiny toilet, and place the whole shebang in a strategic place in the house where no one walks. I'll rope off the area and give it a name like "Poco Valle," and before it's too late, get everyone accustomed to walking a wide circle around it. One thing I'm doing for sure is stopping at the hardware store and buying a handful of signs that offer the cautionary future reminder, "Watch Your Step."