Mushrooms, they'll do it to you every time . . . if your name is Amanda that is

19 September 2017
880

R. Linda:

Ah, mushrooms! They are great on steaks, add a bit to perk up a salad and in general they make a yummy sauce. This has been me experience with them. However, some people take the appreciation of this wonderful fungus a step further.

Let us admire one from me yard first, just to show the glory of a mushroom, most likely not an edible one, but a mushroom just the same.

No clue what kind it is, but it's lovely & probably deadly

What brings this on you ask, this mushroom fetish if you will. Well, it was an event that happened in my abode. Me resident visitor the Weas was here and he and I were sitting in the living room sipping coffee when he excused himself to go off to the loo. He had left his mobile phone on the table between us and it started buzzing. I yelled to him his phone was ringing and he shouted back I should answer it. And so I did.

"Hello, this is Weasil's phone, but he is indisposed at the moment, may I help you?"

"OMG! Just when I need him the most."

"Amanda? Is that you? It's Gabe here."

"Yes, Gabe it is me I am at a Phish concert and someone stole my CD collection."

"Uh, they still play?" I asked more to meself. "Sorry, I don't think I heard the last part of what you said." She said CD collection but that's impossible no one has CDs any more.

"Yes, they still play . . . at least I think they do. I said my CD collection was stolen right out of the back of my jeep!"

The tears started and Weasil was returning to the living room so I quickly gave him a rundown of what Amanda was about with an opinion that she was not making much sense and worse she was in tears.

"She never does make any," he said in perfect English which disturbed me because you know how he talks like he's from the Scottish ghetto. Anyway, he took the phone and asked her what was up and she told him the same thing I told him. He asked me in a whisper if Phish was still touring. I told him I didn't think so. Did she tell him about the CD collection? Yes, he said, but she doesn't have one he told me, nor a jeep.

My eyeballs were nearly bugging out of me head. What was wrong with her? Well, the poor darling thought she was at a Phish concert in Colorado of all places. She thought she owned a white jeep and a vast cd collection. The second it seemed was stolen. Uh-huh.

"Where in Colorado are you?" Weasil asked.

"I don't know, in the mountains."

"What mountains, what town is close?" He tried again.

"I don't know I just followed the Phish signs."

"Manda, you don't know where you are? Are you sure you are even in Colorado?"

"It LOOKS like Colorado."

"Oh, that's helpful." He muttered.

I was floored when I heard that. How could he not know where she was and how could she, who lived in Steamboat for many years, not know where she was?

He was frustrated and put the phone on speaker and sat down signalling me he needed something stronger than coffee to drink. I poured him a double Jameson.

"You have to come and get me. I can't find the jeep now." Amanda said on speaker. "There must be like 70,000 people here and I can't see it for the people."

"Manda, Ima not in Colorado, Ima in New Hampshire and we don't own a jeep." Weasil patiently explained rolling his eyes.

"Oh, and someone stole our tent but didn't take what was inside it. WHO DOES THAT?" She whined.

Who indeed I wondered.

"Does this happen often?" I asked him in a soft voice and he shrugged. So who knows?

"Are ya with anyone?" He tried again.

"I was with some friends, but they are in the caves smoking weed."

"Caves? Rifle Falls?" He muttered and then shook his head no, it couldn't be.

"And what were you smoking?" I asked out loud not meaning to.

"Shrooms." She said brightly.

"Shrooms?" I repeated looking puzzled at Weasil.

"Mushrooms. You were smoking mushrooms?" He asked incredulously his voice hitting a high pitch.

"No, eating them. They make me feel very funny like I am floating and seeing things. Lots of pretty colours."

Seeing things like white jeeps, CD collections and the band Phish I thought to meself.

"What kind of mushrooms were you eating?" Weasil asked getting scientific.

"I dunno, mushrooms. Some yogi kind of guy had 'em and he told us they would enhance our listening pleasure. So I ate some." She explained in a dreamy voice.

"How many?" I asked, getting into the mix.

"I dunno, a few . . . ok a lot."

"Manda, Ima like seventeen hundred kilometres from Colorado. It ain't like I can get there in a few minutes." Weasil said exasperation creeping into his voice.

"Oh here's Charlie and Krista now." She said and we could hear voices just as zoned out as her own and not able to make out any of it.

"Gotta go now." She said.

"NO! Wait hold on," Weasil said suddenly sitting up and forward as if he could reach out and stop her from hanging up the phone.

"You know this Charlie and Krista?" I asked Weasil.

"Nopers, never heard of 'em."

"Oh good," I said, "your wife is someplace in Colorado (she thinks), eating psychedelic mushrooms, oh excuse me, shrooms, and thinks she owns a white jeep, she doesn't and owns a vast stolen CD collection, which doesn't exist according to you, AND she's listening to the band Phish with people you don't know, AND her tent have been stolen."

"That about sums it up." He said taking a healthy swig of the Jameson.

We could hear arguing faintly but couldn't make it out.

"SO?"

"So what?" He asked me.

"So what are you going to do. This is worrisome is it not?"

"Well, sorter." He said looking at the Jameson like he'd never seen it before. "I'd call 911 but where would I tell them to go?" He asked looking straight at me.

"Amanda, it's Gabe, can I speak with Charlie please?" I asked since Weasil seemed stymied.

"Uhhh . . . he's arguing with some bearded guy right now." Her voice drifted off.

We could hear what sounded like slaps or punches and grunts then scuffling about. I raised me eyebrows at Weasil who downed the Jameson and poured himself another.

I poured one too because the sounds from the speakerphone were rather concerning. I could hear a woman shouting, "If you hit him again, I'll brain your sorry ass." And then SLAP and then a clunk like a boat oar coming down on someone's noggin. Weasil's mouth was an O and mine was too, as we looked with big eyes at each other.

"OKAY AMANDA WHAT THE BLOODY HELL ARE YOU DOING?" I shouted.

"Beating the crap out of this loser who hit Charlie with a CD. WAIT A MINUTE THAT'S MY CD. HEY, JERK FACE THOSE ARE MINE!" Amanda shouted and we could hear her feet running and then nothing.

"Hello? Hello?" Weasil said into the speaker.

"Hello, who's this?" A woman's voice said.

"Ima Manda's husband." He said.

"Oh hi, this is Krista Sloane how are you?"

He looked at me like WHAT? Really? This was happening? His wife runs off after someone with what we thought might be a boat oar and Krista is making small talk?

"Uh, Ima fine. How are you?" He says back and I can't stand it so I punched him in the arm and mouthed where is Amanda at?

"Ow, where is Manda?" He asked holding his arm.

"Oh, she's fine, she's probably going to get the kayak ready for the rapids down the river," Krista said in a dreamy voice. "The good news is we may have located her 250 CDs."

I stood there shaking my head no at him.

"Not gonna happen Weas, you better do something and do it fast." I hissed at him.

"Wait Krista was it? I heard her run after some fellow about a CD." Weasil tried.

"Oh yeah, she did and she hit him a good smack, he's lying on the ground out cold. She got the CD and now she's headed for the river. We think the guy in the first kayak has the rest of the CDs and that's where she went."

"Holy Shite dude," I said to him, "THAT isn't good. If she's high on shrooms and headed for the rapids . . . in a kayak yet, AND if she clobbers the guy she THINKS has her so-called CDs, well lawsuit, are you crazy?"

"ME crazy? She's the one eating shrooms and headed for the rapids in a kayak." It was then he realised the enormity of the situation. "Gabe, what should I be a doin'?"

"I . . . I . . . I . . . dunno." I said stupidly because I didn't.

"Krista, you still there?" I said into the speaker.

"Yup, on my way to the river, got the oars." She said like everything was hunky-dory.

"Can you stop Amanda from going on the river?" I asked starting to feel a little fright at the thought of Amanda high as a kite, in a kayak with a stolen CD, paddling in rapids somewhere in Colorado with people who were as sketchy as she was.

"Sorry guy she's already gone I can just see her caught in the Big Catch," Krista said the sound of oars falling to the ground loud and clear that she was getting ready to go in the rapids too.

"What is the Big Catch?" I asked.

"It is a particularly rocky basin that runs deep and the currents are treacherous at best, it used to be called Devil's Pot. But someone got killed there and they changed it to the Big Catch. I think someone was high on drugs when they renamed it."

"Ya think?" I threw at Weasil. I shrugged, I had no clue what to do.

"Too late to do a damn. She'll be fine." Weasil said. Then into the phone, he said, "Have a safe trippy Krista," and he hung up.

"DUDE!" I said just then realising I was using the old hippie Colorado lingo I was hearing in the background of the phone call.

Weas poured another Jameson, I think it was his sixth and sat back relaxed. He closed his eyes and said, "She's got an insurance policy if anything happens."

"That's all you care about?" I was flabbergasted.

"No, but she does what she does and I can't do a thing about it," and he sighed as though he were Pontius Pilate and washed his hands of the whole affair.

I sat down in my chair, me mouth agape staring at him. We sat in silence for a good long time. The time to turn on lights came and neither of us moved. We did finish off the Jameson though. Tonya came in and turned on the lights asking why we were sitting in the dark. Weasil grunted something like "Oh, is it dark?" and I asked "What time is it?" and she decided when she saw the empty bottle that we were useless, and we were, so she left us to it. I think we both passed out after several times biding one another good night because we both woke up in the chairs we had been sitting in the day before. To say we were both walking like herons hunting fish is an understatement. I am still sore in me back and limb from the long night of horrible dreams of Amanda using CDs like Ninja Stars she aimed at the back of some hairy man in a kayak as they both bumped and flew down the rapids. I woke up to her on a rocky shore beating the fellow over the head with her kayak. Thank God I woke up it was not a pleasant dream. Weasil looked like he had pretty much the same dream as me.

In case you're wondering news came three YES COUNT THEM THREE days later from Amanda herself that she was just fine and dandy. When asked about the concert she didn't know what we were talking about. CDs? No one has CDs anymore. Charlie and Krista who? Mushrooms, oh yeah there was some vague memory of eating a few mushrooms, but no, no can't remember beyond that. My question was where did you wake up three days ago? Three days ago? She must have been tired she slept for three days and woke up at her hotel in Glenwood Springs.

OK THEN.

"Looks like you won't be cashing in on her insurance policy anytime soon," I said to Weasil.

"Nope, nope, nopers, not this timey." He said looking wistful.

"Are you going to tell her about her embarrassing phone call?" I asked.

"Nope, let her little brain believe she was sleeping for three days. I think she'd be horrified if she knew the truth and well . . . there is always next time. And Gabe, there will be a next time."

Well, if that's the case I hope she calls him someplace other than my abode. It took a lot out of me to think she was in dire straits and not being able to do a thing about it. Unlike the husband who seemed to now find it all amusing. I tell ya!

Gabe
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