Last week a homeless guy wandered into our church to tell me about his conversation with Satan. I took notes because I am absolutely going to work this into a story someday. Here's what I've got:

Physical description: lean, leathery, neatly trimmed white beard and hair; estimated age sixty-ish; certainly does not "look" homeless/crazy/etc. He wore a wedding ring. His tee shirt was on inside-out and backwards because, he said, there was a picture of George W. Bush on the front. 

    My nine-year-old buddy, A, scared me silly when she said that she'd seen horrible things in a women's locker room.

    Paralyzed, I was afraid to ask for details.

    "I saw spiders," she continued, completely unaware of my reaction. "A huge nest of spiders!"

    I wish that spiders were the worst things I've ever seen in a locker room. Some things you can never unsee, and no amount of therapy will ever help....

First Date Don’ts #4 – 

Don’t start planning on the colors of the wedding and the names of your future children.

My daughter is in the Army National Guard and is planning to invade Russia...as an exercise they're conducting over the summer in a Midwestern state about as far from the Russian front as you can get. She was talking tanks, artillery, and strategy, and I suggested that she include a Zombie Seal Team Six.

She said that her commander has no sense of humor. I told her that if I were her commander, I would reward creativity. 

Which is why, I suppose, I will never be an Army officer in charge of anything.

"When I walked into the yard everything went quiet. The kids all stopped and stared at me.... All those little bright eyes on me were just waiting to get back to the business of noise. Not one of them looked hungry or tired. And I'm willing to bet that they would look back on the days of Mrs. Harris's yard with the greatest pleasure. Running wild with the animals before the hunters started tracking them down."

--from Black Betty by Walter Mosely

"Jackson Blue had a brilliant mind, he might have been a genius, but he was cowardly and blustery to the core. If he could have put it in a jar, Jackson would have sold his soul for tonight's dinner or, even better, for fifteen minutes with a whore.

"If there is a God he was drinking or mad the night he put Jackson together. Scrawny, lying, and afraid of his own footsteps, Jackson was one of the many friends who would never abandon me--he had nowhere else to go.

"The same God who made Jackson Blue took a crocodile to make the man I was facing.

"JBW of Webster, MA, got a free ride from police after refusing to leave a bar on May 5. But as he sat in the back seat, he repeatedly called 911. Finally the officers pulled over to make him stop, but he became uncooperative when officers tried to put handcuffs on. JBW was charged with misuse of the 911 system and interfering with an officer."

"In her youth Dana might have had a figure that wouldn't quit, but now it has. Her skin sags, her stomach pouches out, and she uses Scotch tape to pull up her wrinkles, up in her hairline where she thinks it doesn't show. Her voice is deep, husky from years of smoking. She should have been Empress of Transylvania, but ha to settle for being the bug up everyone's ass."

--As Dead as it Gets by Cady Kalian

"My first opinion of the unknown male as he lay on the ground...was that our new neighbor had a certain something, enough of a something for me to contemplate Ex-boyfriend possibilities. Not that he was really my neighbor; I didn't live at home anymore, but perhaps it was time for more regular visits."

--Curse of the Spellmans by Lisa Lutz