Pet Peeves

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Laguna Medley

By Mark D. Crantz
By Mark D. Crantz

I read the Indy cover to cover. I think I’m a better person for it. My wife agrees. She says the Indy gives her a break from me. She needs her alone time. So, let’s be real quiet while my wife re-finds her center. In the meantime, allow me to regale readers with Indy news of the last few months, the way I read it. It’s slightly twisted, but a nice medley to hum. I dare you to try getting it out of your head.

There was a Whalen sighting. Whalen watchers say the mammal wasn’t migrating north or south. He spouted off plans to stay right here to run for city council and finish unfinished city business.

Michael Ray, an Indy columnist, kayaked out to be the first to get Whalen’s musings on the coast. But before Ray could come a stern to Whalen, Rich German, a Laguna resident broadsided him. German is known as the “dolphin whisperer,” and Ray took umbrage. “Hey, German I got dibs on the Whalen interview. His name says it all. Stick to talking to dolphins. That’s your barrel of fish,” reprimanded Ray.

German wasn’t having any of it. “Listen up good, you old man and the sea, whales and dolphins are mammals, not fish.

Michele McCormick a psychologist and Indy columnist of “Inside Out,” intervened. “Boys, boys, don’t fight. There are plenty of creatures in the sea. Just ask the “Shore Scene” columnists and snorkel ladies, who have managed never to say “yucky, icky or run for your lives,” in reporting. So, let’s take a breath topside and talk it out.”

The boys weren’t listening and continued to hit each other with paddles. Michele sighed and tried another tact. “If you take my advice, you don’t have to pay me in greenbacks. I’ll take sand dollars. Wait. That’s no good. Pay me in sea glass. I don’t want to hear about wrecking the California coastline from Tom Osborne, Indy’s “Green Light” columnist. “Yes, sea glass will work. I just have to be careful not to be harpooned as Captain Ahab in Osborne’s soon-to-be published history book. You can’t come back from a tell all like that.”

Before the boys could agree to the method of payment, another renowned paddle boarder made his entrance. Billy Fried, Indy’s “Kibitzer” columnist glided up smoothly to port side having just arrived from Cuba and Costa Rica.

Ray nodded a greeting and said, “Are you here to interview Whalen?” “No, I’m not,” replied Fried. German, who wasn’t listening, but catching up with a dolphin reminiscing about his Pacific Mammal Center stay, looked up and asked, “Are you here to interview Whalen?” Fried shook his head no. Ray and German then asked together, “What brings you out here, Billy?” Fried replied, “I had a dream to build the next ‘Burning Man’ out at sea. If I build it, they will come.”

McCormick, who had come without a floatation device, began to tire from treading water and sputtered, “Let’s get back to land and sort out the Whalen, Burning Man stuff. What do you say, guys?”

“Okay,” the columnists agreed. “On the count of three, the last one in gets their head examined by Susan McNeal Velasquez, Indy’s “Wisdom Workout” columnist.

“Land Ho.” And waiting in the surf to welcome Whalen to shore were more Indy columnists with more questions. Ann Christoph, Roderick Reed, and James Utt yelled above the crashing waves, “Do you think Laguna’s city budget is in better shape than Puerto Rico’s? And yo, we picked up sea glass to get Whalen dibs.”

And that brings to an end village matters for the last couple months. Honey, I finished the paper. Are you centered, yet? I’m still half a bubble off center, myself.

Crantz suggests to Indy readers who can’t get this medley out of their heads to buck up and take stock with Tony Crowell. He knows a winning tune when he hears it.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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