"Wakey, wakey." "Two days till my birthday cakey." "Sleepy, sleepy." "Please shut upy." "Did you get me a present yet?" "Randy!" "Randy." "Yeah, I'm glad you brought that up." "Since I'm gonna be a little older in a few days," "I'd like you to start calling me by my proper name" " Randolph." "Your name's Randal." "It is?" "!" "Is that even a real name?" "I mean, Randolph's a name I've actually heard before." "Like Randolph Hitler." "Randal sounds so weird." "I mean, mom and dad might as well have named me pork chop." "Pork chop Hickey." "Hey, I kind of like that." "Earl, will you...?" "No, I will not." "I'll just make it my birthday wish then." "Randy, you can't say your wish, or it won't come true." "Damn it!" "Next year." "Good morning, Earl." "Good morning, Randy." "I put a lot of thought into randy's birthday present this year, and even though it was two days early, it wasn't the kind of thing I could hide in the closet." "Nice ride, Earl." "Thanks." "It's a birthday present for randy." "This is nicer than your car." "I know he's your brother, but" "I'd like to remind you that for my last birthday, you gave me a mug that said happy Bat Mitzvah." "I thought it meant "happy birthday" in spanish." "Besides, it's not just a birthday gift." "I'm crossing something off the list." "#213:" "never let Randy have anything better than me." "Our whole lives, whenever me and Randy got stuff," "I always just took the better thing for myself." "Randy, you'd look so cool in this thing." "Whether it was stuff we stole..." "Men wear these?" "...or girls." "Sorry." "I'm saving myself for marriage." "I'm not." "Well, this one's mine." "So, uh, do you want to talk about the Lord?" "All right." "Even when we moved into the motel." "Bad news, Randy." "Your side's got a big blood stain on it." "Randy deserves to finally get something better than me." "And he's always loved Rancheros." "They're his favorite kind of car." "And eggs." "Hey, Randy..." "Not now." "It's catch your own lunch day." "He's picking himself an entree." "I bet this was more fun when they were alive." "It's not my fault." "The water heats up under the lights." "The good news is, you can eat the crab right out of the prize slot." "I know it's two days early, but I got you your birthday present." "Really cool one." "So, a parking space." "What made you think of that?" "Well, uh, I know how you're always jealous of handicapped people 'cause they get their own spots." "I can't believe someone stole it!" "There was a reason I was so surprised my car had been stolen." "In Camden county, there were only two rules.... never snitch, and crooks don't steal from other crooks." "Earl?" "Earl!" "Creepy Rodney?" "What the hell, man!" "I'm sorry, buddy." "I didn't know it was you." "Man, I'm a jerk." "No biggie." "When did you start working with the rock?" "What happened to your knife?" "Rocks are misdemeanors." "Good to know." "Come on, Joy." "I just want to know who's been stealing cars around town." "Tell you who's not stealing cars." "That dipstick who carjacked me-- found him sleeping in the brat." "Beat the snot out of him with that razor scooter i've been riding around on." "Long story short, got the brat back, but the razor scooter pulls to the left." "Look, I don't need to know who's not ripping off cars." "I need to know who is." "Crap!" "Stole my bait." "Fish are too damn smart." "I'm gonna have to dumb 'em down." "Baby, you're undermining the spirit of the game." "This ain't the olympics, Darnell." "It's a freakin' buffet." "Look, Earl, you were smart to come to me." "I am excellent at solving mysteries." "45 minutes into CSI, I always know what happened." "So give me a little more info." "The car was just stolen from the parking lot five minutes ago." "Was it a stick shift?" "No." "Automatic." "On the column, or on the floor?" "Column." "Why?" "You're looking for Clyde Fowler and his little buddy Bedbug." "How can you possibly know that?" "Clyde and Bedbug were in here this morning saying they were looking to steal a car." "Damn it, Darnell, I was mind-freaking him!" "I went way back with clyde and bedbug." "I knew them when they were just clyde and clyde's friend from out of town." "Earl Hickey." "Well, this is a blast from the past." "Hey, how is that hot wife of yours?" "Didn't she run off with some black dude, but you didn't do nothin' because you found Jesus, or his grocery list or something?" "I made a list of all the things i've done wrong." "Was number one letting some black dude steal your woman?" "yeah, so, uh, anyway, fellas, the reason I stopped by is that ranchero there." "Ain't she a beauty?" "!" "She sure is, yeah." "Here's the thing." "The car is mine." "You're kidding me." "Sorry." "I hate to bring you down off what I'm sure was a real good stealing high, but I should probably just, you know, take the car and get going." "Well, no, no, no, look." "I-I hate to bring you down from what must be a real good i-found-my-car high, but... you're not getting that ranchero back." "What are you talking about, Clyde?" "It's me." "Guys like us have a rule." "But you ain't "guys like us" no more." "You see, chief, nowadays, you fall more in the, uh, civilian, slash, victim column of the ledger." "Look, I don't know what a ledger is, but I've paid my dues, and I'll be damned if you two losers are gonna keep my car!" "I don't think W likes your tone, Earl." "But we're reasonable people." "You can have the car back." "For $1,500." "Hell, no!" "I'm not buying it back." "We're taking this problem to mr." "Wallace." "Mr. Wallace was Camden's oldest, toughest and most respected criminal." "So, when two crooks had a beef, they went to him." "He also worked part-time as a crossing guard for the health insurance." "Hold it, boys, hold it." "I have a client." "Okay, I've heard enough." "Earl, you are no longer one of us." "You want the car back, you'll have to pay." "Pay?" "!" "That's bullcrap!" "Hey, watch your language there!" "And if you ever come to me again with a problem this small," "I will shoot you in the face and splatter your brains all over this crosswalk, and everybody in it." "But not on you, sweetheart." "We wouldn't want to ruin that pretty little dress, hmm?" "As soon as I paid up and got the car back," "I went straight over to the Crab Shack togiveRandyhis presentASAP ." "I decided I wasn't gonna let those two dirtbags ruin what was gonna be a great birthday." "Randy deserved this car, no matter what the judge said about his driving." "Didn't matter how much it cost me." "The look on his face was gonna make everything worth it." "Um, another parking space." "Son of a bitch!" "It's one thing not to be treated like a fellow criminal, but stealing my car twice?" "!" "Now they're treating me like a punk." "You are a punk, sitting here complaining like a little bitch." "The old Earl would just get drunk, go steal a city bus, and drive it right through their kitchen." "Of course, if you were the old Earl, they wouldn't have stolen your car in the first place." "True that." "Oh, what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to make a stupid ass list." "You know, I hate to say it, but if they're gonna treat me like a civilian, I might have to act like one." "I might have to go to the police." "Earl, you can't snitch!" "You know the order." "Regular people, fat people, cops, al qaeda, stuff you squeeze out of a zit, and then snitches." "Well, then, I don't know what to do, but I got to get Randy's car back." "When did you move fat people above al qaeda and stuff inside a zit?" "Saw this thing on dateline about thyroids." "Broke my heart." "I was so mixed up, I went walking for hours." "Before I knew it, I was near the police station, but I still wasn't prepared to go in." "I had to work out all the pros and minuses." "Joy might be right about the code, but Clyde and Bedbug said themselves, I'm not one of them anymore." "But snitches are the lowest of the low." "Do I want to be known as that?" "No way." "Well, what do I care what a bunch of lowlifes think of me?" "I don't." "I-I'm lying." "I do care." "But Randy deserves that car, and I'm gonna make sure he gets it." "Thank you." "In the end, the most important thing was getting randy's car back, so what choice did I have?" "So, your car's been stolen." "Man, that's the pits." "Well, sit down, we'll fill out some forms." "By the way, there's coffee and a bundt cake in the break room if you're an emotional eater." "Guilty as charged, your honor." "Look, I was hoping we could skip the forms, and I'd just tell you who did this-- off the record, just between us-- and you could go get my car?" "You know who did it?" "That's great." "Finding out who did it is the part of this job that I hate." "Who was it?" "Clyde Fowler and Bedbug." "Wow, Earl." "I never pegged you for a snitch." "I wasn't left with a lot of choices." "Well, you know what snitches get." "Their tongues cut out?" "No." "You get to pick a prize from our goodie drawer." "We got anything you could want in here." "We've got candy, trinkets, novelties." "How about my self-respect?" "You sure?" "We got comic books, pizza coupons, marijuana." "That's not supposed to be in here." "I walked around for a while hating the fact that I snitched," "But what was done was done." "At least it was all over." "Or maybe not." "I agree." "It's probably got something to do with you snitching." "Earl, there's a present in the sink from either a very large dog or a very small man." "Well, Clyde's got one of each." "How the hell did they find out about this?" "What are you looking at me for?" "I am a trained professional." "I would never compromise the identity of a..." "Check that, I did it." "Hey, Nichols." "Looks like the contest for most arrests this month is over." "Earl Hickey just fingered Clyde Fowler and Bedbug for all those car thefts." "So, it looks like I'm the one going to sunny Tallahassee." "How do you spell Hickey?" "Uh, it's H-I..." "I got to see the letters in front of me-- give it here." "What did we do before texting?" "You ever think about that?" "Might as well just take you to Clyde's house so you can bring him in, since they know I'm talking to the stupid cops now anyway." "Hey, watch the tongue." "I remind you, I'm the only one here with a gun." "Aw, crap." "Hope I left it in the cruiser." "Where is my car, dirtbags?" "Easy, Earl, easy." "I'm the one with the badge." "Oh, that, too?" "I swear, it's like there's little gremlins around." "Would you just ask him about the damn car?" "Right-- gentlemen," "I'm gonna need you to tell me where you're keeping the stolen ranchero." "Stolen ranchero?" "There's no stolen ranchero here." "Rancheros?" "We don't need no stinkin' rancheros." "You got to be kidding me!" "That's it?" "What else can I do?" "The case has gone cold." "These guys are crafty." "Crafty?" "The smartest guy in there was the dog." "They're idiots who happened to know we were coming ahead of time because you're a horrible police officer." "I know when people look at me, all they see is the gun and the badge." "You don't even..." "When I have them." "But under this uniform is a human being with feelings, okay?" "Getting laughed at did two things:" "Piss me off and convince me I had to steal their lowrider and trade it back for my ranchero." "Problem solved." "Would you mind looking at me?" "We are in the middle of a conversation." "Fine." "Just like my sister." "If I was gonna steal Clyde's lowrider, I needed help." "Hey, Jasper." "You know anyone who's good at hot-wiring a car?" "I mean, not someone too expensive, but maybe a college kid looking for their first break." "I have no idea what you're talking about." "I'm a legitimate businessman." "Snitch." "What?" "Snitch." "Wait, wait, wait, I..." "I'm saying "snitch," you stupid, deaf tattletale." "Obviously, you talk a lot better than you hear." "Great-- now my throat really is scratchy." "Go to hell." "When my room got tossed," "I was hoping only Clyde and Bedbug had found out about me talking to the cops, but now that Jasper knew," "I was wondering who else did." "Hey, Creepy Rodney." "Snitch!" "Snitch, snitch!" "Apparently, everybody." "Heads up, Earl." "Mr. Wallace is over there" "He offered big Damien $50 to puncture your kidney with a pool cue." "Maybe you should do your drinking someplace else for a while." "PJ stackers out on the interstate is nice..." "Duck!" "No point intended, but that should be your cue." "I should have known this would have happened." "As soon as I helped out the other team, I got kicked off my own." "But, even if everyone else turned on me," "I knew I could always count on Randy." "Good news, Randy." "We're going stealing." "Oh, my god, the stealing bag." "It still smells like crime." "That's right, Randy." "It's gonna be like the good ol' days." "I can't tell you everything, 'cause it's kind of a tricky job, but we're stealing a lowrider." "The first thing we have to deal with is a big dog, so I crushed up a bunch of sleeping pills and put them in some peanut butter crackers." "What did you say about peanut butter... sleepy..." "Good night, Randy." "Since Randy ate the pills, I had to come up with a new plan." "Fortunately, like Clyde and Bedbug, W was a big drinker, too." "I hadn't kept up on all the latest trade craft, but I figured hot-wiring a car was like riding a bike or shoplifting it'd come back to me." "It didn't." "I just couldn't leave without taking something" "I could trade back to Clyde, and once again, I had to come up with a new plan." "Pull your trashcan to the side of the road, and put your hands in the hair." "Hey, there, officer Hoyne." "I was just taking my garbage can out... for a run." "Save it, Earl" "I've been staking this place out since you said I was such a bad cop." "Well, I'm not such a bad cop now, am I?" "I said, "put your hands in the air."" "Ah!" "My god!" "Look, just give me some info on somebody else, and you can go." "Fine." "I know a lazy cop who didn't wash his hands when he used the bathroom." "That's very funny." "For your information, I didn't touch anything." "Look, I'm not snitching again." "Why would I give you more information?" "It seems like the only person you ever arrest is me." "Come on, Earl." "There's lots of fun stuff in the goodie drawer." "We got little yo-yos, we got jelly beans." "Lip smackers for the lady snitch." "Oh, and we got those little toys where you push the button and the guy falls down." "Remember these?" "I did remember those." "I remembered all of those." "People could have gotten those prizes from anywhere, like a dentist office or a clown's yard sale." "But at this point, I had lost everything and was willing to roll the dice." "Okay..." "I'm ready to talk." "Great." "So, I gave him some information about who was mugging people coming out of the library." "And if my hunch was right, the rest of the work would be done for me." "Hey, hey, hey, felony?" "No!" "Rock is a misdemeanor." "Sorry." "Rock got upgraded to a class A weapon." "Fyi, a stick is still a misdemeanor, as long as it's not too pointy and weighs less than your run-of-the-mill rock." "Wait, I'll talk." "You know I always have good information." "Joy Turner shoplifts from the bargain bag every time the security guard does his afternoon dialysis." "Just like dominoes, as soon as one was pushed, the rest started falling." "This is ri-donk-ulous." "I was wearing ten pair of panties when I walked into that store." "uh-uh, hold up." "Jasper Murphy tried to sell me a chinese baby the other day." "Man, of course I know their names, man." "These are my children." "Um, that one's Yao Ming." "And... and this one's, uh, general Tso." "And... and this little guy's, um..." "Hitachi." "Okay, okay." "Clyde and Bedbug don't just steal cars." "Turns out a chain is only as strong as its weakest link, and the chain of criminals in Camden county were all weak links." "I found out, when push came to shove, everybody was a snitch." "But even better, they found out that I knew." "Hey, Rodney." "Turns out criminals snitching on criminals was the oldest game in Camden." "Snitch." "Everybody played." "New flavor of lip smackers, Joy?" "What, now you're a snitch and a spy?" "You ought to be ashamed." "Even the hall of famers." "Well, well, mr." "Wallace." "I see you took the yo-yo over the fake teeth, which is surprising, since it seems like you've become very chatty." "Fine, you got me." "I've been in the game 70 years, and I'm not letting a punk like you take me down." "How about I give you the same deal I gave Frankie Avalon?" "I'll make you a star." "Ever wanted to make a record?" "I got something else in mind." "Mr. Wallace still had a lot of juice, 'cause by the next morning, I had Randy's present back." "Look what I got you." "I already had her." "Not great." "Not me, jerk." "The car." "For me?" "But this car is better than yours." "That's the point." "Happy birthday, Randy." "Or, if it makes you uncomfortable, we can trade." "Thanks again, Earl." "You're welcome, pork chop." "Karma Team experts.heberg-forum.net"