"Norman Pappy Mailloux: old time East Coast Mafia soldier & all-around yarn spinner."

And, dam*, could he ever put Italian food together!

Rainy Sunday Afternoon Bunk House Memories

Over there in Phoenix, I guess it was that big shelter on some street with a name like West Madison, that's where 'ole Pappy held court in the corner reserved for bonafide veterans.

I guess you could say that thanks to around half a dozen of us, Pappy even had his very own little Palace Guard.

And so, among his listeners and homes there were Alvin Lee, a Native American, along with Michael Kennedy and David St. John, two tall, lean, quiet and thoughtful Anglo hardcases.

Plus there was a little black American ex-French Foreign Legion veteran of a modern legionary's two and a half year contract, reserved for Americans and West Europeans only, as he told us, who went by the name of Eric Porter.

Eric was a twenty-something dapper, Gregory Hines look-alike with a really cool and whimsical sense of humour.

And of course, there was your humble servant.

I guess you could say we were all people persons, thus we were also good listeners.

And when it came to spinning yarns, that Army-Navy veteran of the nineteen fifties, Pappy, that old timey malacarni or Mafia soldier, was as good at telling stories as he was in making fantastic Italian cold-cut sandwiches with fresh baked Italian deli bread.

Pappy's stories really rocked, you can just well believe it.

Something of a homespun philosopher, Pappy's favorite advice offered freely to all hoods, past, present, real, or merely wannabe was the same:

Son, if you can't do the time, then don't do the crime.

And, you all want to know something?

That's what bunk house stories are all about!

Whether over there in Phoenix in December of 2000, or at Johnny Johnson's Beach Comber Place in Singapore in February of 1969.

Like the guy with the super white teeth, and that big 'ole grin who clutches his gold plated pick axe in those UTEP adds on so many billboards around El Paso is all the time telling us:

You just gotta believe!

¡Ora, UTEP! ¡Ora, MEChA! ¡Ora, DESTINO!