"Oh they think I'm a greeter at the Wal Marks, but actually I'm more of a bouncer"....

--Apple.

I'm not sure if I believe my friend Apple anymore. He's only like 68 or 71, it just depends on which day you ask him how old he is, so I'm almost certain he's not senile or anything, but I do think he has a problem with telling the truth. A few weeks ago he told me this young gentleman ingested some bath salts, then he got in the bathtub and gave himself tattoo's with a curling iron, then got out and ran around the street naked until he found a "Bear Cave", then he went in it wanting to kick the Bears ass. Apple then told me this guy was asking if this was a "Black Bear cave or a Grizzly Bear cave?" Because he figures he could take a black bear 1 on 1, but if it's Grizzly Cubs, he wanted to pray about it first. After elaborating about the man's fear of Grizzly Bears but not so much Black Bears, Apple informed me that this particular cave was actually no cave at all, but it was the Wal Marks on Rogers Ave......Where Apple just happened to be doing his 4 hour shift as the Greeter that particular day. 

I thought initially this was the most awesome story I've ever been told and I couldn't wait to read about it in the paper or watch it on the local news from a professional point of view, with witness accounts and everything. I thought maybe they'd even quote Apple about his run in with this psycho drug addict. This story never broke though. I later asked Apple why the media never found out about such an encounter and he basically told me that his job is to keep things like this quiet. He said before he got hired at the Wal Marks, they did an extensive background check on him. He's a former Marine and supposedly participated in some Black Recon missions in Viet Nam in the early 60's before the U.S. really got involved. He told me the goal of the Wal Marks is to hire old, brittle looking people to look like greeters, but in actuality they are more like undercover Bouncers or Security. He proceeded to tell me that he doesn't tell me half of the shit that goes on at the front doors of the Wal Marks because he's always taking care of their business and covering it up, so that regular people like you and I aren't afraid to shop there(Although I still am, even knowing that Apple is undercover and protecting all of us). 

So anyway, Apple told me all of this while we were in the sauna (And fwiw me and Apple are the only 2 men in this gym apparently, that use the sauna with at least some swimtrunk's or a towel around us) and I didn't even flinch or call bullshit like I wanted to. Then I decided I should tell him a true story that happened to me. It was something I had to get off my chest and only Melissa and like 2 other people know about this, I think I told Justin and Clint(I guess now the cat is officially out of the bag though)....But about 2 and a half weeks ago, on the first Tuesday of this semester I had a night class. Before I go too far into it I just want to say that every effing 1st Tuesday of a new semester sucks for me since I've attended institutions of higher learning. I think this makes like my 8th semester that I've attended somebodies University in my lifetime, and I can remember every 1st Tuesday sucking for me for some reason. Shit, I even did a blog about it last semester. Just everything goes wrong. So that night it was raining cats and dogs. I know people always say that as an expression of sarcasm or whatever, but it literally was fucking raining cats and dogs, on my way to school I had 3 German Shepard's and a poodle land on my car and I think possibly a tabby cat. Real talk. So of course I get to school like 3 minutes before class starts and not one parking spot can be found in the general area of my class. I then have to park like 6 miles away. It's dark, raining and I already know I'm gonna be late. I've parked in this same parking lot several times. Some of you might recall that this was the same parking lot that I crossed the street (not using a city marked cross walk) and got a Jay Walking warning ticket last September. I didn't even know they really gave Jay Walking tickets to people before this, I thought it was just a myth. Well I've made it a point since that day to always use the crosswalk and follow the rules. For the better part of the last 6 years or so, I think I've been a pretty responsible adult and I try to stay in line and follow all the rules, even the little miniscule ones that I don't agree with, like stopping at a red light when no one's coming or not throwing eggs at people, that type of shit. But this particular day I had no choice. I just took off across the street, rain hitting my face, wind blowing hard in my ears, dodging falling dogs and cats and shit and all of a sudden I hear this whistle. Like a whistle the coach blows when you're playing dodgeball in Junior High. I glanced to my left and about 50 or 60 meters away was the same campus cop that looks just like Sgt. Hooks from Police Academy that gave me my warning ticket.

Without hesitating I just took off in a full sprint. About 5 feet into my escape I realized "What the FUCK am I doing? I'm 32 years old, I'm married and have a little kid at home!" This isn't something that someone my age should be doing, but now it was too late. I had already committed and now if I turned back, I would surely get more than a warning ticket. I did the old trick when you're playing manhunt and you have to throw someone off your trail by zig zagging down different trails. I think I went through every building on the campus until I was sure I lost her. In fact, I'm not even 100 percent sure she was chasing me, but just in case she was, I couldn't take any chances. So it basically not only ruined my whole night, but pretty much my whole week. I just kept worrying that maybe she had a good description of me or my vehicle and any day they would come up with some kind of arrest warrant and come take me out of class with her screaming at me "DON'T MOVE, DIRTBAG!" Shit, I'm not even sure what the statute of limitations is for running from a campus cop, but I'll just go ahead and assume she doesn't read my blog and if she does, "It wasn't really me."

After I told Apple this, he just couldn't fathom it. He pretty much called me a liar. After sharing such a heartfelt story with him, I won't lie to you, I was feeling pretty insulted. I mean his story was totally legit but mine was just way too far fetched? Whatever dude. But now I have a new goal. It's hard for me to go to the gym when I'm content with life. I am already married to the love of my life, so I have no females to impress, no bonus clause in my contract to stay in shape and really no motivation to go to the gym anymore other than not having a heart attack when I'm 50. But soon after Apple pretty much shit all over my story, he asked me what my fitness goals were now that I'm getting back into it. I never told him what I was really thinking because he's old and ridiculous. But my fitness goal is pretty much just to work out hard enough so that I could kick Apple's ass if he were ever to try and attack me. When I'm running on the treadmill or swimming laps, I'm pretending that Apple tried to put me in a death grip and I have to bitch slap him in his throat or something, and it gives me that extra swag to run that extra mile or swim that extra lap. And sometimes now that the pain of him thinking I am nothing but a bullshitter has somewhat worn off, I will have to imagine that I'm at the park with Mariah and some child molester tries to kidnap her and I have to not only be able to hawk him down from behind, but I have to be in good enough shape to kick his ass after the chase. So pretty much those are my new fitness goals. Just be able to beat up a 70 year old, or a guy that preys on the little children. I don't want to be able to cage fight or anything, just be able to beat up average people in case me or my family are ever threatened I guess.

Keeping it realer than your cousin Chris who injects bath salts into his arm on the reg and tells you he took too much tylenol PM!

Red

"All he does is sit back urr on his ace and plays that dame Intenda!"--Red Hicks affectionately referring to me in elementary school.  
                               
                                                     Red being one with the animals.

 

I'm dedicating this one mostly to my dad, Red Hicks. A few years ago when I heard about that guy that had a twitter account dedicated to the "Shit his dad says", I was so effing pissed. My dad is a whole lot funnier than that dick, and if that was clever enough to get a TV show on CBS, my dad would have had a 30 minute show, every Sunday night on HBO. My dad keeps it realer than Charles Barkley and is a tad bit funnier because his country accent goes just as hard. And yes, he keeps it too real, not the perfect amount of real like I do, which is always hilarious. When has keeping it too real not resulted in a laugh? First, before I get too far and in case you're one of the few people on the planet that never ran into my dad in public (because if you ever ran into him in public, I guarantee you he'd talk to you because he doesn't meet strangers), I probably need to educate you on a few things that comes pretty standard in a Red Hicks conversation. Red already stands out in a crowd because he's like a titty nipple away from being 6 foot 7 inches tall and he weighs close to 300. But what stands out most about him, is his unique language. The first and probably most important thing you'll need to understand is a "Redism."  

Redism; Turning any noun you can possibly think of (and I do mean ANY noun) into an action verb.

EXAMPLES

Mike: Uh dad, have you seen my drivers license? 

Red: Oh, I'll drivers license ya. 

Mike: Hey dad, can you turn on that lamp?

Red: Oh, I'll lamp ur punk ace.

Mike: Woods, lets go in there and beat up my dad real quick before he can get out of his chair!

Red: Come on boy! I'll chair both ur Aces. (Ace is = to Ass. Red just uses the long "A" sound for everything.)

These examples weren't just made up either. These things all really happened at one time or another (some of them multiple times) and I just gave them to you verbatim. The last one is always hilarious because anytime Aaron Woods visits, we try to jump my dad. My dad is pretty deaf UNLESS he thinks you're talking about him. He may ask you a score to the Dallas game and you can scream at him "DALLAS IS UP 17-14" and he'll go "Hunh?" but if you are in a room on the other side of the house and plotting the ole "Hold him down while the other guy beats the piss out of him, trick" in a whisper, he'll definitely hear you. OK, so after he initially meets and greets you, and you have to talk to him for more than 5 minutes or so (like in a long line, or at the Dr.s office or something) he'll tell you a joke. He only has like 4 jokes though and each time he tells any of them, he laughs. Very hard. The first thousand times I heard all these jokes, I never laughed, but now when he tells them I laugh uncontrollably because I guess these jokes just get better with time or something, I don't know.  

JOKE 1

Red: Do you know what that white stuff on chicken shit is? 

Person: No.

Red: Oh that's chicken shit, too.

JOKE 2

Red: Do you know what a Mileormore bird is?

Person: No, I sure don't.

Red: It's a bird that sticks his beak in the ground and his ass in the air, then farts, and you can hear it for a mile or more. lolz.

JOKE 3

Red: (Picks up a rock and shows it to you) Oh, this is a sex stone!

Person: Really? why do you say that?

Red: because it's just a "fuckin" rock.

He has maybe 2 more, but this is clearly his best material. The key to a Red Hicks joke is asking you a question and you expect to hear a genius, sophisticated answer and it turns out it's the most obvious, simple thing you can think of. One time in Jr High he was showing me and JJ how to throw these different types of curve balls. After showing us like 3 or 4 variations he asked JJ if he knew how to throw a snowball?

Red: OK J, do you know how to throw a snowball?

JJ: I sure don't, how do you do that?

Red: Well, you wait until it snows, then you make a little ball out of the snow and throw it. 

His timing on that joke was so fucking impeccable, that I wasn't even expecting it and I lol'd. People think I'm a smartass and sarcastic about everything, but I'm actually very low key compared to my dad. One time when me and my brother Matt were younger, Matt was like 13 or 14 and going through this phase of just wanting to go somewhere, pretty much anywhere. He hated being in the house. So my dad told me he was gonna go pull his truck in the garage before it started raining. Matt was in another room and didn't hear him say that but he did hear my dads keys rattling and the door opening so he sprinted out the door and Asked Red, "Can I go?" and my dad was like "yeah, if you want to." So he let Matt jump in the truck, buckle his seat belt and everything, then just proceeded to pull the truck up about 10 feet into the garage and got out. He never told Matt shit, he was basically like "Fuck you, you figure it out." I was only like 10 or 11 at that time but I really appreciated how hilarious that was. It was sarcasm at it's finest. Shit, it was sarcasm by action. He really didn't say 5 words the entire time, he just let actions speak louder and allowed my brother to make a fool of himself. If my dad was a nice guy, he would have told my brother "I'm not going anywhere, I'm just putting the truck in the garage." But he couldn't resist being a dick. He just crushed my brothers dreams that afternoon and allowed him to think he was going somewhere interesting. At least Matt probably learned a valuable lesson that day that I've always known instinctively...."Don't volunteer for ANYTHING!" 

DRIVING SKILLS

The summer of 1996 my parents took me and G-Burns to the Jay Novacek camp in Denton, TX. We stopped the day before in Dallas just to see some of the sites around town and my mom wanted us to go see the 6th Floor Museum where Lee Harvey Oswald shot JFK. My dad took a wrong turn at the exit just before the one we were supposed to take. As my mom was yelling at him and telling him what a shitty driver he was and how he can't follow instructions, my dad just put the vehicle in reverse (In 3pm Dallas traffic) and drove it backwards for about 500 yards until we got back on the interstate. My mom went quiet for the first time in my life. I've never seen her speechless before and my dad just looked back at me and Greg and said "We're tourists." 

NAMES

Ever hear someone say "I'm good with faces, but not names."??? Well that's Red. Except my dad doesn't know anyone's name. At least not on the first try. Shit, he's never said my name right on the first try. First he calls me Matt, then Shannon, then Lexi (all my siblings names) then he finally spits out "Mike", he does the same thing with my wife Melissa (he calls her Lexi and Lisa before he realizes her name is Melissa). He eventually just gives everyone a nickname. Like if he is trying to talk about Jack Driscoll for example he'd be like "What's old Dustin, I mean Woods, I mean Clint, I mean, Shit, Ole Fast Runner up to?" If he's talking about Dustin he'll be like "Whats ole Jack, I mean Clint I mean Justin, shit, Ole Quarterback up to?" If he's talking about JJ he'll say "Whats ole Keith, whoops Keidric, Justin I mean Snowball up to?" It really gets bad when people have the same nicknames because Dustin and Derick Mayo are both "Ole Quarterback"....Adam Martin and Clennon Turner are both "Ole Neighbor" and Clint and Robbie Carter are both "Ole Red Head". God forbid he tries to ask me about Justin or Bailey because he'll just ask me "What's ole Scoggin up to?" And if you ask him which one, he'll say "The Scoggin one!" Now it's good times watching him try to say "Mariah." We've just come to a compromise and she'll forever be Mo-Rye-Ruh, or Rye-Ruh. 

That's Pops. One of the most profound things Jack ever said to me a few years ago was something I not only agree with but think it's the perfect summation of my dad. He was like "No matter how old we get or how many things change around us, Red will always be the same." True Dat!

I wish I could justify to you guys how funny it's been living with my dad my whole life. There isn't a TV show that's been made or a comedian on any stage that's made me laugh harder than Red. Don't let his redneck persona or idiot exterior fool you, Red is a genius. It took me like 27 years to figure that out, but one day it just hit me like a ton of bricks. I was like "Holy Shit! The joke is on me." All I can hope for in my life is that Mariah thinks I'm a goofy idiot until she turns like 26 or 27, then realizes what a genius I am. 

Before I sign off, I hope none of you get that Win7 2012 Security virus. It's a bastard. We just got our favorite laptop back last night because of it. It's the first legit virus I ever got by not watching porn. That's the only reason I haven't been on much, because our desktop is slower than Patrick on Spongebob. But I have noticed that I'm getting a lot of traffic on here, considering I haven't written as much over the last month or so. Mainly people keep viewing the blog I wrote about the 1st Alabama and LSU game (The one I predicted perfectly might I add).  http://rmichaelhicks83.blogspot.com/2011/11/is-lsu-playing-alabama-this-week.html

I had no idea when I wrote that bitch that we'd be playing them again in the National Championship. Hopefully when I do my next one, LSU will have won it's 3rd NC in less than a decade. 

Keeping it realer than Red Hicks at a Doctors office, handing out nicknames to strangers. 

Edit: This was a picture my brother sent me while my dad was helping him get their shop ready downtown, and that same day he was posted up watching a parade eating an apple on a ladder. Classic Red!