TALES FROM THE CARIBBEAN

Rumors are circulating among the islanders about illegal steroid use at the rooster ranch, but it’s more cynical than that. The rancher’s son recently graduated from a college in France with a degree in Genetic Engineering. Many locals believe Barrack is a super rooster, produced by splicing the genes of a champion fighting cock with a Western Roadrunner. Others believe however, at the least, part of Barrack’s amazing speed is chemically induced because they saw Barrack steal a small baggie of white powder from a street dealer and he ate the whole thing. Another dope dealer gave chase on his moped, but just as he was about to grab “super rooster,” Barrack shifted into “passing” gear and left the moped in his dust. A traffic officer with a radar gun clocked Barrack doing 40 mph in a 20 mph zone.

Another Rastafarian was driving his jalopy and smoking a big spliff, when Barrack went around him so fast that he thought his ride broke down. When the poor devil got out to see what was the matter, he rolled head over heals on the coral road and it removed enough hide to feed a pack of hungry hound dogs. The more people who chase Barrack, the faster he runs; he’s another Secretariat, a Triple Crown winner with no equal.

An irate bar owner demanded payment from the captain for damages done to his liquor inventory by Barrack. The persistent bar owner claimed that since that rooster belonged to the captain he should make good the damages done. The captain claimed the rooster no longer belonged to him because he sold him to Big Jessie before the damages occurred. Big Jessie has great expectations that Barrack will eventually be crowned “Caribbean King” of the fighting cocks, but so far, he has not been able to catch his latest prized prospect. The captain furthermore stated: It’s unfortunate for the injured parties that last week Jessie went back to Eastern KY to litigate a case filed against his mining company. The miners are demanding disability payments for Black Lung, but Jessie contends the slackers, fakers and deadbeats are huffing coal dust from a paper bag before they visit their doctor in order to fake their malady and gain disability sick leave.

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Meanwhile Barrack continues to make trouble on the island. Several of the locals practice Voodoo and at certain phases of the moon, or a year and a day after a sect member dies they gather together under a Jumby Tree where they beat drums, shake beads, rattles, charms, make amulets, cast spells, curses, and communicate with the dead. The Voodoo parishioners believe if the Ti-Bon-Ange spirit is not satisfied and given peaceful rest, it remains eternally earthbound and it brings illness, or disasters, to others.  The High Priest of Voodoo had danced himself into a frenzied state, sacrificed a goat and was concentrating on its exposed entrails, but nobody noticed Barrack roosting above them in the branches of their Jumby Tree. Barrack, either by accident, or good aim, deposited a humungous white blob on the Shaman’s forehead. As Barrack’s white excrement ran down either side of the Shaman’s enlarged nostrils, a zombie, who had been that way for many years, came out of his trance, and began to chuckle. The other parishioners were mortified, but they too began to laugh. The Shaman flew into a violent rage and threw everything he had at Barrack including his sacred fish-bone necklace, but it was to no avail. Barrack nonchalantly flew down from his perch and ran like the wind towards a volcanic mountain; leaving all of them in his dust; in the tropics day comes, and day goes. To be continued…by Jacques Le Foot