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It’s another quiet day for the Bossman at his favorite vacation spot, Alona Beach on the Island of Panglao in the Philipines. He is sitting on the veranda of his cottage at Banana Land, wearing his Florida State University tee shirt, mirrored sunglasses and bermuda shorts, and drinking a vodka martini. It is sunset.
As the sun sets and he finishes his martini, he gets up to go to Planet Bar. Meeting him there is his good friend Joon. “You train today?” the drunk Joon asks.
“Yup. I took my jeep out to the Chocolate Hills on Bohol before dawn. Did two hours of Shotokan Karate and two hours of yo-yo. After an early lunch, I jogged for an hour or so and spent three hours on the clubs and the diabolo. Damn diabolo kept rolling down the hill. I finally had to start training at the bottom of the hill. Then I came back and had a couple of cocktails.”
The waiter came and the Bossman ordered two mangoes, three orders of bacon, two eggs, a bowl of plain rice and a vodka martini.
“How you stay in such good shape eating like that?” Joon asks.
“I train, say my prayers and eat my vitamins. I don’t know; I just do,” the Bossman replies. Suddenly, his PCS beeps Home on the Range. “Bossman here,” he says into the receiver.
“This is the Disco Inferno,” the man on the other end replies frantically, “you gotta’ help me! I’m in jail!”
“What the hell did you do this time? And I thought you were dead, boy,” the Bossman answers, “didn’t you get decapitated when that cage fell on your neck?”
“Vampiro and that indie wrestler helped me with that problem. Well, I was in Rosie’s bar in Ermita. You know what those girls will do for $15. I wanted to find out what they’d do for $1000. What I said got misinterpreted and I...”
“You’re a nasty bastard. How old was she?”
“Forty five. She said she was eighteen, of course. I asked her to...”
“Don’t give me the details. What are you charged with?”
“Alienation and sedition,” the Disco Inferno replies.
“You stupid son of a bitch. Where are you being held?”
“The Western Police Station on United Nations Avenue.”
“You’re a stupid son of a bitch, boy,” the Bossman says, “I’ll be there tomorrow.”
The Bossman hangs up the phone and clicks number thirty two on his speed dial.
“Jake ... I gotta’ get to Manila tomorrow. Can you get me a flight out of Tagbilaran? ... Thanks, eight o’clock. I’ll be there.”
“Your friend is in trouble?” Joon asks.
“Yeah. He’s always been a pest. I’m leaving tomorrow.”
“You come back?”
“Yeah, but not for awhile. I’ve got some places to go before that. There’s a big yo-yo competition in Hiroshima in two weeks and I got some other things to take care of.”
The Bossman finishes his dinner and packs up his stuff so he will be able to leave first thing in the morning and make it to the airport without having to linger too long in the terrible city of Tagbilaran.
The next morning, he gets to the airport and takes the PAL flight to Manila. He takes a taxi to the City Garden Hotel and gets a room. It is in a good location because it is within walking distance of both the Western Police Station and Rosie’s. He decides to go to the Police station and visit the Disco Inferno.
He walks into the station and asks the attending officer, “Hello, I’m here to see a mister Glen ... uh ... Gia something or other.
“Ah, yes,” the officer replies. Please come this way. He leads the Bossman to a cell holding the Disco Inferno, who is wearing his typical 70’s getup.
“I thought you only wore that crap when you re wrestling,” he says.
“Well, Bossman,” DI replies, “you gotta’ stay cool for the ladies...”
“Shut up! Now tell me exactly what you asked that old hag to do.”
The Disco Inferno leans over and whispers into the Bossman’s ear for several minutes. The Bossman listens quietly until he is done. “You’re a nasty basstard,” he says, “the only reason I’m going to help you out is because you once did the J-O-B to my good friend Evan Karragias.”
“No, he beat me legit.”
“Yeah, just keep saying that. What’re they calling Rosie’s these days?”
“The Diamond Head Restaurant.”
“Well, that’s where I’m headed. I’ll see you tomorrow,” the Bossman says and walks out the door. He goes back to the hotel and changes into chinos and a short sleeved silk shirt. Things don’t really pick up at Rosie’s until about nine, so he watches some boxing on TV. There’s a great Filipino boxing show that is on every week. You can watch it for months without seeing a single jab. The Bossman practices string tricks on his Cold Fusion yo-yo while the fights progress.
Putting the yo-yo in his pocket, he steps out the door. He arrives at Rosie’s five minutes later.
An enthusiastic young woman rushes up to him and says, “how much you pay for woman?”
The Bossman graciously declines, citing that it’s too early and strolls up to the bar. He asks the bartender if she knows how to make a martini. She holds up two bottles of Martini and Rossi vermouth and asks him, “do you want red Martini or white Martini?”
He sighs and replies that he will just have a vodka on the rocks. He spots a bottle of Kettel 1 and signals that it would be appropriate. A young man approaches him.
“Bossman?” the young man asks.
“Soren!” the Bossman shouts, “how’s my Danish friend?”
“Still working six months out of the year in Denmark and spending the rest pickin’ up ho’s in Rosies and Angeles.”
“I got a problem, boy. A friend of mine came in here the other night, spreading around a lot of cash and he ended up getting arrested for it.”
“I know the guy. Italian. Dresses like a Jimmy Hendrix album cover. Man, did he get in some trouble. He asked this girl to...”
“I know what he asked her to do. What I want to know is...”
“And the funny part is that it wasn’t even a girl after all. It was George. The only way he ekes out a living is by selling shabu to the girls.”
“So it was drugs that got him into this mess.
“Yeah. They set up a blockade to arrest George and that idiot friend of yours runs his mouth and gets the police so angry that they ignore George and he gets away. They get so angry that they arrested him on some trumped up charge.”
“Why didn’t the damn fool tell me. I’ll have no trouble getting him out now.”
The mystery solved, the Bossman spends the next several hours downing vodka and reminiscing with Soren. He picks up a couple of girls, takes them home and gives them a thousand pesos to share.
The next day, he walks to the police station and asks the same attending officer, “how much?”
“Twenty thousand pesos,” the officer replied.
“Why didn’t you just say that yesterday,” the Bossman said as he handed him the money and waited for him to release the Disco Inferno.
The Disco Inferno comes out and says, “how in the hell did you get me out of this mess?”
“I bribed him, you dumbass. Why didn’t you think of that?”
“Oh, yeah. Hey, do you think Rosie’s is open at this hour?”
The Bossman laughs and the two friends walk down the street to get some lunch.
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