Robert Gussin - Trash Talk

ipswich, massachusetts

This book is dedicated to my wife, Pat,and our children, Jeff, Bill, Lisa, Joe, Lynne, Wayne, and Ben. They are a constant inspiration.Florida novelists have a special talent when itcomes to infusing humor into stories about serious topics, especially the environment. Two of thebest are Carl Hiaasen and Tim Dorsey. It was theirwork that inspired me to write Trash Talk.

I want to thank all my friends and family whomade me a huge sports enthusiast more like afanatic. Thats why Trash Talk is about professionalathletes.

And a special thanks to my ganddaughter,Melissa Stewart, for the illustrations. Not only isMelissa a talented artist, but shes a medical student as well.

And finally, I want to thank my wife, Pat, forencouraging me to start writing this book andthen for her continuous prodding to finish it.Without her this book would not have happenednor would have any of the other wonderful thingsin my life. I can never thank her enough.

Chapter1

Maxwell Gordon was having a bad day. The six footeleven, 250-pound center for the Orlando Starswas pissed off at David Kress, Commissioner of theNational Basketball Association and at WhiteyStarzl, that little shit, skinny-ass guard for theStreaks. Not only had Philadelphia beaten theStars on the previous evening, but the six foot five,200-pound Starzl had peppered Gordon with somany insults, culminating with one about hismother, that Gordon had taken a wild swing atStarzl, which cost him a two-game suspension anda $10,000 fine. If I had only hit the little bastard,Gordon thought, I would have knocked him intothe stands.

Now, Gordon had this additional shit in theletter from Commissioner Kress. The Commissioner, in his infinite wisdom, had decided that itwas time to add a little culture to his players, andclass to the league. So, starting immediately, everyplayer in the league had to attend at least onemeeting or symposium educational in nature per year. Naturally, their teams would pay allfees and travel expenses. These had to be legitimate offerings, and at least one day long. What abunch of crap, Gordon thought. Why the hell doesKress think I went to college? Just to play basketball? Shit, thirty more credits and I can get my degree. Im sure Michigan State will take me back ina few years after I make a little money. And thesefuckin courses got to be taken in the off-season.Bullshit!

chapter2

Arnie Schwartz was more excited than he hadbeen since his Bar Mitzvah, and he was now thirtytwo-years-old. Seven years working for the SarasotaEnvironmentalist Society, and they were givinghim the responsibility to set up the Annual National Environmentalist Meeting to be held inSarasota this year for the first time since 1957.Even the advertisements and other promotionalmaterial would be his to plan. If only they had decided that he would be the man earlier. Withonly five months until the May meeting, the pressure was on Arnie.

Arnie was not particularly adept at workingunder pressure. At five foot four and 170 pounds,he was a bit rotund, and tended to move aboutrather slowly. His thick glasses and pudginess gavehim a scholarly appearance. Since his graduationfrom Rutgers, Arnie had been working for theSarasota Environmentalist organization. Althoughhe loved the job, it took Arnie more than a year inSarasota to become comfortable living alone andin a new area of the country. Arnie grew up in EastBrunswick, New Jersey, and lived with his parentsuntil he graduated from college and was hired bythe Sarasota group. He even passed up the opportunity to live in the dormitory at college, and choseto stay at home and commute to school. When hemoved to Sarasota, he decorated his small apartment to look like his former room in his parentshome.

Even Arnie considered himself sort of nerdy,and rarely dated, or in fact, went out with anyone even the guys socially. He did go to theYMCA once or twice a week to play chess or checkers, which, along with television, was his favoritepastime. Arnie had gone to one of the spring training baseball games in Sarasota with a neighbor inthe apartment house, but had not cared much forit. He just never became enamored with sports theway many of his college classmates did. But hisgrades were reasonably good, and he landed theSarasota job fairly quickly after graduation.

Arnie had always been kind and good-heartedand, when he wanted to, could make friends fairlyeasily. He was very much liked by his neighbors,particularly those on the elderly side, because heoften carried in their groceries, carried out theirgarbage, and even, on occasion, washed their cars.

But now Arnie dived into action with a passionnot before seen in the Sarasota EnvironmentalistSociety office. Within a week he had set aside onehundred rooms at the Sarasota Hyatt and had reserved the grand ballroom and six meeting roomsthat would hold about fifty people each. He reserved the ballroom for daytime meetings and fortwo evenings for special occasions that he envisioned would take place during the four-day meeting. Arnies mind was going a mile a minute.Participants would arrive on Sunday evening to awelcoming reception. Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday would provide a mixture oflarge plenary sessions to address major topics plussmaller specialty sessions and workshops.

Arnie recruited three of the remaining eightemployees of the Sarasota office as his team. Theywere Melissa Stanford, the office secretary; Jordan(Jordy) Gifford, the public relations specialist; andPamela Swain, whose main job was to organizedemonstrations and protests when local environmental issues warranted it.

The director of the office, Rama Schriff, wasimpressed with Arnies enthusiasm and energy. Mr.Schriff had emigrated to Sarasota from Calcutta(now Kolkata), India, only eight years prior, andhad a bit of difficulty appreciating the seriousnessof any of Sarasotas environmental issues. But thepay was adequate, and Mr. Schriff had reasonablemanagement skills and a background of havingdealt with some fascinating environmental problems back in Calcutta.

What had clinched the job for Mr. Schriffwhen he interviewed with the Board in Sarasotawas how hed significantly reduced air pollutionand smog in Calcutta. Schriff was working as achemist in the city lab when he became interestedin the smog problem. He decided to explore themajor culprits contributing to the pollution, smog,and resultant poor air quality. Schriff was doggedin his pursuit. He analyzed garbage he found onthe streets, polluting emissions from vehicles, andsmoke from cooking fires. But the breakthroughcame when he analyzed a sample of dung from thesacred cows that wandered freely on the streets ofCalcutta. To Schriffs surprise, the dung wasloaded with volatile, air-polluting substances.Schriff was shocked and fascinated. So as not to offend any of his fellow citizens, he went out atnight with special collection containers and collected gases from both ends of the sacred animalsas well as more dung. He found all of his samplesto be highly polluting. Schriff calculated that eachcow emitted almost twenty pounds of pollutants a year as gases from manure, regurgitation, andflatulence.