The Seeds

[HUGGY]

The Seeds

Al is a for real bank robber. That is how he bought his first car. He is my com-padre. Al is a funny dude ..he is into all that health food and acupuncture and stuff and he robs banks. That's funny. He's as brave as they come but he limits himself taking unnecessary chances.

Me? I'm a kid from upstate in the Islands...the boonies. I just wanted to get away from the farm and the small town gossips.

I met Al by chance. That's how you will meet your heroes.

I am the partner in a auto repair shop because I did Al a huge favor sight unseen and he was the silent partner in this repair facility. Al gets his money from smuggling these days and he invests his profits into his old high school buddies projects to make his money legal.

The man is always looking to bust smugglers any way they can but Al is smart. He is building an empire right under their noses.

The problem with Al is that he depends on luck too often and that leads us to how I am a car shop co-owner.

Getting back to how I became partner in the shop Al got himself hooked up bad and landed in the king County Jail. Well I did something only I could do and that was bust him out. Yup...that's how I earned half a car shop but I had bigger dreams. I know..interesting..but that story is for another time.

I wanted to get into Al's game..smuggling. I like taking chances just not with luck. I like being prepared. I like knowing what I am getting for my exposure.

So I almost immediately sold my interest in Precision Foreign Car Repair for $14,000 and took an Alaskan Airline flight to Fort Lauderdale, Florida with $14,000 in my hot hands. I intended to get my share of 14 dollar Peruvian investments selling for 3000 bucks in the Emerald city.

If Al could make a fortune buying cocaine from natives in Peru for a dollar US a gram and sell it in Seattle for 3000 dollars an ounce cut in half with baby laxative there was no doubt I could figure out a better way than in SCUBA diving tanks risking customs and drug smelling dogs.

What I did up on Orcas Island was hunt as a kid. But not JUST hunt..I was the best at it. I shot an 8 point buck white tail from three feet away on the first day of hunting season when I was 12. I study a mission and get results...first time...every time. I was a Boy Scout at 11 in 57. Now I'm 22 and much better prepared than the Scouts could have imagined..

I would take flying lessons, steal an airplane and fly the drugs in myself bypassing all the exposure and 99% of the risk.

I settled in to the PAC flight school and with rented Cessna 172's get my ticket in 6 weeks. I practiced the key to my scheme on every solo flight and that was to do my touch and goes on the roads that go out in the Glades..sometimes coming to a full stop.

That was going to be the key to my success.

Now I was fully prepared to go to stage #2 of my plan and that was to hop on a flight to Peru and take a close look at the situation in South America for a smuggler with a perfct plan.

What I needed was a boots on the ground look see at the lay of the land in Peru....specifically the lay of the roads. I needed some nice long straight runways where I could stash some Cocaine maybe a couple of kilos to start with and a hundred gallons of aviation fuel without being seen.

I would come in at night ...set down..dig up my stash of drugs..refuel the plane and be on my way in less than ten minutes...far less time than any Peruvian police response could intercept if I was spotted. That and a quick stop and go in Ecuador is all that was needed. I scheduled my return trip from Peru to do a layover in Ecuador for the final piece of the South American portion of my plan.

The plan was fool proof. I would fly down to Mexico and stash some more fuel for on the way down and the return trip on some old out of the way strip of asphalt. That and the fuel stash in Ecuador was covering fuel requirements for my mission.

The payoff would be 4000 grams after cut times 120 dollars a gram in Seattle ..nearly half a million on my first run.

Stealing the plane was the easiest part. The nice twins don't even have an ignition key..just switches. Once you make it past the cheesy little lock on the access door you are in and ready to fly. Cessna makes two combinations for their door locks. I made my own key. The range on the Cessna 421 is around 1700 miles at nearly 250 knots or almost 300 MPH. South Texas to Peru is about 3,000 miles. From South Texas to Quito Ecuador is 2,600 miles. A pit stop in Ecuador was necessary.

The air traffic at the US Mexican border is a lot busier with private planes than I could have imagined. A lot of pilots from the war in Viet Nam were hiring out to fly in Mexican weed. They are only getting a few thousand a trip for their efforts and most of them are risking their own aircraft. The elevated traffic is to my advantage as I just fold myself in behind an aging DC3 when I cross the border. I will have to stop two more times...once in Southern California and once again in Eastern Oregon. I have already repainted my Cessna 421 Eagle with identical numbers to a plane in Washington that doesn't get much use so I can fly it anywhere with safety.

Now that I have made half a dozen trips trading the profits from each flight into more cocaine I feel it is time to retire. My last haul was 120 Kilos which cost 5 dollars a gram. $600,000 dollars. 24 million in 1969 is a very large pile of money. Yes it time to retire.

!n 1969 the world of smuggling is not a vicious game. It is opportunity and adventure. A test of will and wits that harms few and pleases many with the bounty of precious powders that gets rich kids laid.

I guess I will repaint the plane again, put back the original numbers and return it to close where it came from with $100,000 tucked away inside. More than a fair rental fee... even if it wasn't expected.

Sean Corey

 

[Roadrunner]

The Seeds

Al is a for real bank robber. That is how he bought his first car. He is my com-padre. Al is a funny dude ..he is into all that health food and acupuncture and stuff and he robs banks. That's funny. He's as brave as they come but he limits himself taking unnecessary chances.

Me? I'm a kid from upstate in the Islands...the boonies. I just wanted to get away from the farm and the small town gossips.

I met Al by chance. That's how you will meet your heroes.

I am the partner in a auto repair shop because I did Al a huge favor sight unseen and he was the silent partner in this repair facility. Al gets his money from smuggling these days and he invests his profits into his old high school buddies projects to make his money legal.

The man is always looking to bust smugglers any way they can but Al is smart. He is building an empire right under their noses.

The problem with Al is that he depends on luck too often and that leads us to how I am a car shop co-owner.

Getting back to how I became partner in the shop Al got himself hooked up bad and landed in the king County Jail. Well I did something only I could do and that was bust him out. Yup...that's how I earned half a car shop but I had bigger dreams. I know..interesting..but that story is for another time.

I wanted to get into Al's game..smuggling. I like taking chances just not with luck. I like being prepared. I like knowing what I am getting for my exposure.

So I almost immediately sold my interest in Precision Foreign Car Repair for $14,000 and took an Alaskan Airline flight to Fort Lauderdale, Florida with $14,000 in my hot hands. I intended to get my share of 14 dollar Peruvian investments selling for 3000 bucks in the Emerald city.

If Al could make a fortune buying cocaine from natives in Peru for a dollar US a gram and sell it in Seattle for 3000 dollars an ounce cut in half with baby laxative there was no doubt I could figure out a better way than in SCUBA diving tanks risking customs and drug smelling dogs.

What I did up on Orcas Island was hunt as a kid. But not JUST hunt..I was the best at it. I shot an 8 point buck white tail from three feet away on the first day of hunting season when I was 12. I study a mission and get results...first time...every time. I was a Boy Scout at 11 in 57. Now I'm 22 and much better prepared than the Scouts could have imagined..

I would take flying lessons, steal an airplane and fly the drugs in myself bypassing all the exposure and 99% of the risk.

I settled in to the PAC flight school and with rented Cessna 172's get my ticket in 6 weeks. I practiced the key to my scheme on every solo flight and that was to do my touch and goes on the roads that go out in the Glades..sometimes coming to a full stop.

That was going to be the key to my success.

Now I was fully prepared to go to stage #2 of my plan and that was to hop on a flight to Peru and take a close look at the situation in South America for a smuggler with a perfct plan.

What I needed was a boots on the ground look see at the lay of the land in Peru....specifically the lay of the roads. I needed some nice long straight runways where I could stash some Cocaine maybe a couple of kilos to start with and a hundred gallons of aviation fuel without being seen.

I would come in at night ...set down..dig up my stash of drugs..refuel the plane and be on my way in less than ten minutes...far less time than any Peruvian police response could intercept if I was spotted. That and a quick stop and go in Ecuador is all that was needed. I scheduled my return trip from Peru to do a layover in Ecuador for the final piece of the South American portion of my plan.

The plan was fool proof. I would fly down to Mexico and stash some more fuel for on the way down and the return trip on some old out of the way strip of asphalt. That and the fuel stash in Ecuador was covering fuel requirements for my mission.

The payoff would be 4000 grams after cut times 120 dollars a gram in Seattle ..nearly half a million on my first run.

Stealing the plane was the easiest part. The nice twins don't even have an ignition key..just switches. Once you make it past the cheesy little lock on the access door you are in and ready to fly. Cessna makes two combinations for their door locks. I made my own key. The range on the Cessna 421 is around 1700 miles at nearly 250 knots or almost 300 MPH. South Texas to Peru is about 3,000 miles. From South Texas to Quito Ecuador is 2,600 miles. A pit stop in Ecuador was necessary.

The air traffic at the US Mexican border is a lot busier with private planes than I could have imagined. A lot of pilots from the war in Viet Nam were hiring out to fly in Mexican weed. Thet are only getting a few thousand a trip for their efforts and most of them are risking their own aircraft. The elevated traffic is to my advantage as I just fold myself in behind an aging DC3 when I cross the border. I will have to stop two more times...once in Southern California and once again in Eastern Oregon. I have already repainted my Cessna 421 Eagle with identical numbers to a plane in Washington that doesn't get much use so I can fly it anywhere with safety.

Now that I have made half a dozen trips trading the profits from each flight into more cocaine I feel it is time to retire. My last haul was 120 Kilos which cost 5 dollars a gram. $600,000 dollars. 24 million in 1969 is a very large pile of money. Yes it time to retire.

!n 1969 the world of smuggling is not a vicious game. It is opportunity and adventure. A test of will and wits that harms few and pleases many with the bounty of precious powders that gets rich kids laid.

I guess I will repaint the plane again, put back the original numbers and return it to close where it came from with $100,000 tucked away inside. More than a fair rental fee... even if it wasn't expected.

Sean Corey

Damn the '60's were the Golden Age.

I walked through customs in SFCAL after being in Saigon, paid my taxes on my speakers I bought in Okinawa, with two oz's of China White in my shirt pocket.

Wish I had had more!!!!!

 

[HUGGY]

 

[HUGGY]

 

[HUGGY]

 

[HUGGY]

The Seeds is a work in progress. I entered it in a short story writing contest that closes for edit in 16 days. As I make changes I will post the story here in it's next most compete form. The first rough draft is the one posted at the beginning of this thread. Some of you that have a sharp eye will find the revisions and possibly learn how I approach the writing process.

 

[HUGGY]

The Seeds

Al is a for real bank robber. That is how he bought his first car. He is my com-padre. Al is a funny dude. He is into all that health food and acupuncture and stuff and he also robs banks. That's funny. He's as brave as they come but he limits himself taking unnecessary chances.

Me? I'm a kid from upstate in the Islands. I come from the boonies. I just wanted to get away from the farm and the small town gossips.

I met Al by chance. That's how you will meet your heroes.

I am the partner in a auto repair shop because I did Al a huge favor sight unseen while he was the silent partner in this auto repair facility. Al gets his money from smuggling these days and he invests his profits into his old high school buddies projects to make his money legal.

The Man is always looking to bust smugglers any way they can but Al is smart. He is building an empire right under their noses.

The problem with Al is that he depends on luck too often and that leads us to how I am a car shop co-owner.

How I became partner in the shop was that Al got himself hooked up bad and landed in the king County Jail. Well I did something only I could do and that was bust him out. Yup, that's how I earned half a car shop.

But I had bigger dreams. I know, interesting, but that story is for another time.

What I really wanted was to get into Al's game, smuggling.

I like taking chances just not with luck. I like being prepared. I like knowing what I am getting for my exposure.

I almost immediately sold my interest in Precision Foreign Car Repair for fourteen thousand bucks interestingly enough back to one of Al's friends. Then, I took an Alaskan Airline flight to Fort Lauderdale, Florida with the fourteen thou in my hot hands. I intended to get my share of fourteen dollar per half ounce in Peruvian Powder investments selling in Seattle for three thousand bucks.

If Al could make a fortune buying cocaine from natives in Peru for a dollar US a gram and sell it in Seattle for three thousand dollars an ounce cut in half with baby laxative there was no doubt in my mind that I could figure out a better way than stuffing the pearly flakes into SCUBA diving tanks risking customs and drug smelling dogs.

What I did up on Orcas Island was hunt as a kid. But not JUST hunt, I was the best at it. I shot an eight point buck white tail from three feet away on the first day of hunting season when I was twelve. I study a mission and get results. I get them first time and every time. I was a Boy Scout at eleven in 1957. Now I'm Twenty-two and much better prepared than the Scouts could have imagined.

My master plan when along these lines. First I would take flying lessons, then steal an airplane and fly the drugs in myself bypassing all the exposure and ninety-nine percent of the risk.

I settled in to the PAC flight school and with rented Cessna 172's I planned on getting my ticket in six weeks. I practiced the real key to my scheme on every solo flight. That was to do my touch and goes on the roads that go out into the Glades, sometimes coming to a full stop.

That kind of preparation was going to be the key to my success.

Now I was fully prepared to go to stage two of my plan and that was to hop on a flight to Peru and take a close look at the situation in South America for a smuggler with a perfect plan.

What I needed was a boots on the ground look see at the lay of the land in Peru, specifically the lay of the roads. I needed some nice long straight runways where I could stash some Cocaine maybe a couple of kilos to start with and a hundred gallons of aviation fuel without being seen.

I would come in at night, set down, dig up my stash of drugs, refuel the plane and be on my way in less than ten minutes, That is far less time than any Peruvian police response could intercept if I was spotted. That and a quick stop and go in Ecuador is all that was needed. I scheduled my return trip from Peru to do a layover in Ecuador for the final piece of the South American portion of my plan.

The plan was fool proof. I would fly down to Mexico and stash some more fuel for on the way down and the return trip on some old out of the way strip of asphalt. That and the fuel stash in Ecuador was covering fuel requirements for my mission.

The payoff would be four thousand grams after cut times One Hundred-twenty dollars a gram in Seattle. That is nearly half a million gross profit on my first run.

Stealing the plane was to be the easiest part. The nice twins don't even have an ignition key, just switches. Once you make it past the cheesy little lock on the access door you are in and ready to fly. Cessna makes two combinations for their door locks. I bought both lock sets at the Cessna parts store.

The range on the Cessna 421 is around seventeen hundred miles at nearly two hundred fifty knots or almost three hundred MPH. South Texas to Peru is about three thousand miles. From South Texas to Quito Ecuador is twenty-six hundred miles. A pit stop in Ecuador was necessary.

The air traffic at the US Mexican border is a lot busier with private planes than I could have imagined. A lot of pilots from the war in Viet Nam were hiring out to fly in Mexican weed. They are only getting a few thousand a trip for their efforts and most of them are risking their own aircraft. The elevated traffic is to my advantage as I just fold myself in behind an aging DC3 when I cross the border. I will have to stop two more times...once in Southern California and once again in Eastern Oregon. I have already repainted my Cessna 421 Eagle with identical numbers to a plane in Washington that doesn't get much use so I can fly it anywhere with safety.

Now that I have made half a dozen trips trading the profits from each flight into more cocaine I feel it is time to retire. My last haul was one hundred twenty Kilos which cost five dollars a gram. That cost works out to six hundred thousand dollars. Magically with the help of lactose powder I have transformed this final trip into twenty four million. In 1969 this is a very large pile of money.

It was easy. Slip a cassette of The Stone's "Gimmie Shelter" into the Eagle's stereo, push the throttles forward, and let all hell break loose for a few hours. I'm still alive. Yes, it time to retire.

!n 1969 the world of smuggling is not a vicious game. It is opportunity and adventure. A test of will and wits that harms few and pleases many with the bounty of precious powders that gets rich kids laid.

I guess I will repaint the plane again, put back the original numbers and return it to close where it came from with one hundred thousand dollars tucked away inside. More than a fair rental fee, even if it wasn't expected.

Sean Corey

 

[HUGGY]

The Seeds

I met Al by chance. That's how you will meet your heroes.

Al is a bank robber, for real. That is how he bought his first car. He is my com-padre. Al is a funny dude. He is into all that health food and acupuncture and stuff and he also robs banks. That's funny. He's as brave as they come but he limits himself taking unnecessary chances.

Me? I'm a kid from upstate in the Islands. I come from the boonies. I just wanted to get away from the farm and the small town gossips.

I am the partner in a auto repair shop because I did Al a huge favor sight unseen while he was the silent partner in this auto repair facility. Al gets his money from smuggling these days and he invests his profits into his old high school buddies projects to make his money legal.

I was looking for a job in the city and I had been working on Mini Coopers since 1961 when my dad left one up on the Island for when he visited from his travels withe the Boeing Company. That's how I met Steve the not so silent partner in the foreign car shop. We hit it off immediately and I went to work the day I applied.

Steve pointed to a Mercedes Benz out on the curb. A basket of it's parts was sitting just inside the shop door and said "Put that car back together, running good and you have a job." The Seeds were screaming their song Pushing Too Hard loudly on the shop stereo and I went to work.

"You're pushin' too hard, uh-what you want me to be
You're pushin' too hard about the things you say
You're pushin' too hard every night and day
You're pushin' too hard
Pushin' too hard on me"

In three days the Benz running. "Nice work
Pinky" was all Steve said although I would have thought he could have been more congratulatory since I found out that the Benz had been sitting on the curb for three months. It was the original basket case. I had no idea why Steve called me "Pinky".

I had been employed at the car repair shop for six months and Steve and I had hit it off pretty well. We were out drinking after work one evening and he brought up a rather delicate problem. "Pink, I've got this partner, Al, and he is in jail and likely on his way to prison. We have been best friends since we were kids. I would really like to help him but I just don't know what I can do. You have any thoughts?"

"I'll tell ya what Stevie, I'll think on it over night and give you my answer in the morning."

The Man is always looking to bust smugglers any way they can but Al is smart. He is building an empire right under their noses. Now he is in the custody of the Sheriff's department. If they find out what he is really up to he will go away for a very long time.

I had bigger dreams. I know, interesting, but that story is for another time. This one is about a different subject. Dig It?

What I really wanted to do was to get into Al's game, smuggling.

I like taking chances, just not with luck. I like being prepared. I like knowing what I am getting for my exposure.

I slip the Stones into the Blauplunkt Stereo of my snow white French version of a 911 S Porsche and begin driving around Green Lake. I do some of my best thinking watching the girls skating on the path that surrounds the water. Mick has my number and I his. I start to formulate my master plan.

"Please allow me to introduce myself, I'm a man of wealth and taste"

One must remind one's self that making a deal with the devil requires attention to the devil in the details.

Al cut his cocaine in half before distributing it. I guess it is true as Cat Stevens said "The first cut is the deepest".

I immediately sold my interest in Precision Foreign Car Repair for fourteen thousand bucks. I took an Alaskan Airline flight to Fort Lauderdale, Florida with the fourteen thou in my hot hands.

Al make a fortune buying cocaine from natives in Peru for a dollar US a gram and sold it in Seattle for three thousand dollars an ounce cut in half with baby laxative. There was no doubt in my mind that I could figure out a better way than stuffing the pearly flakes into SCUBA diving tanks risking customs and drug smelling dogs.

What I did up on Orcas Island was hunt as a kid. I was the best at it. I shot an eight point buck White Tail from three feet away on the first day of hunting season when I was twelve. I get results first time and every time. I was a Boy Scout at eleven in 1957. Now I'm Twenty-two and much better prepared than the Scouts could have imagined.

First I would take flying lessons, steal an airplane and fly the drugs in myself bypassing all the exposure and ninety-nine percent of the risk.

I settled in to the PAC flight school and with rented Cessna 172's. I planned on getting my ticket in six weeks. I practiced the real key to my scheme on every solo flight. That was to do my touch and goes on the roads that go out into the Glades, sometimes coming to a full stop.

That kind of preparation was going to be the key to my success.

Now I was fully ready as Rock Steady Freddy to go to stage two of my plan and that was to hop on a flight to Peru and take a close look at the situation in South America for a smuggler with a perfect plan.

What I needed was a boots on the ground look see at the lay of the land in Peru, specifically the lay of the roads. I needed some nice long straight runways where I could stash some Cocaine maybe a couple of kilos to start with and a hundred gallons of aviation fuel without being seen.

I would come in at night, set down, dig up my stash of drugs, refuel the plane and be on my way in less than ten minutes, That is far less time than any Peruvian police response could intercept if I was spotted. That and a quick stop and go in Ecuador is all that was needed. I scheduled my return trip from Peru to do a layover in Ecuador for the final piece of the South American portion of my plan.

The plan was fool proof. I would fly down to Mexico and stash some more fuel for on the way down and the return trip on some old out of the way strip of asphalt. That and the fuel stash in Ecuador was covering fuel requirements for my mission.

The payoff would be four thousand grams after cut times One Hundred-twenty dollars a gram in Seattle. That is nearly half a million gross profit on my first run.

Stealing the plane was to be the easiest part. Cessna twins don't have an ignition key. Once you make it past the cheesy little lock on the access door you are in and ready to fly. Cessna makes two combinations for their door locks. I bought both at the Cessna parts store.

The range on the Cessna 421 is around seventeen hundred miles at nearly two hundred fifty knots or almost three hundred MPH. South Texas to Peru is about three thousand miles. From South Texas to Quito Ecuador is twenty-six hundred miles. A pit stop in Ecuador was necessary.

The air traffic at the US Mexican border is a lot busier with private planes than I could have imagined. A lot of pilots from the war in Viet Nam were hiring out to fly in Mexican weed. They are only getting a few thousand a trip for their efforts and most of them are risking their own aircraft. The elevated traffic is to my advantage as I just fold myself in behind an aging DC3 when I cross the border. I will have to stop two more times...once in Southern California and once again in Eastern Oregon. I have already repainted my Cessna 421 Eagle with identical numbers to a plane in Washington that doesn't get much use so I can fly it anywhere with safety.

Now that I have made half a dozen trips trading the profits from each flight into more cocaine I feel it is time to retire. My last haul was one hundred twenty Kilos which cost one dollar a gram. That cost works out to one hundred twenty thousand dollars. Magically with the help of lactose powder I have transformed this final trip into twenty four million. In 1969 this is a very large pile of money.

It was easy. Slip a cassette of The Stone's "Gimmie Shelter" into the Eagle's stereo, push the throttles forward, and let all hell break loose for a few hours. I'm still alive. Yes, it time to retire.

!n 1969 the world of smuggling is not a vicious game. It is opportunity and adventure. A test of will and wits that harms few and pleases many with the bounty of precious powders that gets rich kids laid.

I repainted the plane again, put back the original numbers and returned it to close where it came from with one hundred thousand dollars tucked away inside. A fair rental fee, even if it wasn't expected.

 

[HUGGY]

The Seeds

Al's a bank robber, for real. That's how he bought his first car. He's my compadre'. Al's a funny dude. He's into all that health food and acupuncture and stuff and he also robs banks. That's funny. He's as brave as they come but he limits himself taking unnecessary chances.

I met Al by chance. That's how you'll meet your heroes.

Me? I'm just a kid from upstate in the Islands. I come from the boonies. I just wanted to get away from the farm and the small town gossips.

I was recently the part-owner in an auto repair shop because I did Al a huge favor sight unseen while he was the silent partner in this auto repair facility. Al gets his money from smuggling these days and he invests his profits into his old high school buddies projects to make his money legal.

I was looking for a job in the city. I've been working on Mini Coopers since 1961 when my dad left one up on the Island for when he visited from his travels with the Boeing Company. That's how I met Steve the not so silent partner in the foreign car shop. We hit it off immediately and I went to work the day I applied.

Steve pointed to a Mercedes Benz out on the curb. A basket of it's parts was sitting just inside the shop door and said "Put that car back together, running good and you have a job". The Seeds were screaming their song Pushing Too Hard loudly on the shop stereo and I went to work.

"You're pushin' too hard, uh-what you want me to be
You're pushin' too hard about the things you say
You're pushin' too hard every night and day
You're pushin' too hard
Pushin' too hard on me"

In three days the Benz was running. "Nice work
Pinky" was all Steve said although I'd have thought he could have been more congratulatory since I found out that the Benz had been sitting on the curb for three months. It was the original basket case. I had no idea why Steve called me "Pinky".

I'd been employed at the car repair shop for six months and Steve and I had hit it off pretty well. We were out drinking after work one evening and he brought up a rather delicate problem. "Pink, I've got this partner, Al, and he's in jail and likely on his way to prison. We've been best friends since we were kids. I'd really like to help him but I just don't know what I can do. You have any thoughts?"

"I'll tell ya what Stevie, I'll think on it over night and give you my answer in the morning".

The Man's always looking to bust smugglers any way they can but Al is smart. He's building an empire right under their noses. Now he's in the custody of the Sheriff's department. If they find out what he's really up to he will go away for a very long time.

I had bigger dreams. I know, interesting, but that story is for another time. This one's about a different subject. Dig It?

What I really wanted to do was to get into Al's game, smuggling.

I like taking chances, just not with luck. I like being prepared. I like knowing what I'm getting for my exposure.

I slip the Stones into the Blauplunkt stereo of my snow white French version of a 911 S Porsche and begin driving around Green Lake. I do some of my best thinking watching the girls skating on the path that surrounds the water. Mick has my number and I his. I start to formulate my master plan.

"Please allow me to introduce myself, I'm a man of wealth and taste"

One must remind one's self that making a deal with the devil requires attention to the devil in the details.

Al cut his cocaine in half before distributing it. I guess it's true as Cat Stevens said "The first cut is the deepest".

I immediately sold my interest in Precision Foreign Car Repair for fourteen thousand bucks. I took an Alaskan Airline flight to Fort Lauderdale, Florida with the fourteen thou in my hot hands.

Al makes a fortune buying cocaine from natives in Peru for a dollar US a gram and sells it in Seattle for three thousand dollars an ounce cut in half with baby laxative. There was no doubt in my mind that I could figure out a better way than stuffing the pearly flakes into SCUBA diving tanks risking customs and drug smelling dogs.

What I did up on Orcas Island was hunt as a kid. I was the best at it. I shot an eight point buck White Tail from three feet away on the first day of hunting season when I was twelve. I get results first time and every time. I was a Boy Scout at eleven in 1957. Now I'm twenty-two and much better prepared than the Scouts could have imagined.

First I'd take flying lessons, steal an airplane and fly the drugs in myself bypassing all the exposure and ninety-nine percent of the risk.

I settled in to the PAC flight school and with rented Cessna 172's. I planned on getting my ticket in six weeks. I practiced the real key to my scheme on every solo flight. That was to do my touch and goes on the roads that go out into the Glades, sometimes coming to a full stop.

Now I was fully ready as Rock Steady Freddy to go to stage two of my plan and that was to hop on a flight to Peru and take a close look at the situation in South America for a smuggler with a perfect plan.

What I needed was a boots on the ground look see at the lay of the land in Peru. I needed some nice long straight runways where I could stash some Cocaine, maybe a couple of kilos to start with and a hundred gallons of aviation fuel without being seen.

I'd come in at night, set down, dig up my stash of drugs, refuel the plane and be on my way in less than ten minutes. That's far less time than any Peruvian police response could intercept if I was spotted. That and a quick stop and go in Ecuador is all that was needed. I scheduled my return trip from Peru to do a layover in Ecuador for the final piece of the South American portion of my plan.

The plan was fool proof. I'd fly down to Mexico and stash some more fuel for on the way down and the return trip on some old out of the way strip of asphalt. That and the fuel stash in Ecuador was covering fuel requirements for my mission.

The payoff would be four thousand grams after cut times one hundred-twenty dollars a gram in Seattle. That's nearly half a million gross profit on my first run.

Stealing the plane was to be the easiest part. Cessna twins don't have an ignition key. Once you make it past the cheesy little lock on the cabin door you are in and ready to fly. Cessna makes two combinations for their door locks. I bought both at the Cessna parts store.

The range on the Cessna 421 is around seventeen hundred miles at nearly two hundred fifty knots or almost three hundred MPH. South Texas to Peru is about three thousand miles. From South Texas to Quito Ecuador is twenty-six hundred miles. A pit stop in Ecuador was necessary.

The air traffic at the US Mexican border is a lot busier with private planes than I could've imagined. Pilots from the war in Viet Nam were hiring out to fly in Mexican weed. They're only getting a few thousand a trip for their efforts. Most of them are risking their own planes. The elevated traffic is to my advantage as I fold myself in behind an aging DC3 when I cross the border. I'll have to stop two more times, once in Southern California and again in Eastern Oregon. I've already repainted my Cessna 421 Eagle with identical numbers to a plane in Washington that doesn't get much use so I can fly it anywhere with safety.

Half a dozen trips trading the profits from each flight into more cocaine and I feel it's time to retire. My last haul was one hundred twenty Kilos which cost one dollar a gram. It works out to one hundred twenty thousand dollars. Magically with the help of lactose powder I've transformed this final trip into twenty four million. In 1969 this is a very large pile of money.

It was easy. Slip a cassette of The Stone's "Gimmie Shelter" into the Eagle's stereo, push the throttles forward, and let all hell break loose for a few hours."It's just a shot away, shot away, shot away, OHhhhhh Yaaaaaa".

I'm still alive. Yes, it's time to retire.

I repainted the plane, put back the original numbers and returned it close to where it came from with one hundred thousand dollars tucked away inside. A fair rental fee, even if it wasn't expected.

!n 1969 the world of smuggling isn't a vicious game. It's opportunity and adventure. A test of will and wits that harms few and pleases many with the bounty of precious powders that gets rich kids laid.

 

[HUGGY]

The Seeds

Me? I'm from upstate Washington in the San Juan Islands. On Orcas Island what I did was hunt. I was consumed by it. I shot a deer from three feet away on the first day of hunting season when I was twelve.

I left home at 14 and set out to find adventure. I just needed to get away from the farm and the small town gossips. My dad kept an apartment in the city and there I lived into my late teens.

Al is a bank robber. He is also into all that health food, acupuncture and stuff. He's as brave as they come but he limits himself taking unnecessary chances.

What's strange is that I will never see Al face to face yet we become best friends.

The turning point in the path to adventure was when I met Steve. He is Al's partner. Al gets his money from smuggling these days and he invests his profits into his old high school buddies projects to make his money legal. Steve ran the Foreign Car repair shop.

I was looking for a job in the city and I had been working on Mini Coopers since 1961 when my dad left one up on the Island for when he visited from his travels with the Boeing Company. Steve looked like a hippie with long scraggly hair. We hit it off immediately and I went to work the day I applied.

Steve pointed to a Mercedes Benz out on the curb. A basket of it's parts was sitting just inside the shop door and said "Put that car back together, running good and you have a job." The Seeds were screaming their song "Pushing Too Hard" loudly on the shop stereo and I went to work.

"You're pushin' too hard, uh-what you want me to be
You're pushin' too hard about the things you say
You're pushin' too hard every night and day
You're pushin' too hard
Pushin' too hard on me"

In three days the Benz was running. "Nice work Pinky" was all Steve said although I would have thought he could have been more congratulatory since I found out that the Benz had been sitting on the curb for three months. It was the original basket case. I had no idea why Steve called me "Pinky".

I had been employed at the car repair shop for six months and Steve and I had hit it off pretty well. We were out drinking after work one evening and he brought up a rather delicate problem. "Pink, I've got this partner, Al, and he is in jail and likely on his way to prison. We have been best friends since we were kids. I would really like to help him but I just don't know what I can do. You have any thoughts?"

"I'll tell ya what Stevie, I'll think on it over night and give you my best answer in the morning."

The Man is always looking to bust smugglers any way they can but Al is smart. He is building an empire right under their noses. Now he is in the custody of the Sheriff's department. If they find out what he is really up to he will go away for a very long time.

I had bigger dreams than turning wrenches. I know, busting somebody out of jail seems an interesting topic in itself, but that story is for another time. This one is about a different subject, Smuggling. Dig It?

I like taking chances, just not with luck, being prepared and knowing what I am getting for my exposure.

I woke up still not knowing what to say to Steve. I slip the Stones into the Blauplunkt Stereo of my snow white French version of a 911 S Porsche and began driving around Green Lake on my way to work. I do some of my best thinking watching the girls skating on the path that surrounds the lime colored water. "Mick" has my number and I his. I start to formulate my plan.

"Please allow me to introduce myself, I'm a man of wealth and taste" Mick coo's on the stereo.

One must remind one's self that making a deal with the devil requires attention to the devil in the details.

When I pulled in to the shop driveway I decided I didn't know enough about Al. "Hey Boss! We gotta talk. You need to tell me everything you can about Al."

"Well, Al cuts his cocaine in half before distributing it. It is making him incredibly rich. He is great at being elusive. But, every criminal's luck eventually runs out." Steve said, looking right through me. I sense he feels he may have made a mistake telling me about Al's plight. But Steve continues on for about an hour filling me in on his best friends situation and background.

Without going into the details I tell Steve I will save his buddy. "Give me five thousand dollars to work with and I will get him out". He did. I did.

What stuck in my mind was that Steve told me that Al cut his Coke in half. I guess it is true as Cat Stevens said "The first cut is the deepest".

After transfer of half ownership of the shop I immediately sold my interest in Precision Foreign Car Repair for fourteen thousand bucks and took a flight to Fort Lauderdale, Florida.

I was a Boy Scout at eleven in 1957. Now I'm Twenty-two and much better prepared than the Scouts could have imagined.

First I would take flying lessons, steal an airplane and fly the drugs in myself bypassing all the exposure and ninety-nine percent of the risk.

I settled in to the PAC flight school and rented Cessna 172's. I planned on getting my ticket in six weeks. I practiced the real key to my scheme on every solo flight. That was to do my touch and goes on the roads that go out into the Glades, sometimes coming to a full stop.

Now I was fully ready as Rock Steady Freddy to go to stage two of my plan and that was to hop on a flight to Peru and take a close look at the situation in South America for a smuggler and a pilot.

What I needed was a boots on the ground look see at the lay of the land in Peru, specifically the lay of the roads. I needed some nice long straight runways where I could stash some Cocaine maybe a couple of kilos to start with and a hundred gallons of aviation fuel without being seen.

I would come in at night, set down, dig up my stash of drugs, refuel the plane and be on my way in less than ten minutes, That is far less time than any Peruvian police response could intercept if I was spotted. That and a quick stop and go in Ecuador is all that was needed. I scheduled my return trip from Peru to also do a short layover in Ecuador for the final piece of the South American portion of my plan.

Once satisfied the plan was foolproof, I would fly down to Mexico and stash some more fuel for on the way down and the return trip on some old out of the way strip of asphalt. That would cover fuel requirements for my mission.

Stealing the plane was to be the easiest part. Cessna twins don't have an ignition key. Cessna makes two combinations for their door locks. I bought both at the Cessna parts store.

The range on the Cessna 421 is around seventeen hundred miles. From South Texas to Lima, Peru thirty-twohundred miles. A pit stop in Ecuador was necessary.

The air traffic at the U.S. Mexican border is a lot busier with private planes than I could have imagined. A lot of pilots from the war in Viet Nam were hiring out to fly in Mexican weed. They are only getting a few thousand a trip for their efforts and most of them are risking their own aircraft.

The elevated traffic is to my advantage as I just fold myself in behind an aging DC3 when I cross the border. I will have to stop two more times, once in Southern California and once again in Eastern Oregon. I have already repainted my Cessna 421 Eagle with identical numbers to a plane in Washington.

Now that I have made half a dozen trips trading the profits from each flight into more cocaine I feel it is time to retire. My last haul was one hundred twenty Kilos which cost one dollar a gram. That cost works out to one hundred twenty thousand dollars. Magically with the help of lactose powder I have transformed this final trip into twenty four million. In 1969 this is a very large pile of money.

I've been lucky and had all the excitement I was hoping for. Just slip a cassette of The Stone's "Gimmie Shelter" into the Eagle's stereo, push the throttles forward, and let all hell break loose for a few hours. I'm still alive. Yes, it time to retire.


I repainted the plane again, put back the original numbers and returned it to close where it came from with one hundred thousand dollars tucked away inside. A fair rental fee, even if it wasn't expected.

!n 1969 the world of smuggling is not a vicious game. It is opportunity and adventure. A test of will and wits that harms few and pleases many with the bounty of precious powders that gets rich kids laid.

 

[HUGGY]

The Seeds

Me? I'm from upstate Washington in the San Juan Islands. On Orcas Island what I did was hunt. I was consumed by it. I shot a deer from three feet away on the first day of hunting season when I was twelve.

I left home at 14 and set out to find adventure. I just needed to get away from the farm and the small town gossips. My dad kept an apartment in the city and there I lived into my late teens.

Al is a bank robber. He is also into all that health food, acupuncture and stuff. He's as brave as they come but he limits himself taking unnecessary chances.

What's strange is that I have never seen Al face to face yet somehow feel we have become best friends.

The turning point in the path to adventure was when I met Steve. He is Al's partner. Al gets his money from smuggling these days and he invests his profits into his old high school buddies projects to make his money legal. Steve ran the Foreign Car repair shop.

I was looking for a job in the city and I had been working on Mini Coopers since 1961 when my dad left one up on the Island for when he visited from his travels with the Boeing Company. Steve looked like a hippie with long scraggly hair. We hit it off immediately and I went to work the day I applied.

Steve pointed to a Mercedes Benz out on the curb and a basket of it's parts sitting just inside the shop door and said "Put that car back together, running good and you have a job." The Seeds were screaming their song "Pushing Too Hard" loudly on the shop stereo and I went to work.

"You're pushin' too hard, uh-what you want me to be
You're pushin' too hard about the things you say
You're pushin' too hard every night and day
You're pushin' too hard
Pushin' too hard on me"

In three days the Benz was running. "Nice work Pinky" was all Steve said although I would have thought he could have been more congratulatory since I found out that the Benz had been sitting on the curb for three months. It was the original basket case. I had no idea why Steve called me "Pinky".

I had been employed at the car repair shop for six months and Steve and I had hit it off pretty well. We were out drinking after work one evening and he brought up a rather delicate problem. "Pink, I've got this partner, Al, and he is in jail and likely on his way to prison. We have been best friends since we were kids. I would really like to help him but I just don't know what I can do. You have any thoughts?"

"I'll tell ya what Stevie, I'll think on it over night and give you my best answer in the morning."

The Man is always looking to bust smugglers any way they can but Al is smart. He is building an empire right under their noses. Now he is in the custody of the Sheriff's department. If they find out what he is really up to he will go away for a very long time.

I had bigger dreams than turning wrenches. I know, busting somebody out of jail seems an interesting topic in itself, but that story is for another time. This one is about a different subject, Smuggling. Dig It?

I like taking chances, just not with luck, being prepared and knowing what I am getting for my exposure.

I woke up still not knowing what to say to Steve. I slip the Stones into the Blauplunkt Stereo of my snow white French version of a 911 S Porsche and began driving around Green Lake on my way to work. I do some of my best thinking watching the girls skating on the path that surrounds the lime colored water. "Mick" has my number and I his. I start to formulate my plan.

"Please allow me to introduce myself, I'm a man of wealth and taste" Mick coo's on the stereo.

One must remind one's self that making a deal with the devil requires attention to the devil in the details.

When I pulled in to the shop driveway I decided I didn't know enough about Al. "Hey Boss! We gotta talk. You need to tell me everything you can about Al."

"Well, Al cuts his cocaine in half before distributing it. It is making him incredibly rich. He is great at being elusive. But, every criminal's luck eventually runs out." Steve said, looking right through me. I sense he feels he may have made a mistake telling me about Al's plight. But Steve continues on for about an hour filling me in on his best friends situation and background.

Without going into the details I tell Steve I will save his buddy. "Give me five thousand dollars to work with and I will get him out". He did. I did.

What stuck in my mind was that Steve told me that Al cut his Coke in half. I guess it is true as Cat Stevens said "The first cut is the deepest".

After transfer of half ownership of the shop I immediately sold my interest in Precision Foreign Car Repair for fourteen thousand bucks and took a flight to Fort Lauderdale, Florida.

I was a Boy Scout at eleven in 1957. Now I'm Twenty-two and much better prepared than the Scouts could have imagined.

First I would take flying lessons, steal an airplane and fly the drugs in myself bypassing all the exposure and ninety-nine percent of the risk.

I settled in to the PAC flight school and rented Cessna 172's. I planned on getting my ticket in six weeks. I practiced the real key to my scheme on every solo flight. That was to do my touch and goes on the roads that go out into the Glades, sometimes coming to a full stop.

Now I was fully ready as Rock Steady Freddy to go to stage two of my plan and that was to hop on a flight to Peru and take a close look at the situation in South America for a smuggler and a pilot.

What I needed was a boots on the ground look see at the lay of the land in Peru, specifically the lay of the roads. I needed some nice long straight runways where I could stash some Cocaine maybe a couple of kilos to start with and a hundred gallons of aviation fuel without being seen.

I would come in at night, set down, dig up my stash of drugs, refuel the plane and be on my way in less than ten minutes, That is far less time than any Peruvian police response could intercept if I was spotted. That and a quick stop and go in Ecuador is all that was needed. I scheduled my return trip from Peru to also do a short layover in Ecuador for the final piece of the South American portion of my plan.

Once satisfied the plan was foolproof, I would fly down to Mexico and stash some more fuel for on the way down and the return trip on some old out of the way strip of asphalt. That would cover fuel requirements for my mission.

Stealing the plane was to be the easiest part. Cessna twins don't have an ignition key. Cessna makes two combinations for their door locks. I bought both at the Cessna parts store.

The range on the Cessna 421 is around seventeen hundred miles. From South Texas to Lima, Peru thirty-twohundred miles. A pit stop in Ecuador was necessary.

The air traffic at the U.S. Mexican border is a lot busier with private planes than I could have imagined. A lot of pilots from the war in Viet Nam were hiring out to fly in Mexican weed. They are only getting a few thousand a trip for their efforts and most of them are risking their own aircraft.

The elevated traffic is to my advantage as I just fold myself in behind an aging DC3 when I cross the border. I will have to stop two more times, once in Southern California and once again in Eastern Oregon. I have already repainted my Cessna 421 Eagle with identical numbers to a plane in Washington.

Now that I have made half a dozen trips trading the profits from each flight into more cocaine I feel it is time to retire. My last haul was one hundred twenty Kilos which cost one dollar a gram. That cost works out to one hundred twenty thousand dollars. Magically with the help of lactose powder I have transformed this final trip into twenty four million. In 1969 this is a very large pile of money.

I've been lucky and had all the excitement I was hoping for. Just slip a cassette of The Stone's "Gimmie Shelter" into the Eagle's stereo, push the throttles forward, and let all hell break loose for a few hours. I'm still alive. Yes, it time to retire.


I repainted the plane again, put back the original numbers and returned it to close where it came from with one hundred thousand dollars tucked away inside. A fair rental fee, even if it wasn't expected.

!n 1969 the world of smuggling is not a vicious game. It is opportunity and adventure. A test of will and wits that harms few and pleases many with the bounty of precious powders that gets rich kids laid.

 

[HUGGY]

The Seeds

Me? I'm from upstate Washington in the San Juan Islands. On Orcas Island what I did was hunt. I was consumed by it. I shot a deer from three feet on the first day of hunting season when I was twelve.

I left home at 14 to find adventure. I needed to get away from the farm and the small town gossips. My dad kept an apartment in Seattle and there I lived into my late teens.

Al's a bank robber. He is also into health food, acupuncture and stuff. He's as brave as they come but he limits himself taking unnecessary chances.

What's strange is that I have never seen Al face to face yet somehow feel we have become best friends.

The turning point in the path to adventure was when I met Steve. He is Al's partner. Al gets his money from smuggling these days and he invests his profits into his old high school buddies projects to make his money legal. Steve ran the Foreign Car repair shop.

I was looking for a job in the city and I had been working on Mini Coopers since 1961 when my dad left one up on the Island for when he visited from his travels with the Boeing Company. Steve looked like a hippie with long scraggly hair. We hit it off immediately and I went to work the day I applied.

Steve pointed to a Mercedes Benz out on the curb and a basket of it's parts sitting just inside the shop door and said "Put that car back together, running good and you have a job." The Seeds were screaming their song "Pushing Too Hard" loudly on the shop stereo and I went to work.

"You're pushin' too hard, uh-what you want me to be
You're pushin' too hard about the things you say
You're pushin' too hard every night and day
You're pushin' too hard
Pushin' too hard on me"

In three days the Benz was running. "Nice work Pinky" was all Steve said. I would have thought he could have been more congratulatory since I found out that the Benz had been sitting on the curb for three months. I had no idea why Steve called me "Pinky".

I had been employed at the car repair shop for six months. Steve and I had hit it off pretty well. We were out drinking after work one evening and he brought up a rather delicate problem. "Pink, I've got this partner, Al, and he is in jail and likely on his way to prison. We have been best friends since we were kids. I would like to help him but I just don't know what I can do. You have any thoughts?"

"I'll tell ya what Stevie, I'll think on it over night and give you my best answer in the morning".

The Man is always looking to bust smugglers, but Al is smart. He is building an empire right under their noses. Now he is in the custody of the Sheriff's department. If they find out what he is really up to he will go away for a very long time.

I had bigger dreams than turning wrenches. I know, busting somebody out of jail seems an interesting topic in itself, but that story is for another time. This one is about a different subject, Smuggling. Dig It?

I like taking chances, just not with luck, being prepared and knowing what I am getting for my exposure.

I woke up still not knowing what to say to Steve. I slip the Stones into the stereo of my snow white French version of a 911 S Porsche and began driving around Green Lake on my way to work. I do some of my best thinking watching the girls skating on the path that surrounds the lime colored water. "Mick" has my number and I his. I start to formulate my plan.

"Please allow me to introduce myself, I'm a man of wealth and taste" Mick coo's on the stereo.

One must remind one's self that making a deal with the devil requires attention to the devil in the details.

When I pulled in to the shop driveway I decided I didn't know enough about Al. "Hey Boss! We gotta talk. You need to tell me everything you can about Al."

"Well, Al cuts his cocaine in half before distributing it. It is making him incredibly rich. He is great at being elusive. But, every criminal's luck eventually runs out." Steve said, looking right through me. I sense he feels he may have made a mistake telling me about Al's plight. But Steve continues on for about an hour filling me in on his best friends situation and background.

Without going into the details I tell Steve I will save his buddy. "Give me five thousand dollars to work with and I will get him out". He did. I did.

What stuck in my mind was that Steve told me that Al cut his Coke in half. I guess it is true as Cat Stevens said "The first cut is the deepest".

After transfer of half ownership of the shop I sold my interest in Precision Foreign Car Repair for fourteen thousand bucks and took a flight to Fort Lauderdale, Florida.

I was a Boy Scout at eleven in 1957. Now I'm Twenty-two and much better prepared than the Scouts could have imagined.

I would take flying lessons, steal an airplane and fly the drugs in myself.

I settled in to the PAC flight school and rented Cessna 172's. I planned on getting my ticket in six weeks. The real key to my scheme on every solo flight was to do my touch and goes on the roads that go out into the Glades, sometimes coming to a full stop.

I was ready as Rock Steady Freddy to go to stage two of my plan. That was to hop on a flight to Peru and take a close look at the situation in South America.

I needed boots on the ground look see the lay of the land in Peru, specifically the lay of the roads. I needed some long straight runways where I could stash a couple kilos of Cocaine and a hundred gallons of aviation fuel.

I would come in at night, set down, dig up my stash of drugs, refuel the plane and be on my way in less than ten minutes, That is far less time than any Peruvian police response could intercept if I was spotted. That and a quick stop and go in Ecuador is all that was needed. I scheduled my return trip from Peru to also do a short layover in Ecuador for the final piece of the South American portion of my plan.

Once satisfied the plan was foolproof, I would fly down to Mexico and stash some more fuel for on the way down and the return trip on some old out of the way strip of asphalt.

Stealing the plane was to be the easiest part. Cessna twins don't have an ignition key. Cessna makes two combinations for their door locks. I bought both at the Cessna parts store.

The air traffic at the U.S. Mexican border is a lot busier with private planes than I could have imagined. A lot of pilots from the war in Viet Nam were hiring out to fly in Mexican weed. They are only getting a few thousand a trip for their efforts and most of them are risking their own aircraft.

The elevated traffic is to my advantage as I just fold myself in behind an aging DC3 when I cross the border. I will have to stop two more times, once in Southern California and once again in Eastern Oregon. I have already repainted my Cessna 421 Eagle with identical numbers to a plane in Washington.

I've been shot at, had military Phantom Jets show up unexpectedly acting as close escorts and pulled up to a fuel pump after flying on fumes to find the airport was out of fuel. Also one time I landed and a cop car with it's lights going came out of a hiding place next to the landing strip and attempted to pull me over like he would a speeding car.

Now that I have made half a dozen trips trading the profits from each flight into more cocaine I feel it is time to retire. My last haul was one hundred twenty Kilos which cost one dollar a gram. That cost works out to one hundred twenty thousand dollars. Magically with the help of lactose powder I have transformed this final trip into twenty four million. In 1969 this is a very large pile of money.

I've been lucky and had all the excitement I was hoping for. Just slip a cassette of The Stone's "Gimmie Shelter" into the Eagle's stereo, push the throttles forward, and let all hell break loose for a few hours. I'm still alive. Yes, it time to retire.

I repainted the plane again, put back the original numbers and returned it to close where it came from with one hundred thousand dollars tucked away inside. A fair rental fee, even if it wasn't expected.

!n 1969 the world of smuggling is not a vicious game. It is opportunity and adventure. A test of will and wits that harms few and pleases many with the bounty of precious powders that gets rich kids laid.

 

[HUGGY]

The latest version as of Saturday the 7th at around 2:30 PM with approximately 100 punctuation changes.

"
The Seeds

Me? I'm from upstate Washington, in the San Juan Islands. On Orcas Island what I did was hunt. I was consumed by it. I shot a deer, from three feet on the first day of hunting season, when I was twelve.

I left home at 14 to find adventure. I needed to get away from the farm and the small town gossips. My dad kept an apartment in Seattle. There I lived into my late teens.

Al's a bank robber. He is also into health food, acupuncture and stuff. He's as brave as they come, but he limits himself taking unnecessary chances.

What's strange is that I have never seen Al face to face yet somehow feel we have become best friends.

The turning point, in the path to adventure, was when I met Steve. He is Al's partner. Al gets his money from smuggling these days. He invests his profits into his old high school buddies projects to make his money legal. Steve ran the Foreign Car repair shop.

I was looking for a job in the city. I had been working on Mini Coopers since 1961. My dad left one up on the Island for when he visited from his travels with the Boeing Company.

Steve looked like a hippie with long scraggly hair. We hit it off immediately and I went to work the day I applied.

Steve pointed to a Mercedes Benz out on the curb, and a basket of it's parts sitting just inside the shop door, and said "Put that car back together, running good and you have a job." The Seeds were screaming their song "Pushing Too Hard" loudly on the shop stereo and I went to work.

"You're pushin' too hard, uh-what you want me to be
You're pushin' too hard about the things you say
You're pushin' too hard every night and day
You're pushin' too hard
Pushin' too hard on me"

In three days the Benz was running. "Nice work Pinky" was all Steve said.

I would have thought he could have been more congratulatory since I found out that the Benz had been sitting on the curb for three months. I had no idea why Steve called me "Pinky".

I had been employed at the car repair shop for six months. Steve and I had hit it off pretty well. We were out drinking after work one evening and he brought up a rather delicate problem. "Pink, I've got this partner, Al. He is in jail and likely on his way to prison. We have been best friends since we were kids. I would like to help him but I just don't know what I can do. You have any thoughts?"

"I'll tell ya what Stevie, I'll think on it over night and give you my best answer in the morning".

The Man is always looking to bust smugglers, but Al is smart.

Al's building an empire right under their noses. Now he's in the custody of the Sheriff's department. If they find out what he's really up to he will go away for a very long time.

I had bigger dreams than turning wrenches. I know, busting somebody out of jail seems an interesting topic in itself, but that story is for another time. This one is about a different subject, Smuggling. Dig It?

I like taking chances, just not with luck, being prepared and knowing what I am getting for my exposure.

I woke up, still not knowing what to say to Steve. I slip the Stones into the stereo of my snow white French version of a 911 S Porsche and began driving around Green Lake on my way to work. I do some of my best thinking watching the girls skating on the path that surrounds the lime colored water. "Mick" has my number and I his. I start to formulate my plan.

"Please allow me to introduce myself, I'm a man of wealth and taste" Mick coo's on the stereo.

One must remind one's self that making a deal with the devil requires attention to the devil in the details.

When I pulled in to the shop driveway I decided I didn't know enough about Al. "Hey Boss! We gotta talk. You need to tell me everything you can about Al."

"Well, Al cuts his cocaine in half before distributing it. It's making him incredibly rich. He's great at being elusive. But, every criminal's luck eventually runs out." Steve said, looking right through me. I sense he feels he may have made a mistake telling me about Al's plight. But Steve continues on for about an hour filling me in on his best friends situation and background.

Without going into the details, I tell Steve I'll save his buddy. "Give me five thousand dollars to work with and I'll get him out". He did. I did.

What stuck in my mind was that Steve told me that Al cut his Coke in half. I guess it's true as Cat Stevens said "The first cut is the deepest".

After transfer of half ownership of the shop, to me, I sold my interest in Precision Foreign Car Repair for fourteen thousand bucks, to Tom, Steve's friend, then I took a flight to Fort Lauderdale, Florida, the biggest drug hub in the U.S.A.

I was a Boy Scout at eleven in 1957. Now I'm Twenty-two and much better prepared than the Scouts could have imagined.

I would take flying lessons, steal an airplane and fly the drugs in myself.

I settled in to the PAC flight school and rented Cessna 172's. I planned on getting my ticket in six weeks. The real key to my scheme, on every solo flight, was to do my touch and goes on the roads that go out into the Glades, sometimes coming to a full stop.

I was ready as Rock Steady Freddy to go to stage two of my plan. That was to hop on a flight to Peru and take a close look at the situation in South America.

I needed boots on the ground, a look see, of the lay of the land in Peru, specifically the lay of the roads. I needed some long straight runways, where I could stash a couple kilos of Cocaine and a hundred gallons of aviation fuel.

I would come in at night, set down, dig up my stash of drugs, refuel the plane and be on my way in less than ten minutes, That is far less time than any Peruvian police response could intercept if I was spotted. That, and a quick stop and go in Ecuador is all that was needed. I scheduled my return trip from Peru to also do a short layover in Ecuador for the final piece of the South American portion of my plan.

Once satisfied the plan was foolproof, I would fly down to Mexico and stash some more fuel for on the way down and the return trip, on some old out of the way strip of asphalt.

Stealing the plane was to be the easiest part. Cessna twins don't have an ignition key. Cessna makes two combinations for their door locks. I bought both at the Cessna parts store.

The air traffic at the U.S. Mexican border is a lot busier with private planes than I could have imagined. A lot of pilots from the war in Viet Nam were hiring out to fly in Mexican weed. They are only getting a few thousand a trip for their efforts. Most of them are risking their own aircraft.

The elevated traffic is to my advantage as I just fold myself in behind an aging DC3 when I cross the border. I will have to stop two more times, once in Southern California and once again in Eastern Oregon. I have already repainted my Cessna 421 Eagle with identical numbers to a plane in Washington.

I've been shot at, had military Phantom Jets show up unexpectedly acting as close escorts and pulled up to a fuel pump after flying on fumes to find the airport was out of fuel. Also one time I landed and a cop car with it's lights going came out of a hiding place next to the landing strip and attempted to pull me over like he would a speeding car.

Now that I have made half a dozen trips trading the profits from each flight into more cocaine I feel it is time to retire. My last haul was one hundred twenty Kilos which cost one dollar a gram. That cost works out to one hundred twenty thousand dollars. Magically with the help of lactose powder I have transformed this final trip into twenty four million. In 1969 this is a very large pile of money.

I've been lucky and had all the excitement I was hoping for. Just slip a cassette of The Stone's "Gimmie Shelter" into the Eagle's stereo, push the throttles forward, and let all hell break loose for a few hours. I'm still alive. Yes, it time to retire.

I repainted the plane again, put back the original numbers and returned it to close where it came from with one hundred thousand dollars tucked away inside. A fair rental fee, even if it wasn't expected.

!n 1969 the world of smuggling is not a vicious game. It is opportunity and adventure. A test of will and wits that harms few and pleases many with the bounty of precious powders that gets rich kids laid."

 

[HUGGY]

"
The Seeds

Me? I'm from upstate Washington, in the San Juan Islands. On Orcas Island what I did was hunt. I was consumed by it. I shot a deer, from three feet on the first day of hunting season, when I was twelve.

I left home at 14 to find adventure. I needed to get away from the farm and the small town gossips. My dad kept an apartment in Seattle. There I lived into my late teens.

Al's a bank robber. He is also into health food, acupuncture and stuff. He's as brave as they come, but he limits himself taking unnecessary chances.

What's strange is that I have never seen Al face to face yet somehow feel we have become best friends.

The turning point, in the path to adventure, was when I met Steve. He is Al's partner. Al gets his money from smuggling these days. He invests his profits into his old high school buddies projects to make his money legal. Steve ran the Foreign Car repair shop.

I was looking for a job in the city. I had been working on Mini Coopers since 1961. My dad left one up on the Island for when he visited from his travels with the Boeing Company.

Steve looked like a hippie with long scraggly hair. We hit it off immediately and I went to work the day I applied.

Steve pointed to a Mercedes Benz out on the curb, and a basket of its parts sitting just inside the shop door, and said "Put that car back together, running good and you have a job." The Seeds were screaming their song "Pushing Too Hard" loudly on the shop stereo and I went to work.

"You're pushin' too hard, uh-what you want me to be
You're pushin' too hard about the things you say
You're pushin' too hard every night and day
You're pushin' too hard
Pushin' too hard on me"

In three days the Benz was running. "Nice work Pinky" was all Steve said.

I would have thought he could have been more congratulatory since I found out that the Benz had been sitting on the curb for three months. I had no idea why Steve called me "Pinky".

I had been employed at the car repair shop for six months. Steve and I had hit it off pretty well. We were out drinking after work one evening and he brought up a rather delicate problem. "Pink, I've got this partner, Al. He is in jail and likely on his way to prison. We have been best friends since we were kids. I would like to help him but I just don't know what I can do. You have any thoughts?"

"I'll tell ya what Stevie, I'll think on it over night and give you my best answer in the morning".

The Man is always looking to bust smugglers, but Al is smart.

Al's building an empire right under their noses. Now he's in the custody of the Sheriff's department. If they find out what he's really up to he will go away for a very long time.

I had bigger dreams than turning wrenches. I know, busting somebody out of jail seems an interesting topic in itself, but that story is for another time. This one is about a different subject, Smuggling. Dig It?

I like taking chances, just not with luck, being prepared and knowing what I am getting for my exposure.

I woke up, still not knowing what to say to Steve. I slip the Stones into the stereo of my snow white French version of a 911 S Porsche and began driving around Green Lake on my way to work. I do some of my best thinking watching the girls skating on the path that surrounds the lime colored water. "Mick" has my number and I his. I start to formulate my plan.

"Please allow me to introduce myself, I'm a man of wealth and taste" Mick coo's on the stereo.

One must remind one's self that making a deal with the devil requires attention to the devil in the details.

When I pulled in to the shop driveway I decided I didn't know enough about Al. "Hey Boss! We gotta talk. You need to tell me everything you can about Al."

"Well, Al cuts his cocaine in half before distributing it. It's making him incredibly rich. He's great at being elusive. But, every criminal's luck eventually runs out." Steve said, looking right through me. I sense he feels he may have made a mistake telling me about Al's plight. But Steve continues on for about an hour filling me in on his best friends situation and background.

Without going into the details, I tell Steve I'll save his buddy. "Give me five thousand dollars to work with and I'll get him out". He did. I did.

What stuck in my mind was that Steve told me that Al cut his Coke in half. I guess it's true as Cat Stevens said "The first cut is the deepest".

After transfer of half ownership of the shop, to me, I sold my interest in Precision Foreign Car Repair for fourteen thousand bucks, to Tom, Steve's friend, then I took a flight to Fort Lauderdale, Florida, the biggest drug hub in the U.S.A.

I was a Boy Scout at eleven in 1957. Now I'm twenty-two and much better prepared than the Scouts could have imagined.

I would take flying lessons, steal an airplane and fly the drugs in myself.

I settled in to the PAC flight school and rented Cessna 172's. I planned on getting my ticket in six weeks. The real key to my scheme, on every solo flight, was to do my touch and goes on the roads that go out into the Glades, sometimes coming to a full stop.

I was ready as Rock Steady Freddy to go to stage two of my plan. That was to hop on a flight to Peru and take a close look at the situation in South America.

I needed boots on the ground, a look see, of the lay of the land in Peru, specifically the lay of the roads. I needed some long straight runways, where I could stash a couple kilos of Cocaine and a hundred gallons of aviation fuel.

I would come in at night, set down, dig up my stash of drugs, refuel the plane and be on my way in less than ten minutes, That is far less time than any Peruvian police response could intercept if I was spotted. That, and a quick stop and go in Ecuador is all that was needed. I scheduled my return trip from Peru to also do a short layover in Ecuador for the final piece of the South American portion of my plan.

Once satisfied the plan was foolproof, I would fly down to Mexico and stash some more fuel for on the way down and the return trip, on some old out of the way strip of asphalt.

Stealing the plane was to be the easiest part. Cessna twins don't have an ignition key. Cessna makes two combinations for their door locks. I bought both at the Cessna parts store.

The air traffic at the U.S. Mexican border is a lot busier with private planes than I could have imagined. A lot of pilots from the war in Viet Nam were hiring out to fly in Mexican weed. They are only getting a few thousand a trip for their efforts. Most of them are risking their own aircraft.

The elevated traffic is to my advantage as I just fold myself in behind an aging DC3 when I cross the border. I will have to stop two more times, once in Southern California and once again in Eastern Oregon. I have already repainted my Cessna 421 Eagle with identical numbers to a plane in Washington.

I've been shot at, had military Phantom Jets show up unexpectedly acting as close escorts and pulled up to a fuel pump after flying on fumes to find the airport was out of fuel. Also one time I landed and a cop car with it's lights going came out of a hiding place next to the landing strip and attempted to pull me over like he would a speeding car.

Now that I have made half a dozen trips trading the profits from each flight into more cocaine I feel it is time to retire. My last haul was one hundred twenty Kilos which cost one dollar a gram. That cost works out to one hundred twenty thousand dollars. Magically with the help of lactose powder I have transformed this final trip into twenty four million. In 1969 this is a very large pile of money.

I've been lucky and had all the excitement I was hoping for. Just slip a cassette of The Stone's "Gimmie Shelter" into the Eagle's stereo, push the throttles forward, and let all hell break loose for a few hours. I'm still alive. Yes, it's time to retire.

I repainted the plane again, put back the original numbers and returned it to close where it came from with one hundred thousand dollars tucked away inside. A fair rental fee, even if it wasn't expected.

!n 1969 the world of smuggling is not a vicious game. It is opportunity and adventure. A test of will and wits that harms few and pleases many with the bounty of precious powders that gets rich kids laid."