There was a law saying you couldn't build
anything on Okaloosa Island.
The member of congress for that area, a public
servant, bought up choice property, which was worthless, because you couldn't build
on it, then changed the law.
Once when Potter and Suzette were divorced,
Suzette lived in a condominium on Okaloosa Island. She dated airline pilots.
Potter was living in Suzette's VW van at Navarre Campground, heating water for coffee
in a tin can.
This was the time when Potter turned down a job playing rhythm
guitar and singing lead for Bill Monroe because he "didn't want to live on a
bus."
Potter went to Suzette's apartment and knocked on the door. He
was loud. He was drunk. She wouldn't let him in.
He tore the door down.
It was the wrong apartment.
Think of the poor terrified people inside their
apartment as a madman tore their door down.
Potter and Suzette got back together.
Potter wasn't usually violent.
Although once when a cop pulled him over,
drunk, he said, "You'd better call for backup because I'm going to whip your
ass and take your gun away from you."
* * *
Old Folks wasn't usually violent. Although once he hurt his hand punching
out a piece of sheetrock.
Once he almost disemboweled a man with a No, 2
shovel he sharpened every morning with a file, like Ty Cobb sharpening his spikes
in the dugout, leering at the second baseman.
He restrained himself.
Cooler heads prevailed.
He told himself, "Be cool."
* * *
In the movie Be Cool Vince Vaughn kills a hit-man with a red aluminum
baseball bat.
Was that in the book? Old Folks read the book. He didn't
remember the Vince Vaughn character in the book.
I guess when you turn Be
Cool into a hip hop La Dolce Vita you have to change a few things.
You have to make it more like a, well, music video.