CSI In My Backyard

No matter how good the riding weather, never turn a blind eye to yard work. Otherwise… things happen.

Reported missing three years ago, could this be the estranged wife of Ken and beloved friend of Skipper? After her disappearance from her Malibu Penthouse in 2005, investigators were left with few clues and a toy industry that quickly closed ranks.

"The entire thing didn't feel right from the beginning," said a source close to the investigation. "But for her to turn up in a backyard in Central Pennsylvania doesn't surprise me."

"I'm a little unnerved by the entire thing," said Mr. J. Ziegler, who found the body in his backyard while raking leaves. "God knows how long she's been back here. I haven't touched that flowerbed in at least two years. I'm just glad my children were inside when I found her."

The investigation has been reopened and persons of interest are being contacted. "This is a little out of our jurisdiction," says Svorrd Svorrdsen of Legoland Homicide. "We're only built to a 1/92 scale, and those Mattel people… well there really isn't a realistic comparison here. I'm really not sure what they're modeled on. Regardless, we'll do our best. If we have to, we'll bring in the Special Victim's Unit from PlayMobil. They're a little closer in size, and frankly, they're all we have left in the toy box."

When asked whether they have any leads Svorrdsen replied, "We'll want to question Skipper and Ken."

Calls to Skipper’s publicist continue to go unanswered, but a source close to the family reveled that she has recently checked into the Betty Ford clinic. And according to Ken's agent, he will be vacationing in Thailand indefinitely.

The Regular

There is something about a smoky bar.

Found in old row buildings crammed tightly together, they share common walls with laundry mats and drug stores. In the old days, they rented rooms to the rail workers and day laborers by the month, day, or hour. Men’s hotels.

In the sticks, they live out on the crossroads in the middle of gravel parking lots miles from nowhere. Servicing loggers and drag line operators. Waiting for something to happen.

They are the places where a pool table is sacred, the darts have steel tips (you keep score by marking a slate bard with chalk) and there’s a shuffleboard that runs the length of the back wall. It is where you would find old men nursing whiskey at 10 in the morning on a Sunday—left over from the ‘lock in’ the night before. They were the regulars

In the small towns where I grew up, these establishments are still part of the fabric. They house local history and refuse to be gentrified.

In Columbia my two favorites are Dietz’s and the Fairview. I frequent them when I go home. My sisters have regular status. We pay for every other.

The Hotel Locust was another. Favored by my late uncle Paul and the boys, late evenings during the holidays led to Christmas carols at my grandmother’s house at 2 a.m. But it has changed hands recently and appears to have lost some of its gritty charm.

Outside of Moshannon there was the roadhouse at the crossroads. I never knew it to have a name. They only served bottles and cans—poured into plastic cups after 8 p.m. Great cheeseburgers for lunch. It’s strip joint now.

The Star Garden is a memory.

At the edge of Karthus there’s a cinder block shack that sits 50 feet from the train tracks. As I kid, my dad and uncle would stop there to pick up a six-pack for the canoe ride from Miller’s Landing to the iron bridge. I’ve always wanted to give it a try.

Bellefonte has the Dodie and the Omar, but the Big Trout is gone.

My step-father and his brother have a family bar in my home town. It’s an old two-story row house hotel with a small sign outside—Smith’s. When I was a kid the rail was populated by old men with names like Beanbelly, Buzz, and Double-dip. The long bar has since been cut in half to make room for seating to accommodate the steak shop the blossomed out of the back kitchen 20 years ago. They still rent rooms upstairs.

My regular bar is Zeno’s—located directly above the center of the earth—and even after my 9 years in Seattle (where I never did find the right bar), it was as though I had never left. Dave still tends five nights a week. And on Friday nights I lose two out of three on the pool table to this guy from Staten Island. Every once in a while, I'm there when the lights come on.

The Old F O R D

The one I fell in love with—a 1976 Ford F150 Super Cab.

This is the one. The one I learned to drive. The one whose tailgate I caved in. The one whose starter failed countless times in parking lots, but never on the back roads. It hauled firewood, mulch, canoes, and countless apartments full of junk. This is the truck that my father owned, but I loved.

It had a four-speed transmission, power steering, power breaks, and an extended cab—which the guy on TV made it longer by puling effortlessly on the tailgate. How clever. Did it collapse the same way? I was ten, and I wanted it.

Dad had bought it for his tree business so there were no extras. Pick-up trucks in the days before the SUV were utilitarian. Everything was optional. Dad opted out.

There was no AC. If it was hot, you put the windows down or you rode in the back with the dogs. Cold? Wait until the engine warmed and turn on the heat. Seat warmers? We would use old seat cushions from hunting season. The Lava Buns brand worked the best. And there was no radio.

Between here and there we talked when we drove. If my grandfather or my uncle were with us, they would tell stories about York County and childhood. If I was with the guys from the tree crew, I was privy to the kinds of filth—that when repeated later in the school year—would earn me the awe and respect of the 8th grade school yard, and the wrath of Sister Anna. If it were only me and Dad, I would be subjected to his stylings of Johnny Cash and Waylon Jennings. His truck. His rules. My penance.

Dad had others over the years—newer, smaller, sportier models that had better curb appeal, but the green Ford was my favorite.

When I moved to Seattle he offered it to me. “Take it across country,” he said.

I didn’t. After working all of those years, I denied the Ford one last road trip. I was too proud. I wanted to start fresh and leave home behind. And now that I see it sitting next to what once was the Big Trout Inn on 144, I feel that I let it down.

There would have been back roads, dirty jokes, and renditions of “Folsom Prison Blues” and “Midnight Rider." Gas was cheap. We would have made it.