True Confessions of an Ex Paperboy

Several frosty mornings a week I have to crawl on my hands and knees, usually in my nylons and heels, to retrieve my daily newspaper from under my car. Yes, I know, I could turn the engine over, roll 10 feet out of my drive and pick it up but I am apparently a slow learner. I have left pathetic messages with the newspaper management but to no avail. Doubt Miss Throwing Papers in My Jammies From My Car Window will get a tip from me this Christmas. When I was a kid, delivering the morning paper was a time honored tradition for getting my hot little hands on cold hard cash to waste without parental control. My parents didn’t believe in allowance, we were on our own to scare up lawn jobs raking five foot deep tree leaves and babysitting Satan’s little children.



Even though my mom had her Master’s degree in math it was too risky to leave us at home during the day unsupervised for even a minute to go to work. Heaven knows what 87 thousand teenagers would do without someone to keep us under at least basic lock down. In order to bring in a few bucks to cover some extras she took a job as a district manager for the Newark Star Ledger. Basically she supervised young teen boys to pedal around the neighborhood throwing papers in the bushes and wresting their collection money out of their fingertips. In order to seek new virgins for the routes she would hang around school yards trying to seduce young boys into earning a little dough. Now a days she might have gotten arrested for trolling for young boys.

The problem was when a route went unfulfilled by an anxious young lad eager to earn cash to impress a certain young lady, my Sistah and I were stuck being the Magic Newspaper Fairy’s little helpers. Since she paid for our horse riding she felt it was a fair trade to get us up at O’f***ing clock early to thrown 50 millionity papers before school. Granted she drove and we slept in the 15 second increments that teens are well known for. Man I wish I could sleep like that now, as many of you know my king size bed and I aren’t seeing eye to eye lately. It’s been pretty brisk the last few days in Phoenix so here is a nice hot soup recipe.

Corn Chowder
1 pound ham steak cut into 1” pieces
4 tablespoons butter
1 cup chopped onions
4 cups peeled and cubed potatoes
2-17 ounce cans creamed corn
2-10 ounce packages frozen corn
13 ounces evaporated milk
13 ounces water
13 ounces milk
Salt and paper to taste
3 tablespoons parsley chopped

Melt butter n large soup pot. Cook ham and onion for 5 minutes. Add potatoes and cover with approximately 3 cups water or enough to cover potatoes. Bring to boil, reduce heat and cook for 15 minutes or until potatoes are tender. Add remaining ingredients and simmer for 5 minutes, serve with bread.

Often my mom would send then nubile teen versions of my Sistah and me to the playground in hopes of scoring fresh meat and we were happy to do. If only to reduce the wear and tear on our throwing arms and glean a little extra sleep. But…….there was one route we were unwilling to give up and delivered well beyond our high school graduation. Fraternity Row at Rutgers University had, who knew, a group of good looking college boys who liked to view the literary world opinions with their morning coffee. We understood our viewing audience and we were well dressed in tube tops and daisy dukes during our weekly collections. Naturally we changed in our car since Mom would never let us leave looking like the little trollops we wanted to portray. Not only did we get great tips, we got invited to lots and lots of frat parties. Let’s just say that grain alcohol in Hawaiian Punch goes down like well, Hawaiian Punch. Hopefully, Sheldon won’t follow in her mother’s footsteps. RU rah, rah, RU rah, rah, Go Scarlet Knights!