I have 8 copies of I Am The Lizard King left.  

I still owe Laura a copy, she helped edit a few chapters so I feel bad for not getting her one sooner. We just keep missing each other, so I’ll send it by mail just to get the job done. 

That will leave me with 7 copies. 

I owe Rob a copy, (I forgot about that until right now, that should have been mailed out a week ago). 

6 copies remaining. 

I ran into Corb Lund the other night randomly and got chatting. He said he wants a copy. I should probably be proactive about that, southern Alberta respect! 

Books are dwindling, 5 copies in the lonely box. 

I should probably make a social media post right before Christmas (Yes, I still say Christmas) but I’m finding self-promotion harder and harder these days. 

No lawsuits yet, thank God. I’m still concerned about the title being close to copyright infringement. Oh well, at this point I could turn it into positive publicity. (I once saw a band from Calgary called Copyright, they opened for Matthew Good Band, third worst band I’ve ever seen) 

I need to place another order of books but I’m having a mild file management issue. I can’t remember which version is the most current. I can sort this out by emailing the printers, they’ll have it on file. I should have this written down. 

Went down to Owl’s Nest Books and did a reading for their monthly series that’s put on by the Alexandra Writers Centre Society. I read part of the first chapter and it slayed. I was hesitant due to the risky subject matter and the median age of the audience (old). It didn’t matter, they loved it.  

An old man made me cry with his poem he read about his wife. He showed me pictures after and told me stories about her. 

I signed up for the Calgary Public Library’s Author in Residence program. The man of the hour was Bruce Hunter. He was badass and I liked him right away. I wanted feedback on a new chapter but we just ended up having a great conversation. He said I was highly sensitive and empathetic. That’s pretty much exactly what I want to be as a writer and exactly what I don’t want to be as a person. I have viking lineage and I always feel like I should be out busting skulls and conquering, but my soul disagrees. 

I’ll be on the cover of WestWord magazine next month, that was nice of them. That should move some copies and spread the word. I talked way too much about punk rock and Josh Ritter in the article. 

I have a writing To Do List that reads: 
1) Check in with my friend and editor and see how she’s doing. 
2) Email my favourite living writer (Matt Love) and connect. 
3) Officially launch the website for Palooza Press (the micro-publishing press I am co-founding) 
4) Place another book order (this now moves up to priority number 1) 
5) Research arts funding for next book 

I didn’t touch alcohol in November. This saved me some time and money. I used that spare time to finish the first draft on a new novella. It’s mystical and ethereal, it’s like Walden Pond in Taber, Alberta. It’s an agrarian, meditation on life. It’s the best thing I’ve ever written but I don’t see a market for it, and I’m okay with that. I wrote it for me. I’ll shelf it for a few months before I start on the second draft. I’m seriously considering getting sober. My priorities in life have changed. I’m hardly drinking at all anyhow. 

My next order will be my third run of the novel. It’s nice to have a product that people actually want to buy. I’m really happy with this book. I love it. I don’t want it to die. I’m treating it like a living, breathing document. I might turn it into a podcast. The Lizard King won’t end here. I’ve created a myth, a legend, and these 142 pages are just the beginning. 

Why did you write a book? 

I’ve always wanted to. I’ve always been writing. I’ve been an avid reader and have been writing in almost every capacity. Writing a book always felt like the end goal. It’s a monumental task, but I try to be naive with my art and get myself going. I generally find out how hard something is once I’m already far too invested to back out. I thrive under pressure. 

You wrote a book, but aren’t you a musician? 

No, I’m a writer and a performer. I’ve been most active as a songwriter but I’ve always stressed the writing part. That’s what I’m good at. I get by as a musician but feel the written word is where my heart is. 

What’s the book about? 

It’s about friendship in the pre-internet days of rural Alberta. It’s about finding your     voice as an artist. It’s about misadventure and self-discovery. It’s a Huckleberry Finn story with more illegal drugs. 

Is it a true story? 

Parts are true, parts are heavily exaggerated and parts are nonsense. 

Why is it called I Am The Lizard King? 

My friend had a shirt with a lizard on it that quoted the late Jim Morrison. Everytime he wore that shirt it seemed like he was possessed by the spirit of the altered beast. The book contains a chapter of the same title. It was just something that always made me laugh. I thought it would be a bizarre title. If Jim wants to sue me he is going to have to do so posthumously.  

Does your friend know you wrote a book about him?  

Aggghhhhhhhhh.....No....not exactly. I’ve lost touch with the character the book is based upon. I plan to tell him, but his reaction will not change how I deal with the material. I believe every person is entitled to his or her side of the story, I’m simply taking mine and putting it out there. 

Will you write another book? 

Absolutely. I loved the writing process and I learnt and became a much better writer because of it. I will absolutely write another book soon enough. My music has been ignored because of my literary ambitions as of late, so for the next six months or so, I really want to get back to writing songs and working on my live show. 

Did you have an editor? 

Yes and no. Technically I didn’t hire anyone to operate under that official title, but I had some very qualified friends who spend countless hours on chapters with me. The book took 2 1/2 years and has probably 300 pages that were simply edited out or completely altered. There are enough lost chapters to form another book altogether. So I absolutely had editors, but just not in a traditional sense. I also took advantage of the Writer-In-Residence program through the Calgary Public Library and received some fantastic mentorship. I joined the Alberta Writers Guild and have been trying to utilize their services. I would call my friend Mandi my unofficial editor. 

Are you self-releasing the book? 

Yes, because I am in a unique position. I drive around and play to an audience that I’ve already build as a touring musician. Most authors don’t have that luxury, so an independent publishing house just didn’t have that much to offer that I couldn’t do on my own. 

When can I read your book? 

I will be releasing the first chapter in April. I haven’t finalized a release date for the physical book, but I will likely be selling copies off stage this summer. (UPDATE: The book is now available via the website for order) 

Are you a narcissist? Isn’t it kind of weird to interview yourself? 

That’s an odd question coming from myself. Maybe narcism isn’t the right word. Maybe deluded or self-opposing would be more accurate. Why am I even answering this? What am I trying to prove here? 

What else is new? 

A) I’m going to put out a new record this year, I’m trying to start a new Punk/Emo band (yep, not joking about that) and I’m loosely thinking about starting a non-profit publishing press. I’m also taking some Urban Planning courses. I’ve been doing Crossfit for a few months now, that’s a pretty messed up thing to put your body through. I started going to church and reading more sacred texts. I’ve also been dreaming about taking up skateboarding this spring. I thought about brewing beer but I think that market may be becoming oversaturated too quickly. 

Cover Art: I Am The Lizard King 

I am a podcast enthusiast. Maybe it’s from spending too much time alone in a car and too much time with live music. There’s always been something appealing about the knowledge, entertainment and endless supply of podcasts with every theme you could ever imagine. 

I often listen to podcasts at 1.5 speed so that I can consume them faster than intended. I presume I learnt about 99 Designs through their constant advertising on all my favourite podcasts. 

So when it came down to getting some designs for my upcoming book, I Am The Lizard King, I figured I would try them out. 

I prefer to support local artists, it felt ironic to outsource for art, but sometimes artists can be really hard to work with (that includes me). 99 Designs made things really easy and I’m really happy with the results. 

Several strong candidates came in and I selected three finalists and ran a poll on Facebook and Twitter to determine which was the crowd favourite. The poll was largely unhelpful and people were split three ways as to which cover they liked best. I suppose that’s a good problem to have. 

I chose the following cover art because I felt like it suited the book best. I didn’t choose it for marketability or any practical reasons. I just thought it represented the body of work. 

I Am The Lizard King is a strange book. It’s a work of Creative Non-Fiction that is far more bizarre and zany than I could ever make up on my own. I’ve had a very strange life, but it’s a life that offers rich source material to pull from. I didn’t have to be a great writer because I already had a great story. All I had to do was tell it. 

The first chapter of the book will be making it’s online debut soon enough. Once you read this I think you will understand how fitting the cover art is. 

I wanted cover art that represented the book. The whole package is weird and strange and beautiful. If you voted or offered your opinion, I thank you. I’m excited to share this wild adventure with you. I’ll absolutely be writing books as long as I live. I can say the same about making music.

Two and a half years ago I started writing a book. Initially, I just wanted to jot down some stories, collect them in an anthology and sell it as merchandise while touring around and playing folk shows. 

I had a story that I believed to be so good, that I figured it would tell itself. 

It is a story about friendship. It is about the person that introduced you to the alternative side of life. It’s about the misadventures of youth. It’s Huckleberry Finn or Tom Sawyer with bad ecstasy.  

Like most things in my life, I underestimated the difficulty of the project by a landslide. I worked on it everyday and it took years of my life. It made my music suffer and just when I thought I finished, I would be challenged by a new idea and begin another draft. 

I met a lady while doing a residency at the Banff Centre, who was a fellow storyteller, author and librarian. She put in countless hours of editing and proof reading with me. I used the Writer in Residency program at the Calgary Public Library and went over partial drafts with another accomplished writer. I asked friends to read and critique it for me. I joined the Alberta Writers Guild and started shaking hands and kissing babies. 

It has grown into a story that I am very proud of. I’m now putting in my final hours on the final chapters of the final draft. Over the next few months I’ll be sharing bits and pieces with you through different social networks. 

The book is called “I Am The Lizard King.”  

(And yes, that’s a Jim Morrison reference)

The following is a sketch by my friend Curtis "The Mushroom King" Manchur.

Northern Sessions live video: https://vimeo.com/185536335

Tom Sawyer was a shit disturber. He was mischievous, he didn’t take direction and he had an ability of pushing everyone around him to their limits. He was also charming, exciting and you would follow him on any adventure. 

I’ve always felt like this was a nobel mission statement. Push the limits right to the edge and then moonwalk back a few steps. 

Quit Fu#$in Around And Be A Christian follows this format pretty closely. 

The song is about the drunk advice a man gave me in Nashville Tennessee. It’s not particularly bad advice, it’s just ironic because it was coming from a man who could barely stand-up and was spitting Bud Light in my face when he talked. He was the type of person who spoke but didn’t listen and he certainly didn’t seem like he had his shit together. He was the type of guy you probably wouldn’t be asking for advice from. 

“Fu$#in” and “Christian” don’t belong in the same sentence. Sam Outlaw says that 85% of writing a good country song is in the title. When the drunkest man in Tennessee told me to quit fu$#in around and be a Christian, I knew that I had a good title. 

I wanted the song to be in a similar vein to the Hayes Carll classic, “She Left Me For Jesus”. It’s certainly not a new theme but I thought I could put my own spin on it. Besides, I’ve used up all my “girl got away” songs, so I’m reaching for new subject matter. 

Ironically, my faith is something I take very seriously. It’s something I don’t like to talk about. It’s something I practice in solitude. I’m an on-again-off-again Christian with an appreciation for Taoism, spirituality and most world religions.  

Personally, I think this song isn’t really about faith or religion, it’s just about drunk people saying funny things in bars.

Prince Rupert Hospitality 

     I have wanted to go to Haida Gwaii (or the Queen Charlotte Islands) ever since I picked up a hitchhiker about 10 years back on my way to Waterton Lakes for a wedding. I was going through a Jack Kerouac phase and my young passenger told me all about living off the land. He told me about snaring rabbits and picking mushrooms and melding them in a wild stew that he cooked in a black cauldron in the woods. If that doesn’t plant the seed of wanderlust then I don’t know what will. 

As a Canadian folk singer, I believe it’s my job to tell the stories of the people of the country I come from. This requires travel and I pride myself on trying to explore every nook and cranny. Stompin’ Tom Connors said that he didn’t need a map to travel Canada. He also said that the only place in Canada he had never been was the Queen Charlotte Islands. Well Tom, you fucked up big time because those islands left an impression on me unlike anywhere else in Canada. 

My friend and pedal steel player, Dylan S Keating, and I were on the second annual Great North Tour. It is a tour we created in order to give us an excuse to explore and perform in more remote parts of Northern BC. We had such a good time doing it last year that we decided to make it an annual thing. We made it all the way to Prince Rupert but had to cancel the voyage to Haida Gwaii. This year we were determined to make it happen. 

Our original plan was to take the car on the 9 hour ferry ride from Prince Rupert to Haida Gwaii. This would give us a place to sleep and help us keep an eye on all our musical gear. BC ferries emailed us 48 hours before the trip and let us know that the ferry was full and that we could ride as passengers but we would have to leave the car. With limited ferry access it was now or never.  

Our backup plan was to rent bikes, leave our gear in the car in some side-street of Prince Rupert, and camp and cycle our way around. This plan came to a screeching hault when we found out the bike rental place in town had recently closed and the local Wal-Mart didn’t actually sell bikes (which we would have just bought and returned after our trip). 

So without a formal plan, we booked ourselves tickets as foot passengers for the overnight ferry on Sunday night. We performed at the Wheelhouse Brewery in Prince Rupert on Saturday night and were chatting with one of the owners after the show. His name was James and he offered to lend us his bike and ask the other owner if we could borrow his bike. We accepted this hail-mary of an offer because we had little choice. 

I should also point out that the Wheelhouse in Prince Rupert is my favorite place in Canada to have a beer. I have been saying this for the past year, and this generous offer just cemented it as my favorite. 

The Wheelhouse is owned by three, cool, young guys who have created a great brewery and a cultural hub of the community. They have a seasonal beer called Scurvy Dog Spruce Ale. It is a beer brewed with spruce tips. Legend has it, that sailors off the coast would put spruce tips in their beer in order to avoid scurvy while out at sea for long durations (spruce tips are high in Vitamin C). James told us that all three owners and their families went camping for a few days and picked spruce tips the entire time, collecting over 70 lbs. They used these spruce tips for the brew and when it’s gone it’s gone. How’s that for “local” and “seasonal”.  

The next day we showed up at the brewery in the afternoon to find two mountain bikes waiting for us with a lock and a helmet. There were two local gentleman (Vaughn and Richy) sitting at the bar when we walked in. They explained that when they got there they noticed one of the tires on the bikes was in rough shape, so they voluntarily took the bike back home and replaced it with one of theres. We had never met them before but they had heard that we were the musicians and we were cycling Haida Gwaii and they wanted to ensure we had a good time. 

At this point we were mind blown at the local hospitality we were receiving in Prince Rupert. Nearly total strangers were lending us there expensive bikes and bike parts to help us go on a mini-vacation in the middle of our tour. 

Then Vaughn and Richy asked us if we would play an impromptu set. We politely declined as there was no one in the bar except the four of us and the bartender. Shortly after that it began to rain and the weather brought in a new crowd of tourists and locals. They tried again and this time we accepted (after getting a green light from an owner).  

The boys kept on sliding beers up to us on stage and calling for celebratory sociables. We finished a half-drunk, Sunday afternoon set to find out that they had walked around the bar gathering us tips. $300 worth of tips to be exact. We were blown away at the local hospitality. These good vibes and mutual appreciation spread and we kept on drinking long into the afternoon. Beers were on the house and we weren’t saying no to anything. 

The next thing we knew it was 7:00. We had to check-in at the ferry at 8:30. We were drunk and hadn’t packed anything. We slammed our music gear in the storage room of the brewery and ran to the car and threw random clothes into a bag. It was pouring rain and we had to cycle 5 miles to the ferry station. We got soaking wet in the process and barely made it on time. 

We were ill-prepared, drunk, wet, hungry and had $300 in tips in our pocket that we decided should be put towards our trip. And with that we boarded the overnight ferry to Haida Gwaii.

“Cool bands don’t win radio contests,” -Dan Mangan 

Now that I’ve got your attention... 

My name is Tanner, I’m the guy at the front of the room taking notes and asking questions. I’m the guy on the road shaking hands and kissing babies. I’m the guy actually putting my money where my mouth is, trying to learn and stay humble along the way. I played nearly 150 shows in 2015. I took chances and learnt a great deal from those road miles. 

I care about the business side of things. I got shut down for my first 10 grant applications, now I’m pretty consistently getting funding. I’m beginning to market myself as a storyteller because I believe there is a hole in the market and not many young guys are doing it anymore. I wrote a novel to replace the revenue I’m losing from CD sales due to streaming services. I’m hoping to break into the literary world as well as public speaking trend (TED Talks).  

I’m learning that I am a brand and that I can stretch that brand out to a number of different avenues. I just edited a music book for an industry associate and made a solid contact and friend along the way.  

There is more than one way to skin a cat and there are multiple ways to make money in this industry, you just need to be creative.  

Here’s the 3 main reasons I want to be involved with Project Wild: 

1) I want to go out of my way to make industry contacts in Western Canada. I want to start touring select markets in the U.S. and I need people I can rely on for information and resources. I would like to expand my professional circle. I’m good with people and believe I could use this to my advantage. 

2) Meet other bands and artists at bootcamp and create stronger bonds for future      relationships. I find that I am always on the go and this can be hard to solidify  relationships. Having this time to connect will be greatly beneficial to me. 

3) I want to have a career with longevity. I want to be doing this for the rest of my life and I want to learn as much as I can about the industry so that I can grow my brand. This would be a great resume piece that I could build off of. 

I could lie to you and say that my main goal is to win the competition. But that would just be a lie. I know that what matters is that you hit the ground running and use momentum as leverage. Winning is less important than what the game plan is after the competition. This entire competition is just a leverage point for me. 

In a nutshell... 

There is going to be flashier people than me entering this competition. There is going to be a girl that looks like Taylor Swift and some new band that’s coming out of the gates strong. They probably don’t have any experience and they most likely will become alcoholics and drug addicts and burn out before they amount to anything.  

You can pass on me now, but I promise you that I will be the guy that sticks to plan and utilizes longevity and sustainability. I’ll be slowly growing when others are moving through massive highs and crushing lo’s.  

You can pass on me now, but the next time you want to work with me you will have to talk to my agent...and he will tell you that you probably can’t afford me. 

         After a slow winter it’s always a pleasure to get back on the road again. March was a crazy month to say the least. I wasn’t sure how I was going to fit it all in, but somehow we made it happen. 

At the tail-end of February I drove out to Winnipeg with my friend Mariel Buckley for the Prairie Winter Song Retreat. We were two of three Alberta artist sent out to Manitoba for a co-writing session. Three artists from Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta were set-up in groups of three everyday, and expected to write and perform a new song. 

It was a challenging experience but I can honestly say that I came out of it with three really promising songs. There was some monster writers and I learnt a great deal from seeing how other people operate. A songwriter named Grant Davidson (Slow Leaves) told me to think of a song like a painting. I’ve always thought of songs as stories so that was a nice alternative for me that has opened up some new possibilities.  

I followed that off with a nice little West coast run to Vancouver Island. I brought Dylan along to play pedal steel and we played some really nice gigs. We played a great house concert in Victoria and a nice folk club in Chiliwack. We hiked in to some strange railway crash in the woods near Whistler. All these boxcars just slid off the tracks and into the forest. People have painted them all sorts of colours. It was beautiful, like a pop-up art gallery. It was one of those cool, local secrets that we wouldn’t have discovered normally. That’s what touring is all about.  

At the end of March we played a show in my hometown of Taber, AB. We rented out the curling club and hauled a bunch of sound gear down and put on a show. I was a little nervous about playing at home but it turned out to be a great night. We will absolutely do it again next year. 

In April, I went down to my parents place and spent almost a week there helping out on the farm. I always enjoy going down there; it’s a nice break from the road and the city. I’m not too sure if I’m built for life in Calgary. I enjoy being at home on the farm, and on the road. I have a solid crew of friends and a support network in Calgary so I certainly can’t complain. But at the end of the day I am a road dog, and that’s where I belong. 

 I followed that off with a prairie solo tour that went really well. I had the pleasure of opening up for John Wort Hannam at the Lyric Theatre in Swift Current. We played to a packed house and an amazing audience. I had wanted to play that room for a long time, so it was great to get the opportunity. John was really good to me and I’ll always remember that. He sat and watched my entire set and was a really positive and encouraging guy. I realize that those are the type of shows that I want to be doing. I also had a nice show in Saskatoon and got to play at a great new room in Prince Albert called the Rock Trout Cafe.  

Touring solo is a strange beast, but I find it’s necessary to make a living. It’s incredibly expensive to bring a band on the road, or to even bring one, hired musician. Playing solo just makes sense economically. Fortunately, I knew enough people out in the prairies to keep me company. I also spent a great deal of time using my Goodlife Fitness membership in every place I went. That really helps keep you stay healthy on the road. 

I’ve got a great spring and summer coming up. On Sunday May 8th I’ll be running a Spartan Run in Big Forks, Montana at 8 AM. I’ll follow that up by opening for Fred Penner at 8 PM in Lethbridge. I can’t say it’s ever slow and I can’t say it’s not interesting.  

Looking forward to catching everybody on the road. 

Cheers, 
Tanner

Every year on Christmas Eve, my extended family on my mother’s side, gets together.  

This year, my little cousin Dane had a toy lightsaber. It was an appropriate toy as the new Star Wars film had just been released and he had just seen it in theaters, AND he got his very own popcorn and pop (this was an important detail to Dane). 

Dane is eight-years-old and he is the youngest child in his family. He is extremely intelligent. He is a natural performer and has a unique sense of humor. He isn’t as competitive at sports as his older brother and sister. He is sensitive, a quality that never bodes well in team sports. He has a strong attention to detail and a vivid imagination. He is one of my favorite family members as we share some similar character traits, for better or for worse. 

Dane was very excited to share with me his favorite moments of the Star Wars film, the technical details of the lightsaber and his hopes and dreams for the future of the Star Wars franchise. 

I started asking him far too advanced, technical and philosophical questions about the Star Wars universe,  

    “Does a lightsaber cut or burn?”  

    “If you get your arm chopped off by a lightsaber, would the wound cauterize and     sterilize? Or is there risk of infection?” 

    “What do you think the annual wage of a Stormtrooper would be?” 

    “Would a Jedi be considered a terrorist?” 

His older brother, Drake, weighed in on the conversation. He had his own answers to my questions and they were well thought out.  

Drake figured a lightsaber was an energy source and therefore would burn. If you lost an arm the wound would be cauterized and would probably be sanitized in the process. Stormtroopers probably weren’t paid and instead were taken care of and brainwashed into the movement. And Jedi’s are the good guys, so naturally they would be embraced in modern society. 

Dane was fascinated by the conversation but couldn’t keep up with his brother’s confident answers to my obscure questions. 

“A light saber would be a really, really, hot heat, Tanner.” 

Thanks Dane. Thanks buddy. 

To be honest, I’ve never been a massive Star Wars fan. I loved the original three, hated the three recent films and considered that a pretty mediocre batting average. I wasn’t really interested in the new film until my conversation with Dane and his brother Drake. 

Dane was jacked-up on Star Wars. He wanted to get into it. It took every ounce of his being to not ruin the ending. He could barely resist telling me that a main character died in the film (whoops, spoiler alert). Instead he gave me painfully obvious clues until I figured it out on my own. 

After Christmas, I went to see the new movie and loved it. It was fun, I felt excited. I was like a kid watching it; eating my very own popcorn. 

My point is that Dane was excited and thus it made me excited. It made me realize that excitement and a distinct interest in something is a contagious quality. When people get excited about things, momentum builds and movements happen. People are excited about Bernie Sanders right now. Everyone loves an underdog story. 

I don’t care what you do, but if you are passionate about it and can demonstrate that to me, then I’m probably going to become interested myself. 

If you are a musician, author, jewelry maker, politician, real-estate agent, entrepreneur, carpenter, work in non-profit, a teacher, a chef or even a Jedi, if you are into it then I’m probably going to be into it as well. I’ll drink the Kool-Aid - I just want to know that you want to drink the Kool-Aid as well, and I want to know that it’s going to be awesome! 

Marketers rejoice. Here is some free information that I learned from an eight-year-old kid.

This is a story that I have been working on to be told on stage. It is a true story about my short lived stint selling security systems door-to-door. It was a strange and adventurous time in my life. The story is about my friend Darrall. 

"Darrall spoke wish a brash, Brooklyn accent, though I’m sure he had never been to New York. 

He was from a small farming community, just like me. 

We first met in Fairfax, Virginia. Neither of us had ever been to Fairfax, and didn’t know where Virginia was until we ended up living there. 

Darrall lived in the condo above me. He listened to R and B music loudly, played poker and drank everyday. 

We were both employees of Pinnacle Security. We sold security systems door-to-door, six days a week. Pinnacle was a mormon company based out of Salt Lake City, Utah. The Church of Latter-day Saints. 

The company hired young, mormon men, many of whom had just completed missions. During these missions, the boys left home for a year or two and tried to sell eternal redemption. Selling security systems was much easier. It was a perfect system. 

The company hired us thinking we were nice, mormon boys. We were not. We were con-artists. I didn’t know this yet, Darrall knew this for a long time. 

-------------- 

Everyday at noon we were dropped off in random Virginia suburbs. We would knock on doors and try to sell security systems. They would pick us up just after dusk. Some of us sold systems, some of us didn’t. 

Darrall refused to be dropped off at noon. “No one is home until 6 PM. Your wasting six hours of my time.” 

For the first three days, the company complied and Darrall stayed at the condo and went to the pool. On the fourth day they threatened to fire Darrall unless he went out at Noon. 

On the fifth day, Darrall went to a mall and set up a booth. He put up a banner that said, “enter to win a free security system.” People did sign up. They filled out the ballot with their name and phone number. After a few hours, mall security kicked Darrall out. He called every single person who entered and signed a few people up for a three-year contract. 

The company offered us free rent in the condos, a cell phone, pepper spray, an American working visa, and $400 travel money, plus commission. 

Darrall used all his pepper spray on the nice mormon boys. He sprayed their toothbrushes, boxer shorts, their food, and occasionally, he sprayed them directly in the face. 

------------------- 

On the 13th day, I took my U.S. working visa, my cell phone, and the only $400 to my name and moved to the beach. 

The company threatened to cut off my cell phone and flag my U.S. working visa....they never did. 

Before I left, Darrall asked me for the spare key to the condo, my parking pass and the key fob that opened the front gate of the condo complex. 

The company leased the condo units for four months. 

On the seventeenth day, Darrall put an ad in the local paper to rent out the condo unit below him. The condo I had lived in. 

On the nineteenth day, he charged a young couple, first and last months rent, plus a $100 deposit for the condo complex key fob. They wrote him a cheque for $2,100. 

He cashed that cheque and moved to the beach. 

A few months ago I stayed at Darrall’s house. He owns a company in Wyoming now. We were drinking and reminiscing about the old days. 

“I wonder how long that young couple got to stay in the condo before the company realized I rented it out,” he said. 

------------ 

Darrall spoke wish a brash, Brooklyn accent, though I’m sure he had never been to New York."