The Goblet, The Girl and the Street Sign, Part 2

The scene is Sherman Oaks California just off Valley Vista Blvd. Three slightly inebriated young men sit in a Bright Orangish Ford Econoline Van contemplating a crime. You see there is a street just off Valley Vista that shares its name with our beautiful brown haired brown eyed friend of Bob’s Big Boy silver goblet fame. There I sit with Radio Rat and another accomplice (Canid, not a Rat) staring up at the street sign trying to figure out how best to quickly remove the sign from the pole. We gather a few tools and emerge from Radio Rats Bright Orangish Ford Econoline Van, cleverly parked in a dark spot of the road. I stand guard as Radio Rat climbs the pole to remove the sign. A few tense minutes pass until he slides down saying it won’t come all the way off. Our accomplice is fresh and climbs the pole to take his shot at it. They take turns wrestling with the tight steel bands until one of them finally liberates the sign. He slides down with the sign and we run to the van, fire it up and high tail it out of there.

We laugh and snort as we flee the scene of the crime and drive straight to our friend’s apartment to present her with our trophy. We knock on the door and her Mom answers it. She calls her daughter as we stand there, three of Demolay's best holding a stolen street sign. She walks into the room and starts laughing when she sees us holding a city street sign with her name on it. We relate a slightly abbreviated tale of our larceny. She then takes the sign to her bedroom and places it proudly in her window. We take our leave and go downstairs. As we walk out we look up at her window. There she is with her sign and a big smile waving goodbye to her three slightly drunken if not devoted bandits.

The next day Radio Rat and I are working at Butler Brothers Department Store in Van Nuys. Sometime during the day I catch a glimpse of Radio Rat walking toward me looking as pale as a ghost that just saw a scarier ghost. He tells me he just received a phone call from a woman in Sherman Oaks who wanted something delivered to her house. As she was giving him directions she told him it might be difficult to find her house because last night someone stole the street sign from the street corner. Someone and I stood there in shock.

I suppose we could have told the woman where her street sign was but why break a young girl’s heart, or get tossed in jail. Our beautiful brown eyed friend had her street sign and I had my silver goblet, the spoils of our short career in crime. I hope she is happy and still has her sign displayed proudly in the window of wherever she lives now. Maybe if she one day sees this post she will send us a picture of it.