Conversation heard at the steps of Adobe Systems, San Jose.

>> Kurt Warner's haircut is not as flowing as that of...
>> what was his name? QB for Brigham Young...Haubrock something?
>>
>> (Always with the) flowing, beautiful (blonde) locks that boy.
>>
>> And a helluva gun, too.
>>
>> And unix chops...
>>

SNAKE: IF I DID IT

AUTHOR: KEN T. HAUBROCK

Rodriguez Books, Hanper Collinz Pubrications

Copyright c 1995 by Haubrock Enterprises.

F I R S T E D I T I O N

Steven Ketchum, Cover Art.

Alice Kwong, Text and Editing.

Forward by Miss Julie Manley (BMI, A & M Records permission.)

Dedicated to everyone in Windows Support

Thanks to Steve Kirsch* for remembering me when you saw me with my head down at Netscape.

C H A P T E R . . O N E:

I AM FOUND

Ken "Snake" Haubrock tossed the remote control feebly to the sticky but colorful carpet next to the semi-empty cans of Old Milwaukee. In the days when the carpet let the tiny feet and high-heels of more than eleven-hundred cheerleaders, nurses-in-training and opera house movie ushers go without making a ripping sound, "Snake" told each one that the color of tonight's Scotch-guarded host for the evening was "Texas Longhorn orange and USC crimson". The once-celebrated college athelete wasn't trying to avoid meaningful conversation with his softer, curvier fans. "The Snake" genuinely liked each fan, every one of his co-workers and teammates.

The Snake, you see, saw the good in everything: His most fatal flaw.

Ken Tiberius Haubrock grew up poor in Georgia, adopted by sharecroppers as an infant. His Mammy & Pa were mercilessly ridiculed by co-workers for their extremely dark skin and the absence of most of their unusually large front teeth. It was not common to find cotton pickers in Alabama who were born in Japan, but Kirin and Saito Haru-Bok were uncommon people. Steadfast in character and rice intake, the newly married Haru-Bok's fled the tortuous cotton fields of Okinawa to escape the vicious yet tidy persecution of impressionable college students that were converted to the Church of Latter Day Saints.

So Okinawa proud and LDS uncompromising were the recently married Haru-Bok couple, the only thing about themselves they changed to adapt to their cotton-field shanty in the Western world would be the spelling and pronunciation of their last name. Nicknamed by "Shoeless" Jeff Brown - infamous chitlin-circuit guitarist and author - for their precise and unusual style of dance, "Kitty and the Mongoose" would've kept their proud name if not for finding the chubby little bundle of blond hair they found under the crippled harvester one fateful July night.

Ken's eyes of NC State Tarheel blue welled with tears as he flashed back to his Japanese dad. Saito Haubrock was convinced that his always giggly, often flatulent bundle of curly-blond joy was the direct, concerted intervention sent from God and God's God. "Mongoose" Haubrock could be heard in every Piggly Wiggly across Fulton county bragging to every stranger that passed little Kenny with a furrowed nose or methane-induced loss of consciousness that his Anglo son with the infectious laugh gave off the "smell of Heaven". The proud, nasally-challenged adoptive Dad to the curly-blond haired lad who bubbled on both ends would pass on to Mormon heaven decades before it was discovered that Ken had a severe gastric reaction to grains; a rare allergy wielding an almost fatal, always humorous toxicity level which dramatically and hilariously increases with rice.

Ken wished he told his Dad more about his feelings but Saito taught him how to bottle up such things in preparation for manhood. When Ken and his world was younger, the sometimes overachieving Saito forced his curly-blond haired son to endure minutes of physical pain under challenging conditions. The "crouching monkey, drunken trout" school of self-defense training grew rapidly in the ranks of Japanese Mormons that emigrated to the West in the early Forties. When Ken had enough of the training and his teacher, he would seek emotional shelter in the presence of Mammy Haubrock.

Throughout elementary school, right up to the time the testosteron kicked in, little Ken spent many twilight hours in Chinese checkers bliss with his beloved Manny as they sang gospel hymns together. The Haubrock family had only one album: The Easter Lilly Choir featuring the Mudgett sisters. Ken particularly loved the songs that featured solos sung by the youngest Mudgett. "Guns n' Bibles" was a song about how the Pilgrims prepared for their journey to the new world. Armed with the gospel and firearms, God gave the new land to the Pilgrims after the redskins taught them how to cook and smoke corn. The edges of the album cover gradually disappeared as Ken spend a thousand-million hours playing Chinese checkers with his Japanese mom while he gazed at the yellow-ribbon girl with the Elizabeth Montgomery nose and a half-million freckles. The Mudgett's were the Lennon Sisters of the deep Georgia south. Little Kenny Haubrock loved to play Chinese checkers and listen to Li'l Trish sing about corn-smoking pilgrims and Man Who Fessed Density.

In the lonely years, little Kenny thought the only two people that truly understood who he really was in his curly-blond heart was Mammy Haubrock and Hadji from Jonny Quest. With tear-stained cheeks and bruises on his forearms from repeating the Chim-Chim bourbon move for one thousand times, Ken often dreamed of rescuing the yellow-ribbon girl from the clutches of the evil, pointy-eyed villaness with pointy boobs. He'd swim through the alligator-filled moat that surrounded the castle of the villaness. In dreams, Kenny was always wearing his wet-suit, scuba mask and turban with a ruby in the front. Ken would throw poor Li'l Trish Mudgett into the speedboat with his turban completely dry, singing songs of packing powder n' pellets.

Now Ken's only friend was alcohol. Ken took the last swig of yet another buddy as life's pictures of "Mongoose" and Mammy flashed across the inside of his eyes. That dang monkey-trout s.. s.. stuff!

Ken questioned the mental stability of someone who mutters consonants and punctuation marks to himself.

In the far corner of Ken's apartment all alone sat his "FB" letter-jacket. Before both got tossed aside and wrinkled, Ken and the flannel varsity letter jacket with "State Champ" patches sewn on leather sleeves walked the halls of Old Hattie High with big strides, waving at all the girls, chicks and babes with his shoulder length curly-blond hair. As soon as the memory of bringing home the State trophy passed through him, Ken's mind winced at knowing his Dad saw only the pain but never the gain from all that dang monkey-fish training. Ken never swore, even if to himself. Ken grinned as he drew half the life of his current Old Milwaukee friend, wishing he hadn't quit smoking cigarettes.

Saito Haru-Bok never saw his pupil of a thousand weeks become a star. Ken looked at nothing as he recalls how his "drunken monkey" teacher never saw him play football. "Mongoose" Haubrock was killed in a freak Jello accident only days before his goofy teenage son took his first snap for the Fighting Barrows of Hattie McField High School. Ken quickly, decisively turned off the chronically joking, class-clown switch inside as he answered the coaches call to replace the Barrows injured starting quarterback. Without trying, without ever knowing how or wondering why, the endless stream of knock-knock and "what's black and white and red all over" that flowed from Ken's flaxen-hair covered mind vanished as he ran on the field brushing aside the amber waves of curly-blond grain from his eyes as he put on his helmet.

In the eye of this football storm of bloody players, bloodthirsty fans and poorly-trained brass bands now directed all their audible anger and support straight at Ken. The quarterback virgin, the target of all the messy yelling, heard nothing. Down ten point with one quarter to go, the Fighting Burrows huddle up slowly, hoping the enemy doesn't know their substitute field marshall tonight is, by day, the guy whose corduroy pants are always falling down with an ample supply of stinky farts. Silently, the heavy white guys on the line and the black receivers speak to each other in silent unity of the hope that the other team doesn't know their quarterback is the only male living in Georgia who wears Birkenstock sandals. Their leader had the command of a prop-comic mime. No "skunk with diaper rash" punchline, no "orange you glad" play on dialect would convince the other eleven guys to let them pass without incident.

In September on a rainy Friday night, the reluctant huddle of the Fighting Barrows unenthusiastically opened like a sick flower. As he walked to the ball three feet behind his front line, Ken not only could see with his eyes, he was looking *past* his guys with his disciplined blondy-covered football mind. Ken looked at the defense.. No, no. Ken was not just looking at the defense, he was looking *for* the defense. Looking, seeing, knows where he is.. he's there... no one is there.. got it, one more look, look, that guy here, that guy there and then...so that means....

(SHIT! I AM KEN HAUBROCK! AND I CONTROL THE FUTURE!)

For the first and only time in his life, Ken used bad words to himself. He also had a life-changing football epiphany which changed him and the game forever for the first time.

(You can see what I'm thinking inside the curly kiews!)

Ken generated a finite number of attack possibilities with variable degrees of success based on the opposition's reaction history and current alignment.

(I AM ABOUT TO MAKE EVERYONE AROUND ME DO WHAT I WANT THEM TO DO!)

Rewind to Ken's first Barrows huddle: Ken calls for a pass on 2, okay? Huddle breaks. The Serious Ken - not the sandals guy who makes you "say 'who's there'" in response to him saying knock-knock - is looking for all their guys (I scan left to right, never pause) forms a mental inventory of the opposition. (Scan back..No Way!) Their guys slightly change their line-up (The chubby Mexican kid..) when Ken's guys finish *their* line-up (..is lined up over Simms) which is based on the play Ken just called in the huddle (Charles "The Cheetah" Simms?). If Ken has formed an accurate picture of which of *his* guys *they're* going to cover (Cheetah!) and what parts of the field they can and *can't* cover (Hand signal Post, you six-foot, seven-inch bastard), Ken can influence the degree of success of certain options based on where he looks (That "Cantinflas" kid..), where he runs (..is *never* gonna catch the "CHEETAH"!), which opposing cover schemes have evolved successfully (What a throoow, baybee) allows Ken to pick a course of action (Spiral so perfect..) of safer, low-producing, "short" plays (..doesn't even look like it's spinning!) or high-risk, high-yield (Ow! Blindsided by that defensive end..) plays which gives Ken the calculated check-list method of advancement.

(DUDE! NO WAY!)

The Decatur Devildogs extend a gridiron gesture of apology for injuring the starting quarterback and welcoming his replacement by spitting on the ball. The unenthusiastic but pissed Barrows front-line purposefully march toward the ball which now sports a fresh, lemony coat of mucus. A lineman jogs slower when he's on the losing team but offensive linemen now bite, kick and line-up with galvanized resolve from losing the guy to injury they were supposed to prevent. The Barrows deliberate, gang-war march to line-up delayed the 'Dogs first look at the "New Girl" on offense by two to three seconds which Ken cleverly used to hand-signal the Cheetah to go long post. As the Hattie High Barrows bend at the waste to assume the traditional, offensive line three-point stance, they lowered the proverbial pass-blocking curtain and unveiled Ken Haubrock to the Devildogs of Decatur High School and the American football world.

Like Ted Neely with shoulder pads, Kirin and Saito's baby boy who smelled of heaven looked directly at the 'Dogs middle-linebacker, tilted his head slightly and with a look of puzzled clarity, seemed to mutter to himself "Dude, no way" right before getting the first of a thousand snaps of the ball.

C H A P T E R ... T W O

It was a dark and stormy night...


* - My sincere apologies to everyone mentioned in this post without permission. The only real thing in this post is my thank you to steve the k.