LeRoy scanned the veritable smorgasbord of tools present on the expansive workbench.

Bubba, sensing his partner’s apparent bewilderment, prompted LeRoy; “it should be on the far end, just right of the monkey wrench.”

Upon Bubba’s prompting, LeRoy quickly located the desired tool. He removed it from the bench and placed it in Bubba’s up and outstretched palm.

“Thank ya,” Bubba said as he grasped the tool and retreated back beneath the open hood, intent upon his target.

LeRoy watched and then broke the silence, “so you never did say why you were working on the old jeep.”

Bubba raised his head and looked back over his shoulder, asking with a furrowed brow, “OLD JEEP? What do you mean OLD JEEP?”
LeRoy realized his error no sooner than the words escaped his lips.

Bubba corrected his good friend - “You mean Jenny!” Bubba referred to all of his vehicles by name, even the lawn mower and every boat in his vast collection has a proper name. “You know, she’ll take you far - but you have to treat her with respect.”

LeRoy nodded in silent agreement, ready to atone for his sin. Attempting to divert his friend’s apparent displeasure, “so where are we going after you get Jenny fixed?”

Quickly forgetting his friend’s transgression, Bubba replied, “I reckon we’ll head over to Carova Beach, to check out ‘the situation’.”

LeRoy didn’t like it when his friend spoke in such cryptic terms. “Oh and what situation would that be?”

Bubba straightened up, nearly bumping his head on the underside of the hood, “you haven’t heard? The north end of the beach has been overrun with nekkid sunbathers!”

“Don’t you mean ‘naked’”, LeRoy asked, attempting to correct his goof friend.

“Nope I said nekkid and I mean NEKKID. There is definitely a difference between NAKED and NEKKID,” said Bubba, emphasizing his pronunciation of the apparently similar terms.

“Oh do tell! Care to enlighten me on the difference, oh bwana of the bathing beauties?” asked LeRoy, taunting his friend.

“Naked,” - Bubba explained - “is when you don’t have any clothes on. Babies are naked. NEKKID on the other hand, is when you don’t have any clothes on and you’re up to somethin’!” Bubba continued, “and from the way that fella at the meeting described things, they’re up to something over in Carova!”

“Hmmm” - LeRoy pondered the situation. “Sounds like an old musical I saw in college,” observed LeRoy.

“We’ll I didn’t fare to well in my theater arts class at school,” noted Bubba. “That dark cool building always put me to sleep.”

“OK let me lay it out for ya,” offered LeRoy. “The ‘flim flam’ man - Dr. Harold Hill - comes to town and entrances the locals with the evils of pool - then he seduces them with the promise of starting a marching band to keep the kids outta trouble.”

“Trouble with pool? I thought it was just a game of geometry,”

“Yep, that’s trouble; that’s TROUBLE with a capital T and that rhymes with P and that stands for POOL!” sang LeRoy.

“TROUBLE?” asked Bubba.

“We’ve surely got trouble my friend - right here in Currituck County - Trouble with a capital T and that rhymes with B and that stands for BOOBS!” repeated LeRoy.

Bubba laughed, “OK, enough of the singing - how does topless sun bathing make for trouble?” Bubba queried.

“Oh, the next thing you know they’ll be memorizing jokes from Captain Billy’s Whiz Bang!” continued LeRoy.

A look of realization washed over Bubba’s face, “OK so what’s this fella selling?”

“That’s right, now you’re with the program,” said LeRoy with a smile. He continued, “the way I figure it, he’s selling salvation - plain and simple.”

“Huh?” Bubba asked, once again confused.

“Well don’t you know if you don’t have sin - you don’t need salvation; and the next thing you know, all the preachers will be out of a job” observed LeRoy.

Bubba countered, “oh those preachers don’t have to worry, they won’t do anything about this topless sunbathing thing.”

LeRoy eyeballed his good friend, “How do you figure that?”

Sensing the tide of the conversation turning, Bubba elaborated, “Well if those ladies are sunbathing in the altogether, they’ll be using more sun tan lotion - more skin to cover ya know.”

LeRoy listened intently to his good friend’s rationalization of the whoe situation.

“More lotion sales - that means more sales tax” continued Bubba.

LeRoy nodded and listened.

“And those boys on the commission, they ain’t gonna mess with the inflow of tax dollars. No siree - that’s political suicide - I don’t care how many women are baring their breasts on the beach”

LeRoy had to agree his good friend had a solid point.

“Besides if you get rid of all the boobs, who’s gonna run the joint?” Bubba added with a chuckle.

• Next week: $20 worth don’t get ya far…