MIGHTY RED

ONE SUMMER IN THE 70’s…we found out about the Longview, Texas “VooDoo-psychic -boggie-man-love-doctor-Jesus breather”…the most terrifyingly accurate clairvoyant who ever told you the appalling truth, "no holds barred"...the great Longview soothsayer...”Mighty Red”.

IF YOU had the courage to come calling on him for help...buckle up buttercup...he never failed to shock and shake.

HE HAD a tiny shed shack out back of his trailer house. The old colored fella was harsh, yet abrasive. He had a bad back and little patience for the rubes when they’d show up drunk…couldn't hardly stand the sight of these white pecker-woods and their drunken prom girls...However, he made money hand over fist telling fortunes to these white kids from the city, and didn't mind the perks of celebrity...therefore, my friends…in a lovely southern twist of irony…the old man suffered these fuckwits…as the cash and celebrity status…and the groupies, never ever gets old…when you do.

ONE NIGHT he took my money…sat me down in that shed…named off 3 of my dead relatives real fast, and named off the secret name my "girlfiend" called me, as well as a recent pregnancy scare… So, now having my FULL attention, he folded his hands on the table and asked me…”wadduwanna know man? I’m tired this evenin’ and my fuckin’ back is killin’ me” he looked up then and forced a smile through the sciatic haze and said “Aw, man you know I love ya…tell me yo’ question little brother…I already know the answer….and so do you…buts you gots to AXE me the question!”

THEN, he began to talk about our heavenly father...how people made it so silly and complicated...and then he'd say a little prayer, and, holding my hand, you could feel his power, and you could feel Jesus sit down right beside us...about the time the candles would start to flicker and sputter…straight up "Holy Ghost-buster" stuff...my hackles stood up to attention, and I had chillbumps that could have grated cheese.

HE MADE ME CRY that night…he knew my trouble…and he helped out my heart…and took a lot of my burden off my troubled little teenaged shoulders…it was as if he was reading my mail. He hugged my neck when he pulled the string and turned out the light bulb over the card table…and we both felt better.

MY BUDDY went in there too...and came out of that little shed white as a ghost, just trembling and speechless. He & I had just been baptized and electrified by the “Mighty Red”. On our way home, we pulled in the gravel and stopped under the yellow parking lot lights of the Liquor store/Bar-B-Q joint…in front of the minnow tank.

bought a six pack,

and drove Hwy 80 East back to Shreveport...

all the way home . . . 

                           without saying a word.


from the award winning new Vernon Rust book FAKE NEWS on Amazon  http://a.co/ctBGQiF

NEWS FLASH!

NEWS

FLASH! 

The Earth is billions of years old, and humans have ridden this little blue rock for millions of years. 

Everything under the sun has been before. 

Oh, and by the way,  Jesus’s name was “ISSA".

The great prophet Mohammed and ISSA are the biggest of buddies in the ‘Koran” and ‘Issa” is regarded as the true Messiah, to return and reign during the ‘end times’. (surprise!)

THERE IS NO DEATH or “Hell”...(that's church bullshit)...we keep coming into other meat suits, over and over, and over again...until we develop empathy. 

If you are having a hard time, suffering through something?...you must dive into the manure...if you want to find the pony...your greatest difficulty is your greatest opportunity...take it from an old manure diver from way back.

THE ONLY TRAGEDY in life...is suffering unpleasant circumstances............ without learning from it. 

Welcome to the “Karma Café"
there are no menus
we get
what
we
deserve.  (this is true, whether one chooses to believe it or not.)

Now, lighten the fuck up, cut yourself some slack and try to focus on the big picture.

YOU are ONE with the creator this very second. 

Relax, take a big deep breath and know this . . .

     

                                                 everything REALLY IS going to be all right.

from my best selling new book on Amazon "FAKE NEWS"  http://a.co/ctBGQiF )

MY GENERATION early rock memories from the Vernon Rust book FAKE NEWS

I watched Pete Townsend and Keith moon destroy the stage of the smothers brothers tv show after “my generation” completed it’s “BIG FINISH”

I watched the BEATLES singing ‘HEY JUDE” on ed sullivan . . . all on live Black and white TV.

Now, great songs make money for corporations outright. Songwriting income is an old wives tale.

Consider this: When one of my songs gets streamed 10 million times, that nets me 300 dollars.

If, by some divine miracle of nature, You Tube played my song 1 BILLION times?

That generates $3000 dollars.

If I had a “co-writer”? Cut that figure in half.

In the “old days” a hit country radio single, top 10 and above, made the writer 200K. An album cut on a platinum record made 60. Banks would loan against it. Hell, drug dealers and bartenders would too. (You too can make “dozens” of dollars in the exciting music business!)

How do you get a songwriter off your front porch?

                          (Pay him for the pizza.)

from the ground breaking new book FAKE NEWS (on Amazon) http://a.co/ctBGQiF

CHICKEN FRIED & CERTIFIED just a little 'Fake News' Vernon Rust

let me tell you about the 'Country'

MY BARE COUNTRY FEET know the coolness of the fresh turned Earth behind a mule in the spring garden......seeing a fat black snake make a run through the high grass...the smell of the thick, funky, sweet rot of the Louisiana soil...rabbits zig zagging thru the weeds and briars...the huge old plantation bell starts to ring back and forth…bong…bong…bonnnng…3 notes ringing for supper…just the one…

                      when supper was getting’ ready.

NOW DON'T GET ME wrong, we took algebra and wore shoes and listened to Hendrix & Cat Stevens & all but our farm was so far out in the sticks . . .

we had to head towards town . . .

to go hunting . 

from the Vernon Rust book FAKE NEWS   from Amazon!  http://a.co/ctBGQiF Fake News 

AN EYE FOR AN EYE

an eye for an eye makes the whole world blind...

EYE FOR AN EYE

Well, we've tortured our planet…choked out the sun…

built so many roads… there ain't nowhere to run

The Earth will be fine…long after we go

they keep sayin' they care, but it's all just a show

Oh, people...time to wake up

before the Angels start to walk off the job

ain't never no reason…to be unkind

an eye for an eye makes the whole…world…blind

When you see someone beggin' on the side of the street

well' he didn't get there on some winning streak

Ain't no way to tell…the pain that he’s in

well, you can't feed the world…but you could sure feed him

Well, the sins of the father, passed down to the son

we raise him up good and we give him a gun

We keep makin' more weapons to stay in the game

what if they gave a war…and nobody came?

from the book FAKE NEWS  available on Amazon http://a.co/ctBGQiF

LIFE ON THE INSIDE

Life on the inside....from the book FAKE NEWS

 . . . I FINALLY got tired of sleeping crooked necked in the wheelchair and slobbering all down my new smock, so I let "Tourette Dude" wheel me down to my room...I liked him...he screamed "SHIT COCKSUCKER!" at the top of his lungs a lot, but he always had cigarettes and would always gave me his chocolate pudding.

WHEN I’d pass out in the wheelchair, he was happy chauffeuring me around, up and down the halls, my thorazine generating a constant stream of drool . . . leaving a shiny trail on the carpet like a slug, wherever we rolled . . .

from the bestselling new book FAKE NEWS...available on Amazon  http://a.co/ctBGQiF 

read FAKE NEWS on AMAZON http://a.co/ctBGQiF

on the 8th day...God made the songwriter

I HAVE TAXIED around in helicopters and limousines, and pushed a grocery cart around under a bridge.

I'VE SLEPT IN PALACES and dumpsters...walked a thousand roadside miles...kickin' rocks with a hand full each of matching luggage...two Kroger shopping bags.

IV'E BEEN the esteemed musical guest of elite circles in Chateaus in France. I’ve also been incarcerated in three foreign countries…including Memphis.

SOME OF US ARE COWBOYS & CARPENTERS, some of us are chefs, artists, mothers, programmers, doctors & musicians…but then, on the eighth day…God made the songwriter.

WE ARE the silent observers, the ponderers, the psalmists…the prophets…the tear conjurers…the hailed, feared and noble soul warriors…the “poets”. We can fly high…and we can get very, very sad.   

BUT THE great songs, you see…the GREAT ones live near the fire...too hot for most Angels even…so close sometimes, the human messenger gets hurt doing his job...a really lonesome messed up gig it is.... being born to eat the sins of the common man, and
   burp
      them
         up
            in musical form.

 please order a copy of FAKE NEWS...here's the link   http://a.co/ctBGQiF 

CRAZY? I doubt it! read FAKE NEWS! be somebody!

WHEN I WOKE UP IN HOSPITAL, I COULD'NT move my arms or legs.  Oh, I wasn't paralyzed or anything . . . I was in four point restraints flat to the bed on my back.

 OBVIOUSLY a victim of mistaken insanity...as this only happens to crazy people, and after all, I, Vernon Rust of mediocre and fleeting songwriter fame, was a lot of things...but insane?

Really? I don't think so...me?

Insane? Mentally incompetent? Honestly?

That's just CRAZY talk! (however, several Doctors and judges seemed convinced enough otherwise to keep me a month or so, ...just to make sure)

BUT WAIT A MINUTE HERE! The last thing I remember was kissing a beautiful woman goodbye at the Sydney International Airport.

There were children laughing.

Her children.

Her husband was really getting pissed off.

There was a struggle.





here's the link to my book FAKE NEWS on Amazon         http://a.co/ctBGQiF      thanx!

From Fake News - my book

I SAW A FAKE ID AD in the back of a slinky detective magazine, you know the ones with the half-naked hot chick on the front in a torn dress with one boob almost out of the bra, about to be raped and murdered . . . kinda  looking like she's into it?

ANYWAY, I clipped a black & white photo from the little strip of four the machine spat out......mailed it to the address in New York City with a 20 dollar bill, and by God waited for the mailman every day, to intercept the package that would change my life forever......with my official looking Louisiana state resident card...I could buy beer...and drink that beer...like a man who could buy his own beer.

Here's the deal though...I have a baby face now. I didn’t shave till college!...back then...I looked perpetually fourteen.

  

ANYWHO, I when it finally arrived, I thought it looked pretty damn cool, and tastefully authentic...

I GUESS THE OLE BOY working at the Speedy Service didn’t share the same opinion.

I guess that's why he cut it right in half with some big black handled scissors he pulled out from under the register chuckling all the while looking back & forth betwixx me and my little ID card...

RIGHT BEFORE he pointed at the door with his head & told me to "get the fuck out of here"

AVAILABLE ON AMAZON/KINDLE fakenewsthebook by vernon rust

#Vernonrust #memoirs #humor #songwriting 

The Weeds Grow 'round a Tractor...

"The weeds grow ‘round a tractor, like an island in the field

With bird nests on the motor and briars crawlin’ up the wheels

and a windmill watches over . . . a rusty water tank

where hoof-prints stomped a crater where the cattle used to

drink

and the sunlight through the barn-boards, cuts slices in the dust

where bridles hang on bent up nails, that long began to rust

You know, the old home place seems smaller now than then

I smell the neighbor’s fireplace in the wind

Paints’ a peelin’, shutters’ bangin’

Screen door hangin’ by a thread

Poor old oak tree, he’s barely standin’. . .

                                         . . . He don’t even know he’s dead"

From the book 'FAKE NEWS' by Vernon Rust...it's a book of lyrics, memoirs & humor. AVAILABLE on amazon/kindle @ fakenewsthebook by vernon rust