The Blue Suit and Leader Herald Editor Josh Resnek played chess Tuesday afternoon at a private apartment in Everett. I’m not going to reveal where we played. Frankly, it is no one’s business, and besides, the Blue Suit likes his privacy and the apartment owner, a good friend of the Blue Suit, does not want his name revealed.
The Blue Suit, it turns out, is not a bad chess player. That’s surprising because I always figured the Blue Suit more a Checkers player than a chess person.
I knew he was good the moment he did his opening.
The Blue Suit drew white. I drew black.
He opened by moving his king’s pawn two spaces. In modern chess, this is the most popular and smart opening.
While we played, we ordered out from the Square Deli.
It was a typical Blue Suit luncheon extravaganza.
Three plain large cheese pizzas and two sausage pizzas, two ham and cheese subs with everything on them including hot peppers, and a large steak and cheese sub with extra steak and cheese. All of this delivered by an Uber driver.
Half-way through the chess game, after consuming three submarine sandwiches, lunch started to get a bit noisy. The Blue Suit had trouble staying still in his seat in the living room. He appeared a bit uncomfortable as began the steak and cheese sub.
He burped out loud two or three times, you know, clapper burps, loud, deep, burbs that come from inside the stomach. Each time he burped he’d push his body forward. After the burp, he’d fall back just a bit into his chair.
Then came the other noises that weren’t burps. I don’t want to get into it, but then again, I don’t mind getting into it.
After the first few incidents of flatulence, I spoke up to him.
“Will you please stop that! You’re stinking up the apartment,” I said to him.
No sooner did I ask him to stop I heard his stomach rumbling.
It was a bit like listening to small muffled explosions small explosion. Eventually, I moved my seat away from him.
“What are you doing?” he asked me. “I’m trying to save my life and to retain my sanity,” I answered him.
I experienced a number of these before moving my chair away from him.
“I can’t take this any more. Will you please stop it,” I asked the Blue Suit. He placed both his hands on his stomach as though trying to hold something in when something deep inside him, an explosion of flatulence came outside. This proves the ages old adage that what we hold inside comes outside.
As always, I asked him to stop.
And what did he do?
A noisy clapper, a long, rich, loud burp followed and then more flatulence came after that. As always, that rumble came outside with a tremendous sound and an accompanying odor, and the Blue Suit just kind of collapsed in his chair for a moment before getting a hold of himself again.
“Hey, guy, do you mind. Try to contain yourself, please,” I asked the Blue Suit. “You’re going to kill yourself with those burbs. For God sakes, man, it sounds like your insides might come out of your mouth.
Just then, he burped again and – you guessed it – he had to jump up and hold out his cupped hands as a large bit of chewed up steak and cheese sub came out of his mouth the way a cannonball flies out of the nozzle of a cannon.
This was a terrible scene, with the Blue Suit staggering into the bathroom holding a pile of hot, wet steak and cheese sub in his cupped hands.
The next thing I heard was more flatulence and the toilet flushing.
“Are you OK?” I asked the Blue Suit.
“Yeah. I’m going to live,” he said. He sounded like he was in pain.
“Are you sure?” I asked.
At that very moment the Blue Suit let out a blast of flatulence kind of like the explosion of the first atomic bomb in the desert in New Mexico as shown in the movie, “Oppenheimer.”
First came the blast, which was palpable, and then the sound and smell, which was a horror show.
I thought the windows in the apartment might blow out!
I was able to handle nearly all of this until…the Blue Suit told me, “I want dessert.”
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” I said to him. ‘Where are you going to put it?” I asked.
“Right in my mouth,” he joked.
“And then what?” I asked him.
“You want me to show you?” he shot back.
“No way,” I replied.