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We were pretty busy initially, and along with the young proteges who held us in something like awe, Sam, Dimitri and I would work all day and late into the night. When the restaurant closed, we'd take over the bar, drinking Cristal --which we'd buy at cost -- and running fat rails of coke from one …

You'd think the union would be happy about this development, or at least curious, with an energetic young organizer in their midst. I scheduled a meeting with the union president, looking forward to commiserating about the Imperialist Jackboot on the Necks of the Workers, and the Struggle Against t…

I was tired, I explained, and in love, I added, hoping to appeal to that romantic Mediterranean nature I'd read and heard about. 'My girlfriend,' I said,

'I don't see her anymore. . and I miss her. . I have,' I added, 'a life . outside of this place.' I went on to describe going home each night …

Bigfoot understood -- as I came to understand -- that character is far more important than skills or employment history. And he recognized character -- good and bad -- brilliantly. He understood, and taught me, that a guy who shows up every day on time, never calls in sick, and does what he said …

We met, and I must have looked like a rhesus monkey-the one in the perils-of-freebase commercial, cornered up a tree, shunned by his monkey pals, exhibiting erratic, paranoid and hostile behavior. I was rail-thin, shaky, and the first thing I did was ask my oId pal Bigfoot if he could lend me 25 bu…