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CHALLENGING DAYS  Today (June 1st) kicks off a new journalistic experimental series called "Challenging Days" !  My friend and creative brother-in-arts Phil Corso (Drummer of The Vigilance Committee and More Than Skies ) and I conceived this fun interactive month-long experiment  called "Challenging Days".  Each day throughout June, we will roll the bones to randomly choose a prompt, task or challenge from a predetermined list meant to shake our routines and perspectives and then reflectively report on the site how it went and what we experienced each day, hopefully feeling a little more informed or enlightened by the events or interactions we may not have otherwise engaged in! My favorite part? We set it up on our website so that you all can be privy to the prompts of each day, participate and then submit your thoughts on the page in real time!   Visit  https://alloneandphil. wixsite.com/challengingdays  ...

“ The Editor” Criminal episode49 written by Bruce A. Pandolfo 4/30/2017 In Maryland, Robin Woods was no Robin Hood robbing goods prolifically from warehouses or whatever whereabouts, but how else are you to make a living with no catered education, given the ruler at school your future is dimming a decade later, breaking and entering villain thieving phones and computer equipment.. stole a car, and 20k worth of gear, he's 26 tops, next night he's playing pool in comes 6 cops, a friend turned rat went behind his turned back, Robin doesn't blame the guy, its every man for himself, which often means its every man v.s. Everyone else. Non-violent felony, but had prior convictions too, given 16 years at Maryland Correctional Institute, Absolutely overkill, perhaps Draconian, certainly the worst place they'd ever thrown him in. Guards beat the inmates with nearly no provoking, so the next night, revenge was reaped in a riot...

“ The Agreement” Criminal Episode30 Written by Bruce A. Pandolfo 4/28/2017 Danny's mother prays every day. She prays daily that she will stay healthy. Danny's mother takes care of herself. She hopes Danny will have a great big family party when he turns 50. Danny talks to his mother on the phone every day. Between phone calls and prayers, Danny's mother speaks with Danny and God equally often about the same things. Mothers are the great creators and they worship their sons. Despite this, if you meet Danny's mother, she will not tell you about him. She does this to protect herself. “ I love you baby” she says to her son with an hint of exhausted desperation. “ I lo--- THIS CALL IS FROM A FEDERAL PRISON ” That familiar automated response interrupts Danny with its rigid robotic reminder. and 15 minutes into their conversation, the phone clicks off. Danny can't use the phone for another hour. But after...

“ Pappy” Criminal Episode 40 Written by Bruce A. Pandolfo 4/27/2017 You want to get yer hands on a bottle o' Pappy huh? More of a statement really i'n't it? You WANT to get yer hands on a bottle o' Pappy. Your lips mor'n likely too. Ouch'er mind if ya don't! Pappy the best bourbon money can buy. And hell, money can't even buy it most times. Like a myth or a legend, that stuff. Comes around only e'ry so offen like a comet or surprise sex in your married life pardon me for sayin' so... More than common firewater.. Put hair on your chest and a fire in it. Ain't no question. Cure yer ailments, keep ya warm, put ya to sleep, douse your problems... 'tho' shit, these days, Bottle o' Pappy? Clean out your bank just as much as your woes (if you got em.) And if you're on a huntin' f'Pappy, lemme tell you...you're in for some heartache pal. I tell ya.. Hard ...

“ Tiger” Criminal Episode 46 Written by Bruce A. Pandolfo 4/26/2017 Come see Tony the Tiger! Yes, son just like the one on the cereal box... Now imagine that 550 pounds! Incredible isn't he? Tigers are fierce predators, Don't get too close ma'am, he may spray you! How old is he? 16! Yes pretty Miss, 16 Years he's lived in this here Louisiana gas station. Putting the ”pet” in “petrol”. Go and get your “ animal rights activists taste like chicken” T-shirts when you're through pumping your gas. Haha! Oh don't cry lil lady! Oh he's happy as can be. He gets the best food money can buy and doe'n't even work for it like he was built to. Oh no son, he's happy here with his poppa Mike. Ignorance is bliss. Wild ain't he?

“ Ex Libris” Criminal episode 22 Written by Bruce A. Pandolfo 4/25/2017 The Book Thief felt like The Master Of The World , he was The Man WhoLoved Books Too Much . This Outsider / Outlier was a Mysterious Stranger who could disappear like David Copperfield , like an Invisible Man in Invisible Cities with a Heart OfDarkness . “ Finders Keepers” seemed to be his Anthem . The social Sphere of book collectors and dealers' patience wore Thinner , they were sick of being Prey and decided it couldn't Carrie on. So, like SherlockHolmes , they set about to solve It . Through emails, teamwork and Persuasion they caught Gilke, something of a   Kite Runner , fishy work kiting checks, they found many of The Beautiful andDamned books he Kidnapped at his Bleak House on Treasure Island . But this Jailbird experienced no Metamorphosis from his Crime andPunishment when he was briefly Walden . It turns out he's a dishonorable co...

“ Angie” Criminal Episode26 Written by Bruce A. Pandolfo 4/24/2017 Adam went to Philly to play soccer as a pro, on off-time he'd wander, by overpasses he'd roam Oft times he'd chat with folks who hadn't had a home He'd make sandwiches he'd dole out to those he'd get to know Met a guy Red Colt, professorial, eloquent, shopping cart of bags, silver tongue of etiquette Red Colt's girl Angie started up with the expletives then to Adam's shock, Red Colt up and defended him! Adam frequented the benches and the bridges, He'd come to love Red Colt and his ornery missus, He wished he could help the folks others dismissed then in March both the vagrants vacated...went missing! Around July 4 th , Homicide Detective Mangold Discovers a body by the river horrifically mangled Someone dismantled it to pieces and bagged those, Hung them from branches an immobile-mobile dangled. The swamped department couldn...

“ Pen and Paper” Criminal Episode 35 Written by Bruce A. Pandolfo 4/23/2017 Andy Austin was a regular in court for over four decades. She harassed a judge until she could get in there. Hardly left since. She's routinely looked mobsters and murderers right in the eye unflinching. She's traded smiles casually with John Wayne Gayce. Unafraid. She once drew on a woman and made her look real bad simply because the lady wouldn't give an inch for Andy to sit. Like most people,  Andy doesn't enjoy being present  for murder trials  (because they're boring.) Not enough passion, she says. She's framed dozens of killers, cleptos, and convicts. Her walls are adorned with pictures of folks who would make you shudder. Bit of a sketchy character really. But then...that's her job, Chicago Courtroom sketch artist. 

“ Finding Sarah and Phillip” Criminal Episode 60 Written by Bruce A. Pandolfo 4/23/2017 Sarah and Phillip went for an extended visit with Dad for Fourth of July. The fireworks weren't all celebratory. Dad shot off two himself. Sarah and Phillip's stay was permanent. They had new rooms, roadside. Fair amount of acreage. A tree, a pile of wood some loose concrete like incidental headstones. He couldn't recall what he'd done. Couldn't recall where he'd done it. Where he buried he and Terri's babies, two babes with bullet holes where sweet faces used to be. He scribbled the police a crude map, (painfully reminiscent of a child's drawing.) Careless, crude cartographer of rustic crypts. He sent himself off on an extended visit of his own before he could be of much help. In someways he had done enough. In others he hadn't. Terry pleaded with the police, pleaded and pleaded. But not a one could fin...

“ It Looked Like Fire” Criminal Episode32 Written by Bruce A. Pandolfo 4/21/2017 Ed respectfully attended the Ferguson protest out of curiosity Appropriate... everyone was outraged over “what killed the cat” Things were getting curioser and curioser. He was immediately enveloped in the waves of sadness. Drowned in the undertow of the overtones of anger, pain, mourning at the injustice. He'd experienced nothing like it and wished he hadn't had to. More cops showed up. Robotic riot gear, clockwork synchronization. Almost inhuman in their actions. But that's why we were protesting wasn't it? Inhumanity in cops' actions “ Go home” the riot police chanted. “ This IS our home!" the protesters reminded them. Then as if forgetting that this demonstration was responsible for enough tears shed. The police start tossing their smoke-billowing alligator-tear-gas canisters unforgiving and unforgivable into the crowd... ...

“ Final Exit” Criminal Episode17 Written by Bruce A. Pandolfo 4/20/2017 Are your beloved keepsakes blurring? Is memory an old friend whose name eludes you, bungee jumping from a broken neural pathway unwritten, unrecognized, unspoken from your drying tongue? Are the integral characters of your past censored like a yearbook whose faces are perforated with wavering, obscuring uncertainty emphasizing the “no”and “lost” in “nostalgia”? Is agony colonizing your withering frame, crippling you coldly, rattling your hollowing bones, gnarling your spine into a question mark as if to punctuate “why are we still here?” ? Is your pain rendering you bedridden and then festering maliciously in your bedsores? Are you in an unthinkable state of thoughtlessness? Is your dignity digging a ditch to decrepitude with your will-to-live becoming a will-not-live? Is your self worth attenuating as you balance precariously on the tight rope of y...