The JTTF and Radioactive Marbles:

These next two vignettes are Mother-In-Law stories.

But first a word about my MIL.  My MIL is one of the most generous people I’ve encountered when it comes to her time and her money.  If it wasn’t for my mother in law, my wife and I would never get out on date nights.  She’s constantly asking when she can come over and kid watch.   She’s always available to come at a moment’s notice when work issues pop up.  She buys expensive gifts and gives generously of her time.  In fact while I type this, she’s out with my middle child paying for a girl’s spa treatment.  We’re lucky to have her.

However, she also has no filter and more importantly (for these stories at least) she has no barriers, defenses, walls, or warning bells when it comes to strangers.  If a stranger walked up to her on the street and said “I’m a Nigerian prince and I’d like to transfer some money into your bank account”, she’d be pulling out her check book.  She assumes everyone is telling the truth until proven otherwise. 

To her credit, if everyone in the world operated on this basis it would be a much better place.  But unfortunately it doesn’t.  Thus this attribute of hers has given rise to two knock-down drag-out all-out fights.  Usually during a holiday party in front of the entire family forum.  Sometimes in front of multiple family clans.

For instance, there’s the Thanksgiving when I had to report her to the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force.  Or JTTF for short.  Nope.  I’m not kidding…

The JTTF Affair:

What is the JTTF?  After 911, the FBI established the Joint Terrorism Task Forces to increase communication between Federal, State and local law enforcement agencies.  With the idea being that with increased communication they could prevent another 911.

The FBI opened space in their offices around the country to bring in local, State and Federal officers to work together and pool their resources.  FBI personnel were also assigned to the Task Forces, some full time and some part time.

The FBI agent I was doing most of my work with then was a member.  I’ll call him Q.  He’s since retired.  I worked closely with Q for a number of years until his retirement.  Q made his mark at the bureau by teaming with us on our cases.  It was good paring for Q and the bureau.  There was just too much money involved for the bureau to pass up.  At his retirement party, Q’s boss got up and let it be known he was the top producing agent for the FBI that year for the entire State of Ohio, as measured in terms of indictments, convictions and monies recovered.  Q was great to work with.  He wasn’t afraid to get his hands dirty and was always asking what he could do to assist.

The story:

It was Thanksgiving about five or six years ago.  We were hosting at our house.  In attendance were: my elderly parents; my sister and her husband; my sister’s son and his girlfriend; my brother his wife and their kids; and my mother in law and her husband (my wife’s step-dad).

Dinner was served, honey roasted ham with stuffing, mashed potatoes, green bean casserole and little butterball turkeys on the side.  (I can remember the menu because that’s pretty much what we always do).

So Thanksgiving was on the plates and everyone was happily stuffing their faces when my mother in law began to relate tales of her recent trip to Egypt.  My mother in law (M) is semi-retired and lives to travel.

She had gone to Egypt on a group tour and began to relate the usual tales about the pyramids and the other main tourist attractions.   But then she digressed.  She started in about a bus trip for the group to an outdoor bazaar.  The tour operators loaded the group up and took them into downtown Cairo.  To an outdoor bazaar for an Egyptian shopping experience.  With kickbacks from the vendors to the tour operators I suspect.

She went on to say that as she was walking through the bazaar, she came on a pharmacy.  Intrigued as to how an Egyptian pharmacy stacked up against the US variety she went in.  Once in, she struck up a conversation with the owner and pharmacist, “John”.

At this point my ears picked up.  “John” would be a very unusual name for an Egyptian.  MIL then stated “John” was a local Coptic Christian who was looking to emigrate to the U.S in order to flee oppression.  “John” is correct on that account.   Coptic Christians are targeted in Egypt and generally exist there as distinct second class citizens. 

Which didn’t jive with the setting.

Although not impossible, it was very unlikely a Coptic Christian named John would be a pharmacist running a pharmacy that was lucky enough to be on the tour circuit’s regular itinerary.  It sounded damn fishy.  She had my full attention at this point.

M then beamed, a giant smile came over her face, and her body was almost perceptibly glowing as she announced she was going to sponsor “John’s” Visa application to bring him to the U.S.  The table stilled notably.  In the pause I interjected, “M are you sure you want to do that?  You don’t know this person at all.”

“Oh, I know him very well.  He invited me to dinner and we got thoroughly acquainted.”

“M, just because you had dinner with him, doesn’t mean you know him.”

“I’m a good judge of people.  He just wants to escape the oppression in Egypt and come to the U.S. where he can make a good living.  But to come over he needs a sponsor.  So I agreed.   When we got back I photocopied my passport and my husband’s passport and Fedexed them to him.”

Dead silence. 

At this point the relative positioning of the dinner guests became uppermost on my mind.  Specifically, how close was my sister in relation to M.  My sister is a card carrying  member of the John Birch society and her political viewpoints run somewhere to the right of Attila the Hun.  There was one seat in between her and M.  Good, I’d have a couple seconds warning if she stood up with a steak knife.

I started to lose my cool a bit.  I said, “M you need to call tomorrow and cancel both your passports.  You also need to notify the State Department about what happened.”  M then lost her cool and a shouting match ensued.  Mind you, the Iraq war is still pretty much in full swing (the insurgency) and many of Al Qaeda’s top members are/were Egyptian.  The movement has deep roots there.

She wouldn’t back down and I was determined to convince her of the need to cancel her passports.  She insisted I was being overly suspicious and that she knew “John’s” character.  The dinner ended shortly after without either of us budging.

The next work day I called Q.  I got a hold of Q and told him I had a problem.  He concurred and urged me to have M cancel her passports.  If she refused, I asked Q if he would come speak with her in person.  Q agreed.  He also ran “John” through the JTTF database.  There were no hits but that assumed that “John” had given his real name.  Which I doubted.

It turned out not to be necessary.  In the intervening several days, M had spoken with a number of her friends and colleagues about the fight on T-Day.  Looking for support from her network.  She didn’t get it.  Instead she got an earful of what I’d already given her.

I think it slowly sunk in with her that, “hey, maybe that wasn’t such a great idea.”  She did the right thing then.  Called and canceled the passports and applied for new ones.

My blood pressure dropped 30 points when I got the news.  But on the upside, how many son in laws can say they reported their mother in law to the JTTF?!?!

The Radioactive Marble Incident:

You’d think you would have trouble topping a JTTF reporting.  Oh no, she did it.  This is my personal favorite M story of all time.

A little backstop:  My mother in law has a habit of latching onto various hobbies.  Usually one at a time, for about a year at a time (sometimes longer – sometimes shorter).  And when she latches on she really latches on.

At this time, the hobby/obsession was hand crafted marbles.  We are not talking about your grampa’s marbles here.  These are individually hand blown/created marbles.  Fashioned by talented artisans that are works of art.  They range in size from about one inch to around three inches and some of them are spectacular.  Price on these rolling Mona Lisa’s ranges anywhere from $50 bucks up to hundreds of dollars.

M was collecting them and decided we should collect them as well.  To that end, she was purchasing a marble for each of my kids on their birthdays.  She had already bought and given out two of these.  Both were alike.  About two inches around, clear glass, with the first letter of the child’s name blown into the center.  Very nice marbles.

It was now March and my third and youngest’s birthday.

So we had the obligatory party cake, candles, and the rest of the birthday usual.  And lastly, presents.  She opened her presents with a typical five year old’s glee and excitement.  I think we got her a new big wheel that year.  She loved racing big wheels down our sloped driveway then spinning them out. 

Then it was M’s turn for her presents to be opened.

M as usual went overboard with more gifts than she should have.  Then out came the small square box.  We all knew it was the birthday marble.  My daughter opened it up expectantly and wasn’t disappointed when she saw a large glass marble with the first letter of her first name suspended inside.

But this marble was a little different.

Instead of being clear glass with a blown letter inside, this marble had a faint glow to it.  And the letter was made out of a metal.  It looked cool.  Especially the way it was glowing.  I said, “Hey M, that’s a really neat marble you bought there.  I hope it wasn’t too expensive, can I see it?”  My daughter handed it to M who handed it to me.

I placed the marble in my hand and took a closer look.  The metal letter inside was a dull silver in color. As I held the marble in my hand, it bathed my hand in a soft yellowish-green glow.  To be honest, it looked a hell of a lot like the Locknar from the cult-classic animated movie “Heavy Metal”. (If you don’t know what I’m talking about – you’re really missing out).

“Hey M, this is really beautiful.  What makes it glow?”

“Oh, it’s radioactive”.

Again…dead silence.  Circuit breakers are popping inside my head. (What the!!!! Did  she just say Radio-Fing-Active!!!!!).  With a calm that looking back on amazes me, I slowly placed the marble back into its box and closed the lid.

M then filled in the rest of the story.  “I was at the marble convention (yeah, they have those) when I saw these glowing marbles.  The vendor said he could fashion one with a letter inside.  I thought they were fabulous and ordered the marble.  It glows because the letter is made out of depleted Uranium”.

I swear on all that’s holy I’m not making this up.  Freaking depleted Uranium!!!

They only scenario I can come up with that this guy could have got his hands on depleted Uranium, metal alloy would be from the Air Force.  Back in the 80’s the Air Force’s main tank buster aircraft was the A-10 Warthog.  The Warthog’s main armament was a 20mm Vulcan gattling gun mounted right down the center line of the aircraft.  The A-10’s main mission was to fly over columns of armored vehicles and destroy them with the Vulcan gattling gun.  The Vulcan could fire thousands of rounds a minute and to help the rounds penetrate armored vehicles they were enhanced.  The way the Air Force enhanced them was to make the tips out of super dense …you guessed it…depleted Uranium.  I figure this guy went out to an old A-10 firing range and dug up a bunch the rounds.

On a side note, I did a several day survival course out at Eglin Air Force base in Florida.  Eglin also had an A-10 range and while we were in the scrub lands eating insects they conducted firing runs.  The sound an A-10 makes when firing the Vulcan is incredible.  It’s like the world’s loudest burp or a giant, ripping a huge sheet of construction paper.  I would hate to be on the receiving end of this monster.  You can pull up YouTube videos and watch tanks literally lifted into the air from the force of the impact of hundreds of these rounds striking it in seconds.

But back to the story.

I slowly placed the marble back in the box.  Then I told M to get it out of my house and never, under any circumstances, to bring it back.  She was livid. 

The vendor assured her the radiation levels were safe.  She then let on that the vendor asked her to let him know if she discovered otherwise.  Comforting.  M then insisted it was safe and should go on my daughter’s headboard so she could watch it glow at night.  You cannot make this stuff up.

Yeah M, lets put a glowing radioactive item where it will irradiate my developing daughter every single night for 8-10 hours for the next thirteen years.  That sounds like a fing excellent idea.  What grandparent argues to place a radioactive device in their grandchild’s room?  Seriously!

There was no way I was relenting.  The birthday ended shortly after and M stormed out in a huff.  But the story doesn’t end there.  Oh, no. 

The next week she came back with a printout.  She took the marble to an OSU research lab and had it tested with a Geiger counter. (her husband worked at OSU)  She then shoved the results of the Geiger counter reading under my nose and said, “See, it’s not harmful.  The scientist said these levels can’t cause any immediate harm.”  Oh, Ok.  I’ll put it right on the headboard then…..

I took the paper and researched the RAD levels myself on the internet.  The scientist was correct.  You weren’t going to keel over, have anything drop off, or burst into flames from exposure to the marble.  But PROLONGED EXPOSURE could cause cancerous mutations.  And there’s more.  Had you taken the marble into a nuclear power plant, the levels were high enough to trigger the plants RAD detectors and shut the facility down as having a dangerous leak.

Again, you cannot make this stuff up…to this day I still can’t wrap my mind around why anyone would push, argue and go to abnormal lengths in an attempt to place a radioactive marble next to a five year olds head.  But again on the upswing, it does make a good story!

(Locknar)