The Boulder picket. Another early morning. 5:30Am I was up and getting ready. I headed over to "Brett's" house to pick him up. Brett is a friend of mine who is an interested lurker in the affairs of the CoS. We were headed out of Fort Collins by 7am. It had snowed the night before, but temperatures were expected to be in the 50's. This isn't Florida. Just outside of Longmont we made radio contact with Telecon, famed co-organizer of the Boulder Protest. We arranged for bagels and a meeting place via handheld radio. After meeting Telecon, the three of us proceeded to Boulder. We hit Wollersheims (should I just call him the Evil Puppetmaster? That's what the church seems to think he is. Wollersheim claims that *I* am the man running the whole show, though. The truth may never be known.) house at just after 8am. Everyone was introduced to the evil puppetmaster and at 8:30 the German TV crew showed up. We did verbal interviews with them while the cameras were being set up and all that funky jazz. Eating bagels and making press kits. The German crew interviewed Telecon and Wollersheim on camera. At 10am, we decided it was time for recon. Brett, Myself and Telecon hit the road. Brett and I went to Pearl Street Mall in boulder and Telecon went off to Teegeack Boulder Base to petition for the presence of Xenu. We knew that Telecon was successful in recruiting Xenu as soon we heard "Xenu calling Telecon, come in Telecon" over my handheld radio. Xenu hears radio waves in his head. The recon was interesting... they kept the area in front of the ORG real quiet, but their people were watching for us. Fortunately, finding OSA in a crowd is about as difficult as real life "Where's Waldo." If Hubbards clones weren't such....well....clones...it might be harder to pick 'em out. We ignored them for the most part. Unlike Clearwater, all I had in terms of radio freq's was police freq's. The CoS doesn't have any freq's registered in Colorado. We gathered at the courthouse... And the woman I'll call "The Screaming Woman" (I know her real name...but it's more fun to think of her as a bansheelike wailing woman that she became later in the picket) came and checked out our signs. She read them and trotted off to the goon in waiting so he could drive her back to the org to report the results of HER recon mission. Now this is Boulder, Colorado. Picketers are about as unusual as trees. But none the less people were very interested in our signs as we walked up the Boulder mall. The response was usually pretty damn cool. People urged us on, took flyers, etc... But nobody shouted anything negative at us. (There is no negativity in Boulder...except around the Scientology Mission.) One girl said, "Oh...scientology, those people are scary." I had talked to Robert Anderson on the phone thursday night before the picket. As a courtesy call. I'd told him that I would be happy to picket across the street in order to remove the local businesses from the situation as much as possible. I had also explained that the critics are individuals, and what I say is no authority over their actions. If they refused to picket across the street, then there was nothing I could do. I also explained that if anyone on "our side" got out of hand, that I would stand next to him and complain just as loudly about the individual. Bad behavior was not wanted and neither side would tolerate it. Robert Anderson is a pretty nice guy...but he was obviously influenced by the wench from Portland that they'd flown in. He answered to her orders, demands, etc, with very quick attention. At one point she chastised him for not handing out leaflets to someone. The turnaround was amazing. This little Portland girl obviously craved my body, but she wouldn't share her name with me. She seemed unwilling to talk at all and was there to direct the events. She was "da boss," and even the overwhelming desire she must have felt towards me, couldn't distract her from her work. I hope she reads this...because I want her to know that I'm everything she imagined. The picketers refused to cross the street. Twice. I'm fine with that...but I figured I'd get hammered for my credibility later. To their credit, they didn't do that. Eventually, they did move, though...after many complaints from the business owners next to the Org. We started picketing and the counter picketers rolled out. It wasn't long before I heard a "hi Ray" from behind me and turned around to see none other than Joe Neal. I said, "Long time no see. Did you miss me?" He said, "No." I asked if they'd flown him out here just for me and he said he wanted to come here. Now Joe Neal is an interesting guy. He can alternate between "nice guy" and "complete asshole" in a matter of seconds. I tried to be a nice guy to him. And he was okay except when I suggested that he start relaying personal messages from me to Mike Rinder. Then he told me to Fuck Off or something. I dunno. I tried to recommend a resturaunt for him to eat at..but my mind was blank to the good ones. Xenu showed up...and the scieno's avoided him like he was some kind of Alien. Oh....er...well...he IS some kind of Alien, so I reckon that makes sense. Of all the arguments that all the stooges made that day, Joe Neal's argument made the biggest impact on me. He pointed to Xenu and said, "Ray, you say you're not a bigot... but that's bigotry, my friend." I made a mental note, "bring this topic up for discussion." Consider it raised. The picket was ok. The bullbaiting was done in Boulder Scieno style. Which is to say, they kept their distance, they talked nicely, they didn't cover the signs, etc. I actually had some good conversations with people. And the church in clearwater needs to realize, we can respect people who respect us. The dumbest move of the picket was when DSA of Denver, Deb Danos had the sign saying "Wollersheim used Penny." I told her, "you're going to look like an idiot when Penny shows up." Show up he did. THE Bob Penny. I was busy protesting and didn't take the time to introduce myself. Much to my dismay. I do hope I get the chance to meet him again. Bob and Lawrence stood there and talked to the media, had pictures taken of themselves, and put the whole "they hate each other" rumor to rest. Hopefully forever. The pictures will be up this week. (As soon as I develop the film) The second dumbest move of the picket was for the Boulder scns's to start chanting, "Internet bigots, spreading lies blah blah blah something something." This was a stupid move because it prompted a handful of internet users to join our protest. Or such was my impression. Real dumb, folks. Real dumb. Tell ya what, next time someone pickets you... Hire me. I'll tell you if something's stupid or not. Okay? Nearing the end of the picket Jane Allen (whose phone messages have not been getting to me apparently) and Robert Anderson and I talked. Now this could be a good cop/bad cop thing but they're a couple of pretty nice people. Robert Anderson seems to have this ability to avoid clamthink. Or at least not *look* like he's displaying clamthink. In other words, he appears logical. They offered to take me out to dinner to chat. How could I refuse? Jane Allen is OT8...So if I can convince her...just maybe she'll postulate a nicer church. Hah! Right. We'll be meeting for dinner sometime this week. Lawrence had this woman from LA following him around bullbaiting him near the end of the picket. At a few points he pressed her buttons and she started wailing and screaming. This is The Screaming Woman. Who didn't seem very bright to me. I think she didn't know how close she was to getting arrested. Maybe she's a smart lady... I don't know her. But she didn't *seem* smart. Hopefully they'll do better next time. We all adjourned to Old Chicago's for eats and beers. Everyone jabbered and chatted and Keith Cochran footed the bill. The ARSCC had better repay or we'll picket them. Whadda guy. Great day picketing. They spent lots of $$$ handling us. And we didn't spend anything. The cost of the signs was even covered as we recycled the clearwater signs. Several newspaper journalists were there and one television crew. Issues and Lessons and stuff: They complained at being called Clams. My response was that when they stopped calling me a wog, I'd stop calling them clams. I told Joe Neal to pass on a little note to his superiors. I said, "Pay Wollersheim and we won't picket next year." He won't pass it on. They think I'm working closely with Wollersheim, or so their clamulets on the picket line had been told. They were shocked to find I had my own brain, that I'd only met Lawrence the week before, and that I was there for my own reasons. Little do they know... *I* am the evil puppetmaster. Next year they'll have an Opto scout....or so Joe implied. OSA, here's a hint for ya. I have a trap set for you...remember that. When it comes to real-tech... I'm several rungs further up the ladder than you are and I always will be. One last thing.... Robert Anderson, who's like 12'8" tall.. or something like that, (closer to 6 feet..but very tall) was dressed up as Uncle Sam. It was a good move on their part. And he definitely gets the "Best Dressed" award. Xenu was cuddly, but this is Boulder...Uncle Sam got more attention than Xenu. Boulder had its fill of Aliens with Mork. -Love And Kisses (especially to Ms. Portland (call me if you can't help yourself ))