As Promised -- 5 Ways Quatto Owes Me $8000

When I first began to brainstorm for this topic, I wasn't sure if I could get five reasons for Quatto to owe me big time. But as the minutes churned by, 5 reasons became 10 -- then 20 -- then 50 -- and so on. So I did some cutting and combining and here is what we are left with.

Number Five -- Quatto's Capret Fresh Habit

Some people do cocaine. Some people do mushrooms. Quatto does Carpet Fresh ... about 25 pounds of it all over the basement floor. Quatto had apparently left a "love explosion" or somethng all over the basement floor one time and dropped a ass-load of carpet cleaner onto it. Nice large track of fine, white powder all over the floor. Our Dad, the George W. Bush of drug detection, comes home to find all this crap on the floor that has now grown clumpy at the dampness of the basement. He assumes that Quatto has some $10,000 Dollar coke habit and corners me about it. I, innocent as usual, tell the old man I know nothing of it. The old man then goes all Batman on Quatto and interrogates him about the Carpet Fresh. The arguing, the crying, disappointment flooding the home caused me great mental duress and would become the first of many times I would have to cover Quatto for his recreational carpet fresh drug habit. Not to mention his pill-popping lock box full of "vitamins" he had in his car. His excuse? "Oh those aren't mine, man. I'm holding them for a friend". Right On.

Number Four: Quatto the Back Yard Terrorist

Quatto then would top his mental cruelty with unwavering physical and emotional trauma by chasing me around the backyard with a variety of lawn, garden, and workshop implements. His two favorites were the weeds-whacker and the propane torch. Usually this boy scout behavior took place when the parents were away and Quatto would be decked out in a welder's mask.
Then he would try to run me down with the riding mower (the push mower was too much work), shoot water at me with the hose, or try to drown me in the swimming pool. What the hell Boy Scout Badge was that one, Quatto?

Number Three: Destroying my Toys -- Part One

My parents didn't have a lot of money. If they had, I'm sure Quatto would have gotten the therapy he needed growing up. Due to the money issue, our parents buying us really cool toys was a real treat. One such treat was my 2 foot tall working Rodan monster from the Godzilla flicks. I already had the Godzilla figure and massive battles destroying Tokyo (my sandbox) were dancing through my head. But, as it was a Christmas gift, those battles would have to wait till Springtime. But Quatto decided that Rodan's working jaws were the perfect place to stuff an M80 into. So, with much Quatto fanfare, he stuffed the M80 into Rodan's mouth and blew his jaws off mere months after getting the toy. I was devastated. Quatto, of course, denied everything. Somehow, Rodan blew his own jaws up or else Mom or Dad did it. Still working on that Truthiness badge.

Number Two: General Douchebaggery

This is a catch-all category of Quatto's finer moments of trying to shill me for money or get me to shit for him or keep him out of trouble. Things under this category include:

"Gimme your allowance"
"Gimme your paycheck"
"Buy me some smokes"
"Gimme your credit card so I can buy a motorcycle"
"Don't tell the parents I crashed the truck into the ditch as an underage driver"
"Hide my porn, err, art films for me"
"Stash my bag in your closet"
"Get lost"
"I hope you die"
"Go upstairs, I'm trying to bang some chick in my bedroom"
"Your music is gay"
"You were adopted"
"Mom loves me more than you"
"Dad is going to sell you to the gypsies"

And so on. The quotes and examples are too numerous to post under his general douchebaggery. Suffice to say, his douchery is greater than most.

Number One: Scruffy's Diet of Action Figures

Oh yeah, save the best for last. We had this really cute mutt of a dog named Scruffy who developed a fetich for eating plastic from the day we brought him home from the shelter. Quatto, like Gargamel, hatches his insidious plot to stunt my emotional growth for the rest of my life by opting to feed my rather large and pristine condition ORIGINAL series Star Wars figure to the dog. To make it worse, Quatto, like f'ing Frederico Fellini, decides to save the event(s) for posterity by either filming it with the movie camera or taking Polaroids of the carnage. Then, to make matters worse, he'd invite over his old hoodlum friends to share the joy of my wrecked childhood by having them join in. They'd construct elaborate plots wherein Luke Skywalker would be buggering Greedo and then the Scruffy Monster would storm in and eat them both. On film. Christ what an A-hole.

So there it is. Five Reasons why Quatto owes me AT LEAST eight grand. Mental cruelty, emotional trauma, the loss of my Rodan, and the ravaging of a slew of Star Wars figures I could probably sell in 20 years and put my kid through college.

But with interest, and Quatto's abject denial of the above events by using the famed "Morty Defense" (I wasn't there, it wasn't me, that never happened. Stinkfist) I figure his debt to me will grow steadily year by year. When Sara is ready for college, I figure Quatto will be paying for at least two years worth of Room, Board, and Textbooks.