He loved fancy dressing plus showing off for the ladies. Laughing, the Dons worked together, tricking him out in fine local style. I almost died laughing, but he looked good. “Jim,” I cackled, “if you wanted to be a colorful parakeet or parrot, with that red hair and beard, you couldn’t have picked a better outfit.” Girls liked it, and that was good enough for him. Jim had always been a fancy dresser. He’d wear silk shirts or leather pants with fringe. Stuff I wouldn’t be caught dead in, he loved…

The Endless Times series: Volume One, The Path of Kokopelli, page 92

Of course, there is, fancy clothes invited real-life stories around Jim Shirley; and this one while not as unbelievable, is still amusing although after a while I wanted to brain him. For months he whined about “all my nice clothes,” blah, blah, blah.

On a drive to paint water towers, way back when, our old truck blew a motor in Terre Haute, Indiana. The next bus took us on to Ocean City, Maryland. It wasn’t till the next day Jim discovered all his fine clothes were still hanging at the filling station in Terre Haute. The station owner laughed and said he’d hold them a week, come get them. No car, no money, goodbye fancy clothes. Jim was broken-hearted and I had to listen; you’d have thought someone shot his dog!