This is sort of a postscript to the encyclopedia series of articles.

One of the anecdotes that I wanted to include in that series but couldn’t quite work it in concerns a guy with tattoos on the middle joints of his fingers. And all I really remember clearly about it is the tattoos.

I think Dick must have sometimes taken the whole team, probably in the mid-afternoon, until we found someone out in the yard or sitting on the porch. I’m guessing this was just to build the team spirit or get us in the mood or it was too early to go off on our own, not really sure. 

Anyway, I remember he had the whole team assembled and he was starting on the spiel to a couple outdoors and I got distracted because I noticed that the guy had letters tattooed on the middle joints of the fingers of one of his hands: L, T, F, C

Hmm, that seemed odd. So I kept watching him to see if his other hand was similarly tatted, and sure enough, I caught a glimpse of it and it had the letters E, S, U, K

When we walked away from the couple (they didn’t opt to buy), I mentioned this to the team, and they wondered why would someone have those particular letters on his hands.

So I had to, uh, spell it out for them. If he joined his hands together and interlocked his fingers in front of what he presumably considered a suitable person, it spelled out an invitation.

They couldn’t understand the mindset of someone who would go to the trouble of tattooing that message on his fingers.

Having met a bunch of frat boys, I thought I could understand it all too well.

Thinking about it today, I’d like to have asked him one question: “If you ever have children, how will you explain those tattoos to your daughter?”