Word: varnished
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Witnesses said a bottle and a one-gallon can of varnish came through a first-story window without warning as the student walked with friends at about 10:45 p.m. Saturday...
...really. But what does one do with a horseshoe crab? Plenty, it turns out. Indians once used their tails for spearheads, and farmers have ground up the crabs for fertilizer and for hog and chicken feed. Some locals varnish dead ones for knickknacks, and others chop them up for eel bait...
They also like to dance on it. South of town is the Stardusty Ballroom, where twice a week in season 300 ballroom dancers fox-trot and waltz to the supple beat of a five-piece band that displays its name, Desert Varnish, on maroon baseball caps. The dance floor is made of plywood panels, and the ceiling is the blue Arizona sky. DANCE AT YOUR OWN RISK reads the sign posted near a huge cactus. Couples dance in the desert, romance hovering like heat haze; some dress in matching colors. Stuck in the ground around them are plastic hyacinths, windmills...
...your own is a phrase with a ring to it, and since the mid- 1960s, when only one privately owned railroad car rolled in the entire country, it is a ring that more than a few people have answered. Railroad slang for privately owned stock is "private varnish," and a magazine by that name is sent to some 3,000 train buffs. The American Association of Private Railroad Car Owners has 157 full and 240 associate members, and 230 cars are registered in Amtrak's Washington headquarters, most of them lavishly furnished and all fully functional as surefire jealousy inducers...
...staterooms, observation room, kitchen pantry and crew's quarters. He sold it last year, but missed it so much that he bought another much like it, and now owns five other cars, including a Union Pacific diner. Given ten days' notice, Amtrak is happy to move a private varnish almost anywhere on its tracks. The price, however, is a tad higher than a first-class ticket. It cost Businessman Gardner more than $14,500 in fees to transport his car from Milwaukee to California and back again in June. Popular runs include the stretch between Washington and New York City...