Prison Life (Series of small snapshots of a Modern Prison) by Geo (#4)
The compound Barbershop is as hard to get to, as the Canteen most of the time. So you’ll have guys hustle and who cut hair using a comb and naked razor blade on the Rec Yard or in the dorm. They affix the razor blade to the comb by bending the prongs of the comb into the holes on the blade and go right to work. I prefer a razor cut over the guys who cut hair in the Compound Barbershop, and will pay two dollars in Canteen items. There’s nothing like a razor cut and edge by a skilled Rec-Yard or Dorm Barber. This may all sound a bit confusing because one doesn’t pay the guys in the compound Barbershop, because it’s their institution job, though even they will do a fade or special cut for a buck or so of Canteen items. Of course, all of this is also against the rules.
The Kitchen is the main source of hustling involving food, when guys are able to smuggle out stolen stuff. Spices are a big item, like glove fingers of garlic, dehydrated onion, or white pepper. It’s a dollar a glove finger. Those who make homebrewed wine have to buy their sugar, juices, and fruit from the Kitchen workers. The cooks will at times make special dishes, like fried rice with green pepper, onion and beef and fill sandwich bags with it; or fries or sandwiches made with the good turkey or chicken that is suppose to be reserved for medical diets. The cook will give twenty or thirty of these special bags to a hustler in the Kitchen whose job is to first smuggle it out past the Corrections Officer, who is supposed to search everything leaving the Kitchen. Selling it in the dorm, and bringing back the cook half the money. Whether the Kitchen workers are getting their hustle on or not, really depends on that Correction Officer. Some Correctional Officers (C/O’s) allow certain guys to get their hustle on, due to their being hard workers, they’ve been in there awhile, and the Florida Dept. Of Corrections (FDOC) doesn’t pay no one to work. So they allow a few perks. Some Correction Officers are straight hard asses who allow nothing out. That’s when guys find a way around them. Something is coming out of that Kitchen one way or another. One monkey don’t stop no show.
Speaking of wine makers, I used to do that too, although I’ve never been a drinker. It’s such a profitable hustle. I can take a few dollars of ingredients and make a Hooch so strong, guys will call it Rocket Fuel and buy it for five dollars a cup. When you make 3 or 5 gallons at a time you are getting paid! But Hooch smells, and the cops shake down too much, and there are too many snitches, and a Disciplinary Report (DR) for manufacturing an alcoholic beverage carries 60 days in Confinement and loss of 180 days of Gain Time. I avoid such situations nowadays. I’ve grown older and wiser. I want my freedom. But there are plenty of guys still making it.
Until next time…
Lynie Tru Vinyard with Bring In Light’s Inmate Art, Stories and Issues
https://www.gofundme.com/bringinlight
photo credit ModernMan
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