1. The term used when a prisoner hides contraband up inside his person – Keystering – and thank you Dad for that detailed description.
2. Inmates can ferment fruit and packets of bbq sauce into wine, taste at own risk.
3. Inmates can make a sharp knife out of toilet paper, kind of like paper mache style.
4. Prison guards steal any mail they may want, e.g. magazine subscriptions, packages of food, electronics.
4. Contrary to prison life in movies, inmates don’t have computers or access to the Internet, unless you’re Martha Stewart.
5. Inmates don’t ask other inmates what they are in for unless they offer you their sentencing papers.
6. The prison pecking order starting from lowest to highest is: sex offenders, including pedafiles and rapists, law enforcement, informants, drug dealers, murderers (but not of children).
7. If your Dad’s appellate attorney is the same as Phil Spector’s, be careful what you may write about Phil Spector.
8. MCI is a racket and has the toe-hold on the collect calls. Rumor has it sometimes they purposely drop calls so you have to pay for the first minute again.
9. Stamps are considered a form of currency.
10. If you are in a prison fight, even if you’re the one being beaten and not beating, they’ll put you in the hole.
>3. Inmates can make a sharp knife out of toilet paper, kind of like paper mache style.
Very martha, really.
Always entertaining, Laurel. I love your writing. It’s gripping. So glad you have a blog. Keep it coming.
I learned how to make hair curlers out of toilet paper at the county jail. I also can convert a maxi pad into tampon. These are skills that are not necessarily transferable in the outside world.
Something that was left out of your heirarchy part is the number of people that are there for simple drug posession, and nothing more. Prisons are bursting at the seems with these people.