A snake charmer is murdered.

I think I’ve known at least one man who was murdered. I say ‘think’ because I have known other men who died under suspicious circumstances, but one was definitely killed by another human. His case remains unresolved. 

I met a very beautiful woman, Anne Gurney, who was in a self-help group I was part of in the late 1970 in Berkeley California. She had been a top executive at a high-end women's cosmetic company in New York City. It might have been Revlon or Max Factor. She always dressed for the role, elegant. She came to California to work for a new natural health care products company called Shaklee again in marketing as a C level executive. She was also very smart. 


She had a friend, a gay guy named Ron something who tagged along with his partner. They were young New York gay men. Very elegant, but a bit quirky. The better looking dude was either her assistant or another vice president at Shaklee. If not rich they were aspiring to be. When Anne and Ron arrived from New York, they both bought houses right away. Anne had a place in Oakland off Park Boulevard and Ron bought on Downey Street in the upper Haight Axhbury, fairly close to the Castro. Anne got involved in Scientology. I think she is still a member to this day. She dragged me, Jack Militello and her young gay protege along to the Dianetics Communication Course at the Berkeley Mission. 


The timeline gets a little quirky here. I had moved to San Francisco and was living on the top floor of a building that Jack Militello had bought. His girlfriend was named Marilee. I have a very clear memory that Terry slept with Ron and I was pissed. 


In the house on Downey Street, we visited, it was very very New York styling, no fussy San Francisco Victorianna. But the quirky part was that the partner, I don’t think he actually worked, had a collection of snakes, more than a few. I remember well their cages in the second floor room that was above the front hallway. He would show them off, pointing out the venomous ones. He had a habit of going into the small room and spending time with these exotic pets. Creeped me out. Later after Terry and I lost touch, I heard that he’d been murdered. His body had been discovered under the main steps up to the house. A friendship gone wrong, a sex encounter, a drug deal, something. 


Anne introduced me to another friend, another executive at Shaklee, very high up, I know that his wife had huge breasts. They lived in a very big house in an affluent suburb of San Francisco, Atherton or close by. I helped the trophy wife with some work on a kitchen renovation. Later when I was driving a cab, I picked up a passenger from one of the clubs in North Beach. It was this executive. He didn’t have the big boobed wife in tow, but another woman, a professional I am sure, with equally big tits. I said “Oh hi, I remember you. How are you? How's the wife?


Sex and business with a particular San Francisco flavor,

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