Maybe I can get my first ex- to whip up a mess of her string bean casserole. When she left, I swear, that's the thing I missed most.

Laugh if you want, but the city of Durham and its residents could conceivably find ourselves resorting to an old church tradition -- selling chicken dinners or fish sandwiches -- to raise money if the tab for lawyers in the Duke lacrosse case keeps going up.

Many of us have probably attended churches where, in times of financial duress, the pastor turned to the kitchen for help.

Let he who has not heard "Sister Hattie, we need to patch up the roof. Can you fry us up a mess of your catfish?" cast the first hushpuppy.

If that old church tradition doesn't raise enough money to defend the city against the moneygrubbers, perhaps we can resort to an even older church tradition: praying.

It's unlikely that Mayor Bill Bell will come a'knocking on our doors asking us to contribute a favorite meal, but I'm dusting off my famous hoecake-with-cracklins recipe just in case the situation turns even more dire than it is now.

It could happen. We reported this week that the bills from lawyers representing the city in "the case that won't go away" had topped $1 million as of August.

Some of that money is supposed to be refunded -- about $239,000, we reported earlier -- but American International Group (AIG), the company that owns the insurer, is asking the government to bail it out of its own fiscal mess.

The amount for which the city is on the hook doesn't even include what the city may find itself spending if and when the other lacrosse players -- the 36 who suffered about as much injury as you or I but who are still scrambling to suckle from the city's teat -- seek to turn the city upside down like it's their personal piggy bank.

There are three other players, indicted but later declared innocent, seeking their day in court and in the city's pocket.

One hopes that their day in court ends quickly, with a kick in the pants and a substantial bill for wasting the court's time with such an obviously frivolous moneygrab.

Then there's the case of Erick Daniels, the 22-year-old Durham man who just skated after spending seven years in prison for a robbery and burglary he didn't commit. In his case, as in the lacrosse case, it appears that prosecutorial misconduct resulted in judicial miscarriages that could cost the city big bucks. Those big bucks, of course, come from us.

Daniels is certainly one who has a valid claim for recompense, but when I spoke with him Wednesday, shaking down the city was not something he was focused on.

"Whether I get money or not, I'm free," he said. "Life would be more comfortable with it, but I'm free."

The man deserves something from the city just for the manner he has handled himself after his nightmarish ordeal.

Come to think of it, most of the lacrosse players deserve something for the way they've handled themselves.

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