Laugh tracks in the dust

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Well, Mother Nature is making up for the late killing frost — big time. The last two days have seen night time temperatures in the low teens and day time temps in the high 20s — and the wind has constantly pumped in the frigid air from the northwest. And, it’s supposed to stay this way for at least another week, with a high possibility for snow Saturday.

However, prior to the plunge into winter, the hunting season opened and I hunted some of our pen-raised quail with my buddies Rollin Birdz and Dusty Farmer. The scenting conditions — dry and windy — weren’t the best, but we had good morning hunts over the weekend and on Monday and got the dogs back in the swing of hunting.

Then, Sunday and Monday afternoons, Dusty and I decided to get in a last few hours of fall fishing in the Flint Hills. We scored around 20 bass and bluegills on Sunday and 11 filleting-size crappie on Monday. We were fishing around 4 p.m. on Monday and we knew the Polar Express wuz gonna roll in soon. We saw it coming over the hill and headed for the pickup. And, by the time we got loaded up, the wind wuz blowing so hard we could scarcely close the pickup doors. And, by the time we drove 15 miles home, the temperature had dropped 25 degrees. Now that’s what you call squeezing every last minute out of the fishing season.

***

I’ve got a good friend, ol’ R. R. Mann, whose string of bad luck — not catastrophic, but funny and sad at the same time — this month reached near epic proportions.

First, he accidentally rolled a wheel over the favorite house dog of the family and grandkids. That’s bad enuf, but when he tried to help the injured pup, it bit him hard enough to leave his hand and arm bandaged up.

The second incident involved a skunk getting into his man cave/shop. When it got scared, it ran under the refrigerator and got itself entangled in the compressor. In the process of trying to extricate the skunk, R. R. got sprayed a few times. His man cave now has a lingering pungent odor about it.

And, the third incident involved R. R.’s first attempt to get involved in the poultry bizness. First, he built a nice chicken coop to house the mature birds. Then he borrowed a neighbor’s incubator and hatched a dozen fluffy new “laying” chicks. He augmented his new poultry flock by buying 25 “meat chicks” at the local farm store’s last “chick day” of the year.

For the baby chicks, he build a plywood pen two-feet high in his man cave/shop, equipped it with heat lamps, feeders and waterers and enjoyed a few days of watching his new chicks and envisioning tasty fried chicken meals this winter.

Alas, R. R. has a red heeler dog that — as it turned out — shares R. R.’s appetite for chicken, but it didn’t wait for winter. The dog easily hopped over the pen fence and helped itself to all but four of R. R.’s new chicks. I guess he got full before he could devour the entire flock.

Now that’s what I call a string of bad/sad luck. The only good thing that could possibly come to R. R. of all that bad luck is that experience is usually the best teacher. I’ll bet he does better next time.

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A part-time farmer is at work one day at the welding shop when he notices that his co-worker is wearing an earring. The farmer knows his co-worker to be a normally conservative fellow and is curious about his sudden change in “fashion sense.” So, he walks up to his fellow welder and says, “I didn’t know you were into earrings.”

“Don’t make such a big deal, it’s only an earring,” the co-worker replies sheepishly.

The farmer falls silent for a few minutes, but then his curiosity prods him to ask, “So, how long have you been wearing one?”

“Ever since my wife found it in my truck,” his co-worker admitted.

I always wondered how the men with ear-ring trend got started!

***

Two grain farmers from the same rural community finished combining soybeans the same day and that night meet for a cool one at the local watering hole — the Dew Drop Inn.

Eventually their conversation turns to the subject of making love. The first farmer volunteered, “Did you know that lions make love 10 to 15 times a night?”

“Dang,” says his friend, “and I joined the Elks just last week!”

***

From Colorado comes this story. A farm wife and her five year old daughter were in a checkout line at a grocery store, when the young one became upset

about something.  The rambunctious youngster announced, “As soon as we get home I’m going to run away.”

Well, of course, the best thing for the mother to do was to let her child come to her own realization that it wouldn’t work. So she asked her daughter, “Why wait until you get home. Why don’t you just run away from here?”

The child was ready with an answer, “Because I don’t know my way to grandma’s house from here.”

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And a few wise words about grandmothers in closing. Baseball Hall of Fame member George Brett once said: “If a tie is like kissing your sister, losing is like kissing your grandmother with her teeth out.” Have a good ‘u

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