Well, I’d just finished a long cattle drive; 1,500 doggies from Colorado to a 7-11 in Virginia Beach. I’m wearing: my ten-gallon white hat, a 6” fringed, rhinestone studded waist-cut deerskin jacket with an LED lit “Cowboy Up-Yours” logo on the back, 6” fringed, rhinestone studded deerskin chaps, snake-skinned boots, diamond spurs and NOTHING else. I don’t use a saddle; I prefer full man-to-beast contact. My horse insists on feeling me against him. Now, the tough thing about riding barebutt bareback is that the position tends to spread my cheeks quite a bit which of course makes it very difficult to keep my hidden penknife in place. If I clench really hard I can keep it in place for a few hours, but all it takes is a cough or a sneeze and that little thing always thing pops out. Sweat from either the horse or I doesn’t seem to help matters much either. Somewhere around Missouri I got the brilliant idea of just Super Gluing my penknife in place.
Fast-forward to the drive destination 7-11 in Virginia Beach. This place felt a little strange to a cowboy like me. Two thousand miles of just prairie, me, my horse, the stars, 1,503 cows (I delivered three on the trail) and then all of a sudden BAM! a real convenience store with electricity, Slushies and non-bulk tobacky. So as I stroll on in I notice a bunch of black-tailed deer eying me. Now I’ve had a few run-ins with white-tailed deer and am known to hold my own against them even while severely outnumbered. I don’t know what to make of these black-tails, however. So I load up on Diet Pepsi Free One, Doritos, Pink Snowballs, Marlboros, Ho-Hos, Twinkies, Mike-n-Ikes, Skoal, AAA Batteries for my LED Cowboy Up Yours logo, Fruit-Roll-Ups, Bubble-Yum, Mentos, Tic-Tacs and an ice cold Slushie (after a month of nothing but dusty jerky and hard-tac you’d want all this stuff too).
So, I exit the 7-11 and one of the black-tails asks me why I’m not wearing any pants, whether my duds are genuine deerskin and why I opted for the pink Snowballs instead of the plain white ones; If I had a nickel for every time someone asked me that… I mount my horse and all of a sudden I’m surrounded by deer. One of them says something about me wearing his momma and that he’s going to skin me and wear me.
Game on. I reach back, grab a hold of my penknife, unclench my cheeks and tug. No go. Then I remember the Super Glue thing. Dang, it’s stuck good. Just when I think I’m screwed, a brilliant idea pops into my head. I sit up a bit and press the knife opener switch; click - it opens. I flip over so that they all can see the blade. One of them yells, “He’s got a three-inch penknife! Everyone; run 21 feet!” They all scatter, so I trot on over to my herd, keeping my penknife blade up so it glistens in the moonlight.
A couple minutes later the sheriff arrives and asks me if I brandished a knife within 21’ of a threat. I tell him the story about how I kept dropping the penknife and then the Super Glue thing and then show him the knife and my NASCAR and Rebel Flag tattoos. He’s a good ’ol boy and likes what he sees. When I explain the black-tailed deer incident he gets real excited and exclaims that “them are in season”. Next thing I know the law is showing up from all directions and has the area around the 7-11 surrounded. Then they start poppin off the deer left and right and pretty much dispatch the entire herd. Each one leaves with a deer strapped down to their patrol car’s hood.
All I have to say is: God bless my buttcrack penknife.
