As my three or four regular readers already know there is never any profanity in Rural Legends. That being said, they also know the correct scientific name for donkeys and burros is Equus asinus asinus which in English is Horse ass. The name donkey wasn’t even used until 1784. Prior to that they were asses and nothing but asses.
In any case, Saturday morning as I was sitting on the porch drinking coffee, I noticed Hairy (or maybe it’s Harry, we never decided on a spelling) behind the dam of the pond. All I could see was his head and he wasn’t moving. Upon investigation, Hairy (or Harry) had stepped into the pond and was stuck in the mud up to his posterior. In fact he was stuck up to his posterior and his anterior.
Hairy was stuck in the mud like a lawn dart.
Now, this presented a small dilemma for me and a large one for Harry. In an ideal world, I could have put straps around him and lifted him out with a crane. Although I have lots of useful items in my inventory including straps suitable for lifting a small ass from a pond, I couldn’t find a barge mounted crane anywhere. You’d think that would be something I would have in my arsenal of useful tools
So, the only option was to tie a rope to Harry and pull. It was sort of like Kipling’s Elephant’s Child. We pulled and we pulled and we pulled without success. Possibly, we needed a crocodile and a bi-colored Python Rock Snake.
When it became obvious Harry was freezing and unless we did something soon we would be dealing with a dead ass, we tied the other end of the rope to the truck and pulled. Management was driving the truck and I was, well- let’s just say my ass was freezing in the water and I was doing all I could to get him out.
Finally, with a giant sucking sound that sounded like jobs going overseas, Harry came loose. When it became obvious he was too weak to swim and too heavy to tote, I shouted to Management to keep driving. I was shouting go-go-go and she was driving in slow motion. Although she often ignores me, I thought that maybe she would pay attention this time to keep my ass from drowning.
You’ve probably seen someone being pulled through the water on an inner tube. Imagine, someone tubing on a Harry ass- in slow motion no less.
Once Hairy (or Harry) was on a firmer terra firma, I pointed out that it might have been more helpful if Management had driven faster. As has happened before, she claimed she couldn’t tell if I was yelling Whoa, Go, Slow, Ho or No and we should agree on a specific word that means Go and Stop.
We had previously had a similar incident. She was pulling me on a lawnmower and I was shouting Slow-Slow-Slow. That time, she heard Go-Go-Go.
This time, we reached an agreement (again) that Stop means cease forward motion and everything else means go.
That night, we decided to go out to dinner and to watch a movie. We ate out and then went to a large red box in front of a store. We watched several dozen movies scroll through the screen. I thought it was great. I really like watching movies like this. It is when they take an hour that I get restless.
It seems that I was mistaken again. That red box is sort of a vending machine for movies that you rent and then have to watch. What a disappointment.
We rented and watched “The Mediocre Gatsby”. As every reader knows, the movie is never as good as the book. It didn’t even come close to “adequate” much less great which was another disappointment.
Later, Management and the son vacuumed leaves in the yard. There was an aluminum can in the leaves. I was going to suck it up. Both bride and brat accused me of attempting to damage the leaf vac. “This is why we don’t have nice things,” they said.
Now, I have often seen the contents of aluminum cans cause problems but I still can’t see how a little can-can hurt a cast iron impeller.
A few minutes later, they were vacuuming hickory nuts, walnuts and a few rocks. In the interest of avoiding being sucked through a leaf vacuum I resisted saying “This is why we don’t have nice things.”
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