After multiple attempts, a few involving five people pushing and shoving and swearing and falling in the muck, Foxinator still had two pigs she could not get into the trailer. I couldn’t move my pigs (to the butcher) without borrowing said trailer but I didn’t mind. My pigs were delightful critters; a great addition to my morning routine:
Curmudgeon: Tramping toward the truck… muttering under his breath. “Another day, another dollar. If I’m lucky. My back hurts. I think I spilled my coffee. But I don’t care. I hate everything. Because mornings blow…”
Pig #1: “‘Morning Curmudgeon! Isn’t it a great day?”
Curmudgeon: Brightening considerably and patting pig #1 on the head: “Well, I suppose it is. Good morning to you too.”
Pig #2: “Got anything for us?”
Curmudgeon: “Sure do. Come on out sleepyhead.” (Pig #3, always the late sleeper, bounds over to join the fun.) “Here you go guys, a half a baloney sandwich and some fries left over after an unfortunate encounter with McDonalds.”
Pig #3: “You rock dude!”
Pig #2: “I was hoping for a toy?”
Curmudgeon: “Here’s another block of wood.”
Pig #2: Tearing around in circles with a piece of wood in it’s mouth: “Weeeee!”
Curmudgeon: “There’s a hundred pound bag of feed in the truck. Man they make my arms ache, I hate lifting them…”
Pig #1, #2, #3: “You can do it! Go Curmudgeon. Go!”
I’d flop a bag of feed into the feed trough and was therefore the greatest being ever to grace the planet. Trust me on this… you may never meet a human more grateful than a pig.
——
One morning Mrs. Curmudgeon and I headed to town to meet Foxinator. She planned to have delivered her bacon wielding demons. I was going to pick up the empty pig trailer. We met at a parking lot. As is appropriate for redneck greetings, we pulled our trucks adjacent and talked though rolled down windows. The Foxinator’s kids were in the Foxinator’s truck; carrying on loudly, as kids do. There was no trailer to be seen.
Foxinator: “Are you packing? Right now?”
Curmudgeon: “Well that’s sorta’ personal. You see they call it concealed carry because…”
Foxinator: “I want you to kill them.”
Curmudgeon: Glancing at Foxinator’s rambunctious children, “Well the teenage years are indeed tough but perhaps with love and time…”
Foxinator: “I’m talking about the pigs!”
Curmudgeon: (Relieved) “Oh that’s another matter. But the carcasses will weigh a lot… how will we move them? Also isn’t that Bill’s job?”
Foxinator: “I don’t care. They’ve pissed me off. I could NOT get them in the trailer and missed another appointment.
Curmudgeon: “Oh no… Bill will definitely have something to say about that. Repercussions may ensue.”
Foxinator” “Yep. I called him and he told me just how to do it. Says he just uses a pistol.”
Curmudgeon: “What? Wait…”
Mrs. Curmudgeon: “I’ll bring mine. If you can get them close enough to the trailer… but once we shoot one how will we get the next one to come in close enough?”
Foxinator: “If we shoot them in a flat place I can drive the trailer up to to the dead pig…”
Mrs. Curmudgeon: “Curmudgeon has a come-along we could use to get the carcasses in the trailer…”
Mrs. Curmudgeon: “Do we have to bleed them and gut them before delivery to the butcher?”
Foxinator: “No! We just have to deliver the carcass within a half hour of death, so we have a really tight time frame.”
Curmudgeon: (Getting nervous.) “Ladies you’re freakin’ me out.”
Mrs. Curmudgeon: “We can DO this. We just need to pen them up in a small place that you can drive the trailer to. We can lure them in with junk food, shoot them in the head and then pull them up into the trailer with the come-along and drive them to the butcher. The come-along is going to be the hard part. Do you know anybody with a winch? If we have a winch the timeline is a snap.”
Foxinator: “Yes! My neighbor has a winch on his ATV. I bet he would let me borrow it if I gave him some of the chops and bacon.”
Mrs. Curmudgeon: “Perfect! Call him and let me know what day will work. I say go time should be 6:00 a.m. so we can get this done before work.”
Foxinator: “Exactly!”
I made a lame excuse and got out of there. All I can say is that you don’t want to piss off either Mrs. Curmudgeon or the Foxinator. They have it all planned out.
“6:00 a.m. so we can get this done before work” Uh, what with shootin’ and winchin’ and haulin’ and the oh-dark-hundred go time, I’d say that IS work. You’re a wise man to have run away from the unfolding debacle.
Yes, I can imagine about eleven dozen ways things could have gone south.
Curmudgeon: (Getting nervous.) “Ladies you’re freakin’ me out.”
That is, hands down, the funniest thing I have ever read on your blog. And that includes the story about the hawk. And the cats.
Thanks.