Wednesday, April 20, 2005

My Daughter, the Capitalist...

I was wandering back up the driveway yesterday from the mailbox when I noticed this sign pasted to the back of my wife's buggy, complete with a phone number (Deb's cell phone number, which I photo-shopped out to protect her number).



That's right, she had captured some poor, unknowing rollie-pollies, and she had put them up for sale. My daughter seems to have entered into the isopod flesh-trade. Yes, the rollie-pollie, for as much as you may think it is an insect, it is actually more like a shrimp. So perhaps my daughter qualifies more as a fish-monger. Armadillium vulgare, or the common pillbug, breathes through gills and has crustacean-like features which means you will only find them in shady, dark and wet type places. You'll find them more or less in exactly the kind of places that kids dig around.



Although I'm extremely proud of Em's hunter/gatherer instincts, and I'm especially proud of her enterprise, I think I might have to explain to her a bit about markets. Although the rollie-pollie is extrememly handsome, I could only desribe its demand on the market as a pet or a foodstuff as "niche". There are some other bugs that would be interested in eating the rollie-pollie, but I would expect them to balk at the quarter-dollar price, and I would never extend any sort of insect credit. That's just a heartbreak waiting to happen...

My Cat Sits in Everything

Why does my cat have to annoint anything I bring home by sitting in it? Is this some sort of feline ritual to which I am not privy? Is her relaxing in my possesions a tacit feline approval? Must I vet all things through my very demanding and very discriminating feline? What of her tastes? What of the things that I bring home that she does not sit in? Should those things be discarded?



My cat quickly sat in this exquisite hammered copper pot from the Mexican state of Oaxaca. Thank goodness she liked it, now I guess we can keep it.

"Excuse me, sir, I ordered the extra-large brushguard..."

Holy cow, when I went and picked up my truck from Orig-Equip I could not have been more delighted with the monstrosity that they appended to my front bumper. No sir, you should not ride around in a truck that's stripped, you should get that baby Orig-Equipped!

When I showed my new brushguard to my friend Mark, a hunter, naturalist, taxidermist, and more or less all around cowboy three years in a row, he asked, "Mark, did you get that for the two or three days a year you ride through some weeds?" I answered, "No sir, I got that for pure vanity, whaddyathink?" He cried, "well, I like it!"


As the frenchman in Monty Python's Holy Grail said, "Outrageous!"

I could tell you the whole story behind the brushguard, about how we only get cool brushguards like that from Texas manufacturers, and how a fancy, west coast brushguard like a WAAG or Westin could only hope to grow up big and strong like a Texas-made Frontier-Gear Rover, but that would be boring. It has been only recently that a real, no-kidding Texas brushguard manufacturer figured out there are lots of Tundras on the road that need some front-end lovin'. Ranch Hand brushguards still haven't figured that out, and there is one called Central States I believe, in Junction, TX that builds for the Tundra, but the guy that sold me this one said they are a hard fit. I had to wait three weeks for the piece, but I'm real happy with the results.

Honestly, the reason why brushguards are so popular here can be summed up in one word: deer. Anyone hates to hit a deer, but we are so heavy with whitetails, one good shot across the bow will make the $500 or so cost of the brushguard worth the ounce of prevention, for a hard deer-strike on a dark, West Texas highway will probably end up costing a lot more for an unprotected vehicle. There is a late-model Toyota Avalon riding around town here that has a color-coded front end protector real similar to the one on my truck, maybe a bit more petite. During the rut, go to any body shop and see the wrecked cars and trucks awaiting repair, and see the deer hair wedged into the broken side markers, mirrors and grilles. The only thing worse than a deer-strike:

Mr. Hailstorm from hell...

2 Comments:

Blogger prairie biker said...

hmmm, maybe you should consider hiring her to wash that car?

3:45 PM  
Blogger Mark A. said...

I'll admit it, Matt, that's a dirty car... We hit a little rain on the way back from San Antone, you know the rest of the story...

6:50 PM  

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