A couple of weeks ago, Dee's elder son had a traffic violation for which he needed to appear in court. Dee went to support Alex & I went to support them both. Fortunately I have had very little experience being in court but I suppose that this being a hot morning in the South that it caused visions of Atticus Finch & chifferobes to dance through my head.
Everyone else appeared normally dressed and then Alex's lawyer arrived. He was in a pink & white seersucker suit and white bucks, wearing a diamond earring and carrying his white boater and briefcase. I wondered if perhaps there was to be a "Music Man" flash mob later of which we were unaware (although I'm a realist and somehow knew the chances of that were quite small indeed). It wasn't the seersucker suit per se, I have a friend in Montana that can rock the seersucker/white buck/white boater like nobody's business but it's always been the blue & white and he may even have the tan & white but I didn't think that the pink & white had ever been made in adult sizes since the last time I can ever remember seeing it, it was the pattern of the matching bathrobes from Best & Company my younger siblings & I wore in the summer of 1965. I should also mention that the lawyer bore more than a passing resemblance to Mr. Haney from "Green Acres".
But in the end, what matters is years of doing business and making contacts - the details were sorted out quickly and fairly and off we went.
Meantime, a few days later, back at the farm, Dee solved the mystery of the missing guinea hens. A couple of the guinea chicks had started disappearing but there was no dog nor hound nor cat nor coyote nor fox, (fine - I'll stop saying "nor") that could get in or out of that coop. Dee went in one morning and found the culprit - a very large black snake (about 9 ft. it turned out) that now just had 2 large bumps in it (of now ex-guinea hens) hindering its ability to escape.
As I've mentioned, Dee loves all animals and despite the fact that this serial killer had already murdered a handful or so of her new guinea hens, she put the snake in a sack (it was too full to put up much of a fight - but still - it was pretty huge) and let it go somewhere else on the farm. Knowing absolutely nothing about nature but being a natural cynic, I wondered if it mightn't just slither right back up the hill. Do snakes have a sense of direction? A memory? Did it emerge from its food coma thinking, "Hey, I think there's a great new restaurant with tender guinea fowl somewhere in this neighbourhood"?
Last Saturday, with trips and other conflicts, Dee & I suddenly realized that we were the only two to take the hounds out for exercise. Normally, D & I ride in one golf cart with a couple (to several) others helping us on horseback (as the riders are able to go more quickly after any hound/hounds that take a mind to run off from the rest of the group). And so, armed with naught but 2 golf carts, 2 whips and a horn, the two of us decided we would take the hounds for their walkout and just to up the difficulty factor and only for their second outing, we added PUPPIES!
I suppose if anyone had been driving down the county road that day and didn't know what was going on it probably looked like a couple of ladies of a certain age being "little rascals on our Little Rascals" and having a crazed motorized wheelchair rodeo of some sort. Anyway, we were well pleased with ourselves when we returned with the same amount of hounds with which we left. Extra points were awarded (by us to us - 'cause why not?) for the facility in which we got them in and out of the trailer and into the kennel as well. Huzzah!
I then went down to my house to start to make lasagna for dinner that night and realized that I had meant to grab a Pyrex pan from Dee's house so back up I went in the golf cart now accompanied by my Mexican Canine-American housemate, Carmella, the chihuahua. On the way back down I was doing pretty well driving with one hand, balancing the pan and the tiny dog while opening the throttle to give the cart a bit more gas and then saw something black laying across the drive and thought, "Well, look at that big old black stic..SNAKE!!"
I am happy to report that no chihuahuas, snakes or Pyrex dishes were harmed in the stunt driving that was required at just that moment. I totally think it was the serial killer snake though. Ever notice the reptilian onomatopoeia of the word recidivist? MmmHmm...
On a less homicidal note, Dee & I think that "Two Whips and a Horn" would be a great name for a B&B and/or Pub catering to the Hunt crowd.
Alas, it might also be a good name for an S&M Club so the marketing would really be everything...
