The Big Question. John R. Erickson

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      Holy smokes, a spark of electricity bit me on the end of the nose, and you talk about a stampede! Fellers, I ran smooth over the top of little Drover and was heading toward Del Rio when it suddenly occurred to me that Slim was…well, laughing. I slowed to a walk, then stopped.

      I went to Puzzled Wags on the tail section. What was the meaning of this?

      Slim got control of his laughter and said, “Well, the fence is hot. Thanks, pooch. You saved me from having to test it with my own flesh and blood.”

      Oh great. I saved him from…you see what we have to put up with around here? Oh well, it didn’t cause any permanent damage to the nose, and I ended up getting pats, rubs, and the piece of jerky, so maybe it wasn’t such a bad deal. But if you ask me, Slim enjoyed it a little more than he should have.

      Anyway, we got our work done and made it back to Slim’s shack before dark, and the next day, we had ourselves a bachelor Christmas. It didn’t amount to much. There are many things that bachelors don’t do for Christmas. They don’t put up decorations, send Christmas cards, buy presents, bake cookies, or invite a houseful of kinfolks to come for the holidays.

      I don’t know how many kinfolks he had, but they weren’t invited. Why? Because when you invite visitors, you have to clean the house, and as Slim often said, “What’s the point of cleaning the house? It just gets dirty again.”

      Yes, Christmas at Slim’s shack was a pretty quiet affair. He’d cut himself a little juniper tree up in the canyons and decorated it with a tin foil star and a few strings of popcorn, and that was about all. Oh, wait, I almost forgot. Before he went into the kitchen to cook Christmas dinner, he sang us a song, and get this: it was a song about Cowboy Cooking.

      Musically, it wasn’t so great, but I have to admit it was pretty funny. You want to hear it?

      ‘Maters and ‘Taters

      ‘Taters are friends of the cowboy.

      They’re honest and pretty near free.

      If you leave ‘em too long in the sack, though,

      You’ll think that you’ve sprouted a tree.

      ‘Taters don’t take any talent,

      Their cooking is easy to learn.

      Just slice ‘em and throw ‘em in your hot grease,

      And leave ‘em until they are burned.

      When they’re black, you can drain all the grease off.

      Old newspaper works like a charm.

      If you happen to eat the sports page,

      That’s okay, it don’t cause any harm.

      When you’re done, leave the pan on the stove top.

      That grease will turn solid and white.

      When it’s time to fry up some more ‘taters,

      Light the fire and pick out the flies

      ‘Maters and ‘taters for breakfast.

      ‘Taters and ‘maters for lunch.

      Yippy-ti-yi-yo, p-o-t-a-t-o-e-s…spells ‘taters.

      Yippy-ti-yi-yo, t-o-m-a-t-o-e-s…spells ‘maters.

      Your momma has told you that ‘maters

      Are healthful and better than pie.

      But when you bite down too hard on a ‘mater,

      It’ll ‘splode and squirt in your eye.

      Fresh ‘maters require too much effort

      To interest your average man.

      When a cowboy feels need for some veggies,

      His ‘maters will come from a can.

      Canned ‘maters are good in your gravy.

      Canned ‘maters are good by theirselfs.

      Canned ‘maters don’t rot in the ice box,

      They’ll sit twenty years on the shelf.

      A bachelor chef uses ‘maters

      As a sauce that is meant to disguise.

      If you dump a can into your cold grease,

      You won’t notice the taste of them flies.

      ‘Maters and ‘taters for breakfast.

      ‘Taters and ‘maters for lunch.

      Yippy-ti-yi-yo, p-o-t-a-t-o-e-s…spells ‘taters.

      Yippy-ti-yi-yo, t-o-m-a-t-o-e-s…spells ‘maters.

      ‘Maters and ‘taters are good.

      Well, for Slim Chance, that was a pretty good musical effort. It wasn’t as corny as most of his songs, and I can tell you that it was based on true life experience. I mean, the guy actually does those things. He didn’t get his ideas out of a book.

      But for that particular Christmas meal, he didn’t cook either ‘taters or ‘maters. He fixed a turkey...well, part of a turkey. Boiled turkey necks. He’d found them on sale at the grocery store in Twitchell, ten pounds of necks for three bucks. He cooked them all in a big pot, don’t you see. What he didn’t eat, he threw into a bread bag and placed it in the ice box, which left him enough pre-cooked meals to last several weeks. Then he deep-freezed the pot so he didn’t have to wash it. Pretty shrewd.

      Oh, and did I mention that he gave me and Drover a neck apiece? He did. It was our Christmas СКАЧАТЬ