Rapture

You know you're in the deep south when you're standing idle with a shovel in hand and the boss walks by and says, "Is that what yew want to be doin' when the Lord comes back? Holdin' a sh'vel up and daydreamin' about gerls?"

The answer is yes, but since it was my boss I said no and got busy digging a trench.


I would've refused to relocate to Mississippi but for some reason I thought I'd misjudged Louisiana folk last time I was pumping see-ment in the Gulf. I thought I might've become more worldly or Louisiana more tolerating... I now think my instincts were correct the first time around and we really don't mix very well.

Oggy: What you do this weekend?
Louisiana Native: Killed some possum in my attic. Trapped a hog and gutted it. Shot a deer 'n hung him in a meat locker.
Oggy: That right?
Louisiana Native: Look! There's a rat under those pipes.
Oggy: Oh, yeah, a mouse. I wonder what kind?
Louisiana Native [grabbing a shovel] : Fixin' to be a dead kind.

They weren't joking when they called Louisiana "Sportsman's Paradise". Hippies really should steer clear.

Except in my darkest hours I am usually a comic/clown with stories that have people laughing to tears. With few exceptions my homeless tales of moving port-o-potties in the desert with a one-eyed junkie and a retard with one gimp arm slays the audience. In fact, that story is one of the greatest stories I've ever heard, let alone told. Well, Louisiana is one of the few exceptions.

In answering where I'm from I might drift into my arctic wolf quest in 2009-20011 and I say, "So I'm wearing these plaid bell bottom pants and it's about 4 degrees out in New Brunswick, Canada, snowing hard and I've got a wood burning stove in my van... and the border patrol lady tells me that I'm banned from her country and I tell her I'm on a mission of extreme environmental importance and I've been sent back in time to save the Arctic Wolf...etc. etc..."

And the crowd assembled reveals absolutely no emotion, spitting chaw slop sullenly to the dirt. It's dead silent. You could hear a mouse piss on a ball of cotton. I'm sweating uncomfortably and feel like a total asshole.
Then someone drawls slowly: "Sounds like you got what you had comin'. Lucky to be alive."
And another: "Yep, got what was comin' to ye."
And another: "Bell bottom pants? You a fuckin' idjit? Mama drop ya on yer head as a baby? Never heard nothin' so stupid."
And Lastly: So you was huntin' Arctic Wolves without a license? Is that what I'm hearin'? Cuz I got a buddy who can kill yew a wolf if yew want."

And I shrug and feel like there is no response so depression set in.

I got an awful flashback to when I was trying to be a vegetarian on the supply vessels. I remember thinking that if Gandhi could try to unite Hindus and Muslims then at the least I could affirm my simple ethical treatment of animals mandate. HAHAHAHA. Flash forward to meal time:
"Oggy, here's yer dinner."
The Mate throws me a can of plain kidney beans.
"Be careful 'cuz those beans might start bleeding when you bite them."
The Able Seaman says with a mouth full of fried catfish: "Yeah, and that lettuce probably has some bacteria you don't want to kill. HAHAHAHA. Oggy, you crazy motherfucker."
And everyone is chain smoking Marlboro cigarettes like a convention of Future Cancer Patients of America so that my depression is masked by the carcinogenic haze

I guess the good Christians skipped Romans 14: ²⁰ Do not destroy the work of God for the sake of food. All food is clean, but it is wrong for a person to eat anything that causes someone else to stumble. ²¹ It is better not to eat meat or drink wine or to do anything else that will cause your brother or sister to fall.

6 months of eating canned pinto beans and being humiliated in the middle of the ocean. I guess it's my bed and I made it so I should sleep in it because I'm a fucking asshole.