I get an email or two several times a week from this fella, a friend down in Southeast Texas. This'un is just too good not to post here. You can subscribe to his newsletters if you wish at newt281@embarqmail.com , or you can just write to him at that address.
Grab yourself an iced tea, get a grip on yourself, prepare to be entertained!
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By Newt Harlan
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Good morning y'all. I trust everyone passed a good weekend and all you fathers were suitably honored on Father’s Day. There’s coffee made on the stove and unsweetened tea and store-bought orange juice in the icebox. For those of you who need them, there’s fixing’s on the sideboard, including artificial sugar in pink packages some of y'all like so well. I remembered the doughnuts this morning, so y'all help yourselves.
Today dawned partly cloudy, hot and muggy. The temperature on my back porch at 5:30 this morning was 79 and it's supposed to get to 97 this afternoon. That won't quite match yesterday's 99, but I'm sure we'll find it plenty hot, and yes, the humidity will still be on the high side to complete our sauna...Hang in there, it's only 3 1/2 months until October.
Y'all might want to pay attention to these warnings today, since we're going to be discussing some fairly sensitive material.
This email is intended for the use of the addressees named above and contains information that is confidential and privileged (especially the part concerning damnyankees). It is definitely unsuitable for overly sensitive persons with low self-esteem, no sense of humor or irrational religious beliefs and should also be avoided by persons of questionable parentage. Persons sensitive to the words "damnyankee" will probably suffer a reaction; in fact care has been taken to assure this.
Those of you with an overwhelming fear of the unknown need to be aware that a hidden message has been inserted somewhere in this issue. Due to your irrational fear, it might be necessary for you to forego reading certain parts of this email, however I'm not at liberty to tell you which ones. Since you've already been exposed to portions, it might be a good idea for you to unplug your computer and light a dozen votive candles placed in a triangle around your monitor in the event that some of the secret message spills out. It will accomplish absolutely nothing, but you'll feel better about yourself.
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You Might Be A Blue Belly
For several years now Jeff Foxworthy and his friends have been entertaining us and I'm fairly sure by now you've heard most of the “You might be a redneck if” jokes. I enjoy most of these and often repeat them to friends and family. Nevertheless, I do resent it when those of the northern persuasion take it upon themselves to place everyone in the South into the redneck category, and look down their collective noses at us as if somehow living in the north makes them more intelligent than we Southerners, or whatever it is they think.
To tell the truth, the way damnyankees act and some of the things they do are just as funny as the antics of so-called rednecks, when they're viewed through a Southerner’s eyes. In order to be politically correct I shouldn't use the term damnyankees, so I'll call them what we've been calling them since the “War of Northern Aggression” – blue belly.
Here are my observations.
You might be a blue belly if...
1. Your last name is Lodge-Berkley or Smythe-Williams and you think it’s hilarious because Southerner’s have first names like Billy Joe, James Lee, Ludie Beth or Martha Fay.
2. You don't understand the concept that a man wearing his newest pair of bib overalls and a starched white shirt is just as dressed up as a man wearing a dark business suit.
3. You've never eaten okra, ever, not boiled, fried or in okra and tomatoes.
4. You think Heinz Hot Ketchup is REALLY spicy.
5. Your concept of roughing it is staying in a “Motel 6” instead of a “Sheraton”.
6. You use a knife and fork to eat fried chicken.
7. You have no idea where over yonder, down yonder or up yonder are.
8. You've never planned a vacation to coincide with the opening of deer season, a chili cookoff or the National Finals Rodeo.
9. You laugh when a group of people is referred to as y'all, but think it is perfectly okay to refer to them as you guys, even when it’s a group of women.
10. You think black-eyed peas are hog food and have no idea what purple hulls, crowders or cream peas are.
11. Your snow blower breaking down is a far bigger problem than your lawn mower breaking down.
12. You even know what a snow blower is.
13. You haven't the foggiest idea what a polecat is.
14. You're a male and can see no reason for owning a truck.
15. You don't know and don't want to know what a “spit-cup” is.
16. You have no problem pronouncing “Worcestershire Sauce” correctly and have never just given up and said, “pass the Lea and Perrins please.”
17. You don't have at least one can of WD-40 and one roll of duct tape somewhere in you house or at least in your truck.
18. You don't have at least 6 or 8 gimme caps advertising a product, company or organization hanging on your hat rack.
19. You can't understand why a head football coach is worth as much money as a university president.
20. You don't smile, speak or wave at people you meet on the street or while driving down the road, even if you don’t know them.
21. You don't understand that fixin’ to is a necessary step to accomplishing something.
22. You think 200 miles is too far to drive to watch a high school football game.
23. You refer to all western-style hats as “ten gallon hats.”
24. You have no idea what a doodad is.
25. You don’t know whether to be pleased or pissed off when someone tells you, “you’re worth about as much as a truckload of postholes.”
26. You can’t understand why drivers of diesel 4X4 pickups, hummers or Suburbans aren’t impressed with your Lexus, Mercedes or BMW. Just try running yours through a bog hole or in and out of a road ditch.
27. You think a stock tank is something the Army keeps on hand in case one of theirs breaks down or something.
28. You think NASCAR is an automobile dealership.
29. You have no idea of the therapeutic value of just sitting in the porch swing at grandma’s house.
30. You don’t understand when I tell you this whole essay is worth about as much as a milk bucket under a bull.
That’s about all I have for now. I hope you got a few chuckles. I imagine many of y’all have some of your own “you might be a blue belly if-----ideas.” If you’d like, share them with me and maybe we can do something interesting with them, even if it’s just to make a bunch of damnyankees wonder what the hell we’re up to.
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It’s obviously time to put a-30- on this attempt at literary mediocrity. I want to offer my usual thanks to y’all who again waded through all the twaddle and endured the blather and drivel until the bitter end. I’m blessed to have friends who overlook shoddy writing while in search of that one flash of literary brilliance…Unfortunately it didn’t appear today either. If parts of this look familiar, it’s probably because I found some of my old notes from back in early 2004 and used some material from them.
On the outside chance you actually enjoyed this effort, please forward it to your friends. In the event you loathed it, you can always forward it to your enemies; can you think of a better way to aggravate them? If nothing else, simply print it out for bathroom reading material and then you’ll have some extra paper in the event of an emergency.
If you have the time, ping me over an email and give me your comments on this effort, good or bad, I have an ego to feed and if I can move you to comment, I will have accomplished something.
Remember while you’re traveling down the road of life; try to dodge the used chewing gum and doggy piles. Be extra good to yourself and surprise someone with a random act of kindness. Remember, when you get to thinking you’ve run plumb out of friends, you haven’t yet… old Newt’s still over here. May God bless you and yours, my brothers and sisters and God Bless America!
My Pledge:
To maintain the highest standards of which I am capable or happen to feel like on any given day, to publish only information that is based on as much fact as I can find or make up, and most of all to have as much fun as possible without offending too many readers. The facts expressed here belong to everyone, the opinions are mine, and it’s your job to figure out which are which.
Newt Harlan
© 06-16-08
-30-
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