Monthly Archives: October 2018

Whoa! Legless Bronco Busting

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Legless Bronco Busting!!!

Hang on to your hats ladies and Gentlemen! Here’s the latest in Rodeo events, the newest, the wildest, the craziest yet, its LEGLESS BRONCO BUSTING!!! That’s right we said it, you heard it, Legless Bronco Busting. The new event that’s sweeping the rodeo circuits from Texas to Oklahoma, Wyoming to Oregon, Colorado to, well you get the picture. It’s everywhere. Are you bored with the same old wild mustang bucking horses that come out and jump around the arena for a while doing stupefying flying leaps and incredible horse-like acrobatics while trying to unseat its rider. The spectacular has become boring. You’ve seen it all before and you’re tired of it. So all that’s left is to head to the refreshment stand and drink some beer to break the boredom. Better to go hammer back a dozen longnecks then watch the same old Crow hop, sidestep, Sunfish, swap ends, flip over backward, bite you in the loading chutes, tired old antics of conventional buckers. If that’s where you’re at then this newest of the new events Legless Bronco Busting is right up your alley.

What’s wrong with the old stuff? Why do we need a new event? Well that’s easy. If you’ve been to a World Championship rodeo, say like the one in Vegas or Tucson with all that prize money and seen the same old dusty world champion cowboys riding the same old tired world-class bucking stock. Staying on for 8 seconds, throwing their hats in the air, wearing those big fancy belt buckles, lip packed full of Skoal, you know that deep down you’d like to see something fresh, something new, something that puts the shine back on your chaps. Well Legless Bronco Busting is just the ticket.

A little history about the event. Bronco busting has been around since way before Gene Autry or Roy Rodgers. It goes way back. Back even before Lash LaRue. Some say it was the first event ever held and prepared the world for what we now know as RODEO. Don’t know if I’d go that far, but it has been around for a long time. Way before TV anyway. But it’s gotten a little stale. The Boomer generation, which has practically ruled the world ever since they came into being, is getting a little long in the tooth. Aging, getting old. Some of them are way into their late 60’s 70’s and even their early 80’s and they still want to rodeo. They still want to ride the big rides. They still want to go the saloon for a shot and a beer and a fistfight. They want to chase, or at least shuffle, after those long-legged but buxom cowgirls that hang out in those smoky, whiskey infused places. They want to win those big belt buckles to complement their wide suspenders. They’re not done yet, not by any means. But what to do? They can’t even crawl up the sides of those loading chutes to board a bronc let alone stick on anything but a toilet seat for 8 seconds.

That’s where the genius of modern technology comes into play. Science in other words,  the same stuff that brought you global warming. You all heard of genetic modification, or the cloning of that sheep, Dolly. That’s all done with science. You put some DNA into the hopper, usually about 6 or 7 pounds depending on what you want to make, dial-up what new  animal you want, flip the 440 electrical switch and stand back as out pops a new sheep or goat or in this case a new kind of horse. That’s the secret right there to this newest of new rodeo events. A Legless horse. They made a legless horse! Cool beans, right? Well to be accurate the horse isn’t totally legless, that wouldn’t work, those suckers are heavy, no, it’s just a horse with radically shortened legs. Like only 6-8 in. long not counting the hooves. Using a mix of DNA from Lipizzaner stock out of Austria, known for it’s jumping ability, some Percheron stock out of France for its wide back, some Black Forest Horse, also called the Black Forest cold blood or Schwarzwälder Kaltblut, because it’s the rarest horse in the world and the guys doing this had a lot of money, and last but not least some DNA from a few broomtails out of the west Texas hill country because there was some left in the bottom of the bucket from another experiment.

What they got was the Legless horse, the meanest, orneriest, most unforgiving bucking stock on practically no legs. Now boomer cowboys can march up to the chutes, park their walker next to the gate, sort of lean over the back and fall on. It’s like getting on a Roomba that eats hay. The chute door opens and they hang on for dear life as the horse wallows and pitches and jumps dizzyingly into the air, leaps are often as high as 6-8 inches before slamming back down to earth in a bone-jarring crash, twirls slowly, rears back and does its damnest to throw that octogenarian rider into the next county. As you can see in the image above it’s a wild ride. Dust is flying, the horse is trying to rear up, it’s rolling and leaping, the ride is terrifying. So much so that you can see the rider clutching one of the stanchions of the chute gate thinking to save his life. Disqualifying for sure, but better than dying. No score for him today.

There it is folks, Legless Bronco Busting, the newest most electrifying rodeo event to come down the road since *Horse Spinning. Watch the PRCA circuit for its inclusion in its next major rodeo and don’t be surprised if it becomes a world-wide sensation. I know I will be.

*http://www.bigshotsnow.com/horse-spinning/

Split Horn Ermine Covered War Bonnet

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Not every war bonnet was made of eagle feathers. There were a host of different styles made from many different things such as buffalo scalps, where the top of the *buffalos head, including the horns, was adorned with important spirit items of the maker and formed into a head covering. Leather caps covered with feathers and perhaps a set of horns were used as well, and the ermine covered war bonnet with the set of split buffalo horns pictured above is often seen at various tribal functions.

It is thought that the plains tribes were the first to wear headdresses but all Indian groups had their own style of head covering. This image is of a Crow warrior at a parade during the famous Crow Fair held every August at Crow Agency in Montana. But many other tribes wore the same style, but vastly individualistic types of headdresses or bonnets.

This view is a strikingly dramatic presentation of a tribes culture and history and an honor to be able to see and photograph this amazing piece of living history. If you’re ever able to visit a powwow do so, it’s an incredible glimpse of a people’s culture as they live it today.

* http://www.bigshotsnow.com/regalia-buffalo-headdress/ for an example of an incredible buffalo headdress check out this link. This is one of the most spectacular examples you will ever see.

I See By Your Outfit

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While perusing some of the photos that were originally on the now defunct *The Institutes hard drives this image popped up. It was familiar looking as if the rider atop his magnificent steed was known, perhaps a famous cowboy from the 60’s or 70’s. Was he in one of those westerns that were so prevalent back then? “Breakheart Pass” maybe or “The Cowboys”, surely not “The Wild Bunch”. The longer we viewed the image the more curious we became. The only clue we had was a cryptic note written in a firm but shaky hand that could have been written while horseback that said “Cattle Drive May 1973”. Could that have been the origin of this picture. After all that was 45 years ago, a time that will live in infamy. Another clue was the fact that the horse who was apparently named “WhoaBoy” had very short legs. They barely reached the ground, the herding dog, a corgi named “WatchIt! I’m walking here!” had longer legs. The mystery deepened.

We had to get to the bottom of this mystery to find out the secret of the cowboy, “Could it be done?” we asked ourselves. We went into the tuff shed where we had stored many of the records and old machinery and scratched off lotto tickets and other secret stuff from our long time association with The Institute, and found the Rolodex that contained all the names and addresses, dress sizes, cigarette preferences, land line numbers, (see Wikipedia for information on what a land line was) food allergies, relevant status, gender, personal info, shoe sizes, whether they were inked or not, (interesting side note here. Inked meaning Tattooed.  Rarely anyone had a tattoo then, only hookers, some ex-military guys, people who had been in Russian prisons, and Alice What’s her name who had one in the coolest place, but that was it, you just never saw it, oh yeah Biker Bitches, they had them.) hopefully containing the one name that might help us in finding out more about this image.

There it was, the name and home number of one of our secret benefactors and researchers, Mr. Peabody, inventor of the pretty much forgotten WayBack machine. What’s more the start code for his WayBack machine was there too. And almost beyond belief was the very machine itself. Forgotten, stacked behind The Institutes collection of old National Geographic magazines, which are going to be worth a goldmine someday, but still workable as there were still glowing lights on the main GoBack panel. What a coincidence.

Mr. Peabody himself hasn’t been seen since Nixon and the Watergate thing happened but as he’d left the operating manual and full Power of Attorney to us to use the machine any way we deemed necessary, but only for good you understand, we hired a couple of burly college kids to haul the 4800 lb. machine out to where we could run an extension cord from the garage. Luckily we had a 20 amp wall plug-in our new quarters, so we would have plenty of power to get back to 1973 but more importantly to get back to today. Who wants to be stuck back in the 70’s, right?

One of the college kids, a burly but inquisitive youth named Todd, wanted to know what it was like to time travel, to go way back. In trying to describe the effect to him it became apparent to us that this WayBack machine, as handy as it was, had not been used or tested for a very long time. Like years. So we casually asked Todd if he would like to experience time travel himself. HIs answer was an enthusiastic “Yeah, but I got to be back for a math quiz this afternoon.” We assured him there was “No sweat. Time doesn’t count when you’re way back. It’ll seem like you didn’t even go.” We weren’t totally positive about that theory but it kind of made sense. So we quickly looked thru the manual one more time and did the check list countdown.

Sit in chair with back straight. Check.   Fasten seat belt. Check.   Do Not bring any food or drinks on trip. Check.   Keep all hands and feet and other extremities inside the launch area. Check.  Keep tray tables in their upright and locked position. Check.   Fill in time to go to and when to come back on GoBack panel. Check.   Hit button ,Yell Sayonara. Check.

Here’s where stuff kind of went off the rails. Todd the big lummox, kind of sprawled out to be more comfortable and sort of inadvertently stuck his foot out past the launch area and as soon as that big flash of light struck he was gone. Except for his foot. That big size 14 Birkenstock was still there filled with his foot up to the middle of his skull tattoo on his calf. The cut was surgically clean, no blood no gore, the cross-section as smooth as a piece of plastic. The toenails unclipped. It was Todd’s foot. His buddy, Evan, yelled something and came racing over to the WayBack machine and tripping over the extension cord yanked it out of the wall. There was a not good sounding electrical noise emitting from the GoBack panel and the machine went dark.

In looking through the operating manual under Trouble shooting Your WayBack machine there was a warning box that emphatically stated “Never Ever unplug the WayBack machine while in use. We mean it. Don’t do it.” It filled half the page. It went on to state if this happens the following parts must be replaced or retrieval of the traveler will be cancelled. Then there was a list of the parts needed. All would be readily available at your neighborhood RadioShack. We breathed a sigh of relief until someone mentioned “Didn’t they go out of business?” and it was like OMG! No freaking parts! Todd’s like almost legless stranded in the 70’s and we’re like S O L in doing anything to get him back. It was a dark moment when the implications began to set in.

This was bad, this was really bad. Evan was freaking out and was becoming totally  unglued until we told him “Hey, it was you that unplugged the machine. Everything would have been cool if you weren’t so clumsy. You’re the one probably going to the slammer so quit your whining.” Thinking it over he decided that probably Todd would get some good care there, right? and wasn’t that the time when you had all those drugs and free sex.” We said we weren’t sure as our memories of those times were a little hazy but that sounded about right. He then decided that he would just go then, he had some homework to do or something. But not before we made him shove the WayBack machine back into the Tuff shed and restack all those National Geographic’s around it.

That left us with the fact that we had no way now to learn anything more about the handsome but young and virile looking cowboy in the image above. But given all the hassle and crap that we just went through we decided to hell with it. It wasn’t that big a deal. It was probably just some dummy that wanted everybody to think he was a cowboy, when in fact he wasn’t. Not even close. End of story.

But wait! What about Todd’s foot? Thinking that someday RadioShack would make a comeback and we’d be able to get those needed parts, and retrieve old legless Todd, we packed it in dry ice in an old cooler and threw it back there where the now useless WayBack machine was stored to be dealt with at another time. So we guess it’s just a case of all’s well that ends well. Just out of curiosity does anyone who reads this have a grandfather named Todd, that tells weird stories about time travel and the seventies? If so it’s probably just crazy talk. Ignore it.

* Note: For those of you unfamiliar with The Institute and what it does, please see the page labeled The Institute on the Menu Bar above. That should explain everything. You shouldn’t have one single question remaining regarding The Institute after reading it. None. For those of you favored few who already know about the Institute, Nevermind. Return to your daily activities. Thank you for your support.

The Irregulars

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Early in the West there was often a dearth of law and order. It was a big place and there was plenty of room for bad actors and those evil doers that didn’t keep regular hours.  You had your desperadoes, your neer-do-wells that would rather steal than work. Your run of the mill murders and those that were a cut above, so to speak, the more exceptional murderers. You had the disgruntled and the just plain mean. There were those that knew better but just didn’t care. You had those that would do something horrific to a person, not just for personal gain but just to see the look on their face as they did it. And that’s not even mentioning those disenfranchised that were really cheesed off because their entire way of life was being reduced to a few square miles here and there. Those folks could really act out when they had the chance. There was a lot of opportunity for really terrible things to take place out here in the wide open west, and they did.

So what about the folks that just wanted to live their lives without the introduction of murderous, horrendous events being thrust into their day-to-day activities. Who took care of them? Who tried to make sure that there was some form of decency and safety and a little quality of life to reward their hard work and tenacity for their efforts to have a normal life. Who championed the innocent?

There were U.S. Marshals that patrolled the vast open spaces but they were one and the bad actors were many and not always all in one place. The Marshals rode herd over huge areas where it would be days if not weeks before they could get to the scene of a crime and longer still before they might have a chance to arrest a perpetrator. The military was available occasionally but they were there to mainly keep the recalcitrant in line and were not much interested in redressing wrongs done to civilians unless they were done by the aforementioned recalcitrant’s that would leave their restricted areas to get a little payback. Then they were there with bells on.

What you had many times were a bunch of good people, such as the group in the image above, that were basically pretty good folks and by that I mean people that didn’t normally do murderous, horrendous things to their friends and neighbors, but were truly fed up with bad behaviors by the other side, or the bad people, that would band together quickly to chase down, apprehend, give swift and final justice to, and try to bring some sort of order to the territory. They were called Irregulars. Irregulars because they weren’t sanctioned by the government or even with the permission of their friends and neighbors. They just said “I’ve had it. Let’s go get the bastards,” formed up into groups led by the most charismatic member of the bunch and set off to do justice and strike fear and terror into those that needed it. The bad guys.

Though of course being human many times they got it wrong. This was usually due to an error of judgement by the charismatic leader who didn’t have the facts straight, or had his own agenda or was just plain nuts. So people who were marginally guilty of some offense or weren’t guilty at all, had justice done to them just because they looked funny. There some colossal screwups where some leaders who were actually psychopaths who seemed normal by everyone else at the time, did things that still astound us today. Whole villages were obliterated and those that were supposed to do good actually were really bad. The name Chivington comes to mind here.

We have to remember what’s in a name. Irregular by its own definition means not normal, so it stands to reason that things wouldn’t always go according to plan. The Irregulars served a purpose when they got it right, not so much when they screwed the pooch as is said today. Maybe it isn’t such a good idea for those like-minded folks who think they’ve got it right to band together and get led by a psychopath and decide what’s best for the rest of us. After all if you don’t agree with them or just happen to look funny bad things can happen to you in the name of good folks who’ve decided that their world needs some straightening up. So watch out for those Irregulars. And if you can try not to look funny.

The Rear Guard

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Any good war chief knows you don’t commit all your troops to a battle. Some of the younger members are held back to hold the ponies while the more experienced warriors are off conducting the raid, or perhaps they are too young to be in the thick of things just yet but need the experience of being part of the action. To learn how to handle the fear and excitement, to learn how to be responsible enough to handle the smaller tasks of the war party before being entrusted with the larger duties.

Learning to be men is a difficult and frustrating task for these young warriors. After all if they’re old enough to be along on a raid they should be able to take part in it rather than just be pony holders. They’re brave enough, they know how to shoot and fight. Don’t they practice every single day? They tell each other they would count many coups against the enemy, and take many scalps. All they need is a chance to prove themselves, instead of being left to wait on the sidelines.

There is more to being a man and going to war than fighting hand to hand. The lessons learned by being a part of the group, of being thought of as mature enough to be equal company with the older men, learning to be patient and take orders and stand their ground, to be trusted. These are all lessons being taught while being the rear guard, even if they don’t realize yet they’re being taught. Their time will come all too soon.

That The Flag Did Still Wave

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It was a bright sun filled day, that terrible bloody day in June of 1876. A day filled with cries and screams and shouts of victory. Of lances pointed high and gunshots ringing out across the Greasy Grass, of scalps taken and fatal blows struck by both sides and then a lonely silence as the victors cleared the field and wind was left to blow solemnly over those left behind.

 There is a thing about the why’s and how’s of battle. It is not enough to win. That feeling is fleeting, the adrenalin soon dissipated. There needs to be something concrete and tangible to remind one of the results of that terrible risk taken, an actual prize from the field of battle that can link one back to that time when the memory grows dim. Something that is often referenced to remind one of the chances taken, the absolute finality of decisions, the very luck of the day. In this case for the victors it is the colors, the flag that meant so much to the vanquished, now held aloft and celebrated as a symbol of the glory of victory. To have captured that which was so important to their enemy validates their worth as warriors. It is proof undeniable that they were victorious.

There is a song important to us which contains the words “Oh, say does that star-spangled banner yet wave” that were spoken as a symbol of hope during another battle. On this day in June of 1876, on the gently swelling hillsides of the greasy grass alongside the Little Bighorn river, where many good men on both sides met their fate, that hope was transferred from the vanquished to the victors. The meaning of the symbol holds true regardless of who controls the flag. This time it is the warriors of the Indian nations that hold the flag. Soon enough it will transfer back as the pendulum swings back to the ebb and flow of battles past and present. But then that’s a story for another time.