Recently, I had occasion to take a road trip out to Hairy Hill, Alberta. I, of course, know exactly how to fit in in any small town in Alberta; so I thought I would share some tips with all of The Redneck’s patrons. The majority of these tips should, most likely, serve you well in all small towns anywhere in North America.
The first thing you want to do is to make sure you’re decked out in your finest rockabilly clothing. It’s also a good idea to act very touristy. For example, ask everybody for directions to main street, or ask how to get to the hairy hill (even if you’re not in Hairy Hill at the time).
One thing you can be assured of; any community in Alberta that is officially village sized or larger, there is always a bar of some sort (often times attached to a hotel where no one ever actually stays). I recommend you go in, order a bottle of Chateau Haut-Brion, 1959 and then start making redneck jokes. This is guaranteed to make the regulars in the bar stand up and “take notice” of you.
If you’re there with friends you could start playing fun drinking games. Every time you hear someone say “I reckon”, or talk about their tractor or if you see a guy with a belt buckle bigger than his wife’s purse; you have to take a drink. But if anyone actually says he or she has to “go home and slop the hogs“, you have to slam your entire drink.
In no time at all you will have a crowd of people around your table who will be clamoring to introduce themselves to you. You will be repeatedly asked if you would like to either “step outside” or possibly even “to dance”. I heartily recommend that you accept all of these offers. You will come out of the experience with memories that will last for a lifetime (assuming the brain damage isn’t too severe).
Of course you should be aware that travel to small towns is not recommended right now due to an outbreak of the H2N3 Virus; more commonly known as the Weasel Flu. Symptoms of this flu include extreme lethargy: most people who come down with it just sit on the couch watching television and eating cold cereal all day long. They also have problems speaking, quite frequently using improper grammar and sentence structure (I.e. they may say things like, “I eated all my cereal.” or they may just stick out their tongues and make a wordless noise). However, if you ensure that you wear a surgical mask over your mouth and nose at all times, it will filter out 98.9% of the virus.
Redneck Bar & Grill
Beer, Friends, Food
There seems to be a need for a how-to on big fat bird squeezing. Surprises me, too. What surprises me even more is to realize that I know how to squeeze a plump bird properly. Go figure. I guess it’s just specialized redneck knowledge. And no, this isn’t related to choking chickens or spanking monkeys. That’s a different post for some other day.
Reading this post just won’t be the same unless you know why I’m writing it, so you better go look at JD’s I am Famous (and More!) post. Okay, read it now? Good. Now go back and read all the comments.
So if you want to squeeze a nice, fat bird, you have to promise to follow JD’s parameters. Just enough to get a little squawk (maybe a squack if it’s a duck), and no more! This discussion is not to allow anyone to go out squeezing birds indiscriminately or in a harmful manner. The other thing I’d like you to do for me is stay off the bottle! I don’t want to hear of anyone getting all juiced up and squashing some poor bird while inebriated.
I never planned on squeezing birds. It was more my parent’s idea. They would send me out there by myself to pick eggs, and there would be chickens sitting on them. Right off the bat you find out that one end of a chicken is pointy, and it can hurt you. You can usually just reach under the hen and get the egg, or the hen might jump up and leave. Remember to watch out for the rooster, if you have one. Some of them sneak up behind and attack! No, really, I’m serious. Not too bad for an adult, but a seven year old is a little shorter. Those little peckers can hurt! Anyways, sometimes we had to catch the hens or move them out of the way, so we would have to pick them up. Usually squeezing was involved to keep them in your hands. Birds are warm and fluffy, just like you bird squeezing wannabe’s might have all thought.
Let’s move on here.
All bird squeezing beginners should start out with large chickens, or quails, or another domesticated bird with small useless wings. The reason for this is big wings can hurt you! Just take my word for it. A goose can darn near flap you to death. And don’t even think about what a swan could probably do. Once you’ve mastered chickens, you can work your way up to larger birds if you want. Another key point to remember is the beak, and you want to stay out of the way of that. Chickens, ducks and quails have short necks, so if you squeeze them from behind they can only reach around so far to get you. Geese have long necks and really nasty bills, so you do the math (chickens over short neck + tiny beak <goose with long neck dangerous bill).
I shouldn’t have to point out, but will anyways, that squeezing wild birds can be a dangerous activity fraught with peril. If you can even get close enough to a wild bird to squeeze it, it’s not gonna be happy. If you do any wild bird squeezing, I suggest you get a camcorder and someone to tape it, so you can show us how it went!
One last tip. Every spring, many kinds of birds moult, which means to lose most of their winter feathers and grow new ones for the year. The new feathers are called pinfeathers, and chickens for sure seem very uncomfortable if you squeeze them in the pinfeather stage. A good analogy might be how some people have reported they feel after they shave their unmentionables and the hair starts growing back in. I haven’t done this myself, so I have to go by what I’ve heard about “uncomfortable crotch pricklies” and I imagine that’s what chickens go through every spring, on their whole body.
So take it easy on those chickens. You can tell if they are moulting or not by checking to see if they look bedraggled. If they are sleek and shiny, you’re good to go. Squeeze!
Now after all this, I expect some feedback. I want to hear some reports from the field. Even if you get as far as seeing a bird and then ‘chickening out’, I want to know! First one to give us their bird squeezing story (or video) gets one of our world famous Blue Beaver Beer Gift Baskets!
Photo courtesy of Sillydog
We all want to get ahead. We all want more traffic, more comments, more backlinks, more online friends. How can we attract these desirable outcomes? There are a lot of methods and techniques you can use to go after your fame, or whatever you are trying to achieve with your online ventures. I’m going to put my effort into helping others reach their goals, and I’ll tell you why. This is going to be aimed at things you can do on BloggingZoom, and other social networks, but it applies to ‘normal’ life in some ways too. Keep in mind that online you really need to learn SEO as well.
Let’s examine the case of a person who finds BZ and thinks “What a great idea! I’m going to join up and get busy submitting my articles. Finally, a joint that doesn’t penalize me for putting in my own work.” Now, with several articles submitted, this new member is barely making any progress at all. “I don’t get it,” they cry out. “I thought this place was going to help me get more exposure.” As they look at how well other people’s posts are doing, they become enraged, grab a high powered rifle and climb the nearest watertower.
It doesn’t have to be this way. First of all, sitting on a tower can be pretty lonely and cold. And, second, there are things you can do to ensure your success. If you are too busy planning your shooting spree, I’ll leave you to it, but otherwise, lets crack a Blue Beaver Beer and come up with a more reasonable course of action.
You have to give before you can get! If I, or many other BZ users, see five of your articles all submitted at nearly the same time, and I know darn well you haven’t bothered to read anyone else’ work, I probably won’t read yours and I won’t make you my friend.
It’s that simple. Your profile will show what you have been up to, so don’t think you can hide it. It doesn’t matter how good your articles are if other people can tell you are being self serving.
On the other hand, if I am looking at various entries, and I notice that not only has a particular user zoomed these articles, but also commented on them and commented on the respective article’s blog, I am going to be predisposed to like that person by association. If I see their name on an entry, I’ll probably read it even if it’s not in my main interest area. I will try to like it. I will try to comment when I have to struggle for something to say. I will probably zoom it.
Another area that needs emphasizing is comments placed on a blog. It costs nothing, and takes such a small amount of time. All of you know how good it feels to know that someone out there is paying attention. There are times when a new blogger is wondering if it’s worth it, maybe ready to throw in the towel. Well, you need that new blogger. You need that person to read your articles! You can’t afford to let them quit. I know that most of you produce how-to and other helpful posts, to show others what you know. I love these articles, and all those new to blogging can really use your help.
And all you veteran bloggers with the scars to prove it, I know you appreciate the comments too. If you like your commentors, reply to them! If I go to a blog and I feel like maybe the writer doesn’t even read the comments, I will only leave a couple before I give up. If my comments get answered, I know that there is a two way street there. It isn’t all about them.
So there you have it. Share your toys, help others, play nice, and you too can get ahead in this world. And stay away from water towers. You never know who might be up there.
There are always going to be times where you don’t want to do what others are trying to get you to do. It could be at work, or it could be when you meet an old acquaintance on the street. It could be your parents want you to clean your room. If you feel you need to get out of some activity, you may be tempted to use some lame excuse. We’ve all heard “My dog ate my homework”, and we can all guess how effective that one is with the teachers. Just as effective as “Honest, officer. I just picked that baggy up on the sidewalk and I was going straight to the police station to turn it in.”
Excuses are lame by definition. Basically, there is no excuse for excuses. So how can we turn them around and make them cool?
Simple. Admit that they are lame by trying to out-lame all other excuses. If you get asked to go to a Slurp Fest Soup Cookoff and you hate soup, don’t try to get out of it using the standard “I’d love to, but my grandmother died.” Go straight into,” Soup traumatizes me. My Grandma just died last week. She choked on some soup. I will never go into a room with soup again! Go! Hang out with your soup Nazis. I am going to go visit my Grandma’s ashes in the garden. We sprinkled her on the lettuce row.”
If your boss wants you to work late and you don’t want to start a bad precedence, don’t even mention your kids and their school activities. “ I’d love to, but my girl Petunia has a piano recital,” gives your boss the impression that next time, you will work late. If you want to put your foot down, use something like “I really can’t. My dog is teaching me to bark tonight.” This lets your boss know that you don’t really have any reason to say no, and you really don’t want to do the work. Or, your boss is gullible. The next day he might ask you to demonstrate what you learned. This would be highly entertaining to everyone, but maybe not appropriate in a work setting.
Here’s a couple more. Feel free to create your own cool excuses.
“I have to pick an outfit for my meeting with the President of The United Countries of America.”
“Yellowbeard the Pirate told me he’d kill me if I ever hung out with a scum sucking land lubber like you.”
“I ‘d love to go hiking with you, but I’m allergic to sunlight. It makes my throat close up, and then I burst into a dazzling ball of flame! Whoosh!”