Games Rednecks Play

My dad has a toy. Can you guess what it is?

I'll give you some hints.

It's so exciting that the whole family loaded up to come see the excitement.

It makes a really loud noise.

So much so that you feel the need to duck and cover every time he uses it. And he required every grandkid to have a set of ear protection...

It's guaranteed to kill large amounts of rodents in a few seconds.

It can make the ground shake beneath your feet.

It involves an explosion...


Can you guess what my dad's toy is?

It's called a prairie dog gun. He and 3 of his friends went together on the purchase of it after a traveling salesman (did you know they still have those?) did a demonstration for their community. Prairie dogs are a real problem for ranchers and farmers. Where you see a prairie dog town, you can expect to see very little grass and too many rattle snakes. Not to mention that your livestock incurs from stepping in their holes. A piece of land with prairie dogs on it is virtually worthless unless you're marketing it as prairie dog hunting land. Of course, I don't know anyone that's actually been successful in marketing formerly good farmland as a prairie dog ranch!


So, my dad and his friends are always on the lookout for new ways to destroy their nemesis. We have people that come from New York, or some other Yankee place to hunt "dogs." My dad doesn't even charge them. They show up with a table with an umbrella for shade, their cooler, and spend a day or two in demolition heaven. Men are a mystery to me, I'm telling ya.


At first, Dad was having trouble getting his gun to "fire." As a matter of fact, the hunters gave up and headed to a pond a few miles away to do some dove hunting. Of course, I realize in the above picture Logan is holding a rifle, not a shot gun. Hunters never leave home without a rifle. Never know when you might see a coyote that needs to be taken care of!

It turns out one of the neighbor kids was hunting on his family's land next to the prairie dog town we were in. He came over to check out the gun shots he had been hearing (Popcorn had been learning to shoot a gun, or rather to fear shooting a gun, and my nephew Logan had been target practicing while he was waiting on the show to begin.)

Poor Levi showed up just in time for Dad to have figured out where the problem was. It turns out that the instructions on the handle of the gun are important. He had inadvertently flipped his oxygen and propane ratios. Apparently that's pretty important...Once he figured it out, it was BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!

Levi, being a guy, and therefore enamored of all things explosive, was eager to learn the ropes. My dad, obliging fellow that he is, gave him a quick lesson, and let him have at it.



Levi was euphoric after his turn at creating an explosion big enough to shake the ground under his feet. And big enough to make me huddle down to the ground.

I was the only one who stood by Dad to see his gun in action. Everyone else had moved on with their lives. All I can say is "I'm there for you, Dad. You can count on me! Umm, but no, I still refuse to fire it myself." I personally, had no desire to fire it myself. I felt the desire to huddle to the ground and cover my head every time it fired!

The Original Prairie Woman

In case you haven't noticed I'm using this site to preserve every precious memory that I can. I've always loved to write the stories about my kids and save them for later use, lest I need to blackmail them, or stroll down memory lane. I've always planned on writing about my Grandma Irene, The Original Prairie Woman, but I never get around to it. So, today when nothing exciting has happened thus far, and I feel compelled to verbalize with someone I will tell you about this lovely woman.

My grandma is really a source of endless stories... the paper jewelry I used to cut out of magazines for dress-up at her house... the card tables she set up thousands of times for my cousin Jason & I to play house in...cupcakes for supper...ordering Bill Cosby's Picture Pages for me to do along with him during Captain Kangaroo...two packets of cocoa mix per cup make it better (one just isn't sweet enough. Can I get a Hallelujah, amen!)...Well, of course I could go on and on, but you get my point.

This story involves my grandma, who's Indian name should be Shewhokillsasnake or Shootsmanyarmadillos. Grandma turned 88 this summer. She also told me about her pesky armadillos this summer.

Did you know armadillos jump really high? They do flips in the air and everything. In fact, this is why you hit them driving down the road. They panic and jump up and...bam!...no more armadillo. I actually had a friend who's van had a mysterious dead animal smell. You guessed it, there was a dead armadillo wedged in her undercarriage! Yuck.

But, I've digressed...as usual...we were talking about Shootsmanyarmadillos. Apparently when Grandma shoots the armadillos under her trees they jump really high in the air, then run under her spreading cedar. At least she thinks she's shooting different armadillos. She said maybe she misses the same one over and over and it runs for cover. Oh, tears of laughter are clouding my vision as I picture my little Grandma toting the rifle out to go 'dillo hunting of an evening.... You just don't get much classier than that. But that's the thing...she is "classy," but she also sees what needs to be done, and she does it!

Take a rattle snake in the house....Yep, in the house. In the summer of 1995 (lots of great things happened that summer) there were rattlesnakes in the panhandle like crazy. I don't know how many Dad & I killed that summer (Okay, I mostly fetched Dad and prayed for his safety as he killed them.) However, there was literally an infestation of snakes at my grandparents. I'm telling you, they must have killed a snake a day.

Well, Grandad went out to supervise my dad working, (yes, supervise...he was very good at that) and he left through the living room door. Now, this door had a hydraulic closure on it...you know, you walk away and it closes a moment later. Well, Grandma walked into the living room, and there was a snake, stuck in the door. She, being the great prairie woman, recognized it as a rattler right away. Grandad was gone, no one's around, and if she left that snake unattended, it might slip on in. So, she pulled the door shut until it latched with the snake hissing and rattling like nobody's business.

Now, Grandma can't just leave the snake there. What if it somehow gets free and is loose in the house? So, she got the 22 rifle, pinned that snake's head to the floor (picture pristine white carpet here) and blew it's brains out. When I came over later that day, she said "Look, you can't even see any blood in the carpet...It all came out!" I tell you what-those murderers on television need to talk to my grandma about how to clean up blood splatter!

Yep! That's Grandma Irene...The Original Prairie Woman.

Proverbs 31:25 She is clothed with strength and dignity; she can laugh at the days to come.