Unbagging the Cats 1

Unbagging the Cats 1

Tuesday, July 5, 2011

Backroads Miz Manners on 5th of July Etiquette

Miz Manners has returned after her Independence Day holiday from the mouth of rants, and is rarin' to go.

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Dear Backroads Miz Manners,


On a journey over the river and through the woods to drop my boy off for a visit at his grandmother's house, I encountered a most distressing situation. Rounding a curve on two-lane, unlined, faded blacktop, I was forced into a game of chicken with an oncoming automobile. His lane was blocked by a cardboard city of spent fireworks tubes. A hasty, nonverbal detente was achieved. I proceeded while he slammed on his brakes, then turned sharply into my lane to semicircumnavigate the pressed-paper metropolis. I warily avoided the urban sprawl on my return trip.


Why can't these hillbilly meth heads pick up their trash after shooting their wad of random sparks?


Signed,
Burned Up in Bumfudgeville

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Dear Burned Up,

Cut the poor wretched refuse some slack. You don't know that the city planners and executors of the tattered jungle are meth heads. They could be garden-variety drunks. Not everybody has to manufacture his own substance of abuse. Some can afford to buy corporate-brewed moonshine. It is a bit petty of you to whine over your fellow flag-wavers' method of celebrating the birth of our great nation.

How anticlimactic it must be to gather up empty launch vessels under the light of the rocket's red glare! Besides, there might have been a glowing ember trapped within the staging units. I'm sure you would not wish for the revelers to carry such an instrument of death into their rusted tin dwelling to burst into flame whilst they slept, thus incinerating the whole passel of patriots.

It's not like the shot-off pyrotechnic containers were blocking I-270. It was a rural, paved, pig-trail of sorts. What were you planning to do, anyway, host a high tea for Queen Elizabeth on that stretch of byway? Get your snoot out of the ozone. Live and let live. And beware of celebratory remnants in the roadway on the day after holidays. Or move to civilization.

Backroads Miz Manners

6 comments:

Kathy's Klothesline said...

We do a fireworks show every year here at the kampground ....... shhh, don't let my insurance agent in on this. He who plays with matches goes way over to the far side of the pond, placing a body of water between danger and kampers. Our kampers reserve places in advance for the priviledge of seeing he who plays with matches perform his pyromania. Some of these kampers ask to be his side-kick for the night, too. As I sauntered out to enjoy the fruits of his labor, after cleaning up the debris of the picnic, I noticed a ne'er-do-well resident from down the road parking his rattle trap truck in the ditch across the road from our property and climbing into the bed of the truck to enjoy the show. Apparently he enjoyed it with beer and food, cause her threw all the trash in the road. Did he escape from your county?

Chronicles of Illusions said...

This was a fantastic read. I loved it. :)

Author Joshua Hoyt said...

Very interesting to think how people could be bothered with cleaning up after themselves. I mean really why should they isn't that why we pay people to clean the streets and such. This gets me to thinking about waitresses that complain about having to clean up after I'm through eating at their table I mean I leave them a good tip and all why should I be bothered with making sure the trash my kids dropped on the floor be cleaned up. It's a matter of responsibility after all. They get payed so they should take care of it :)

Author Joshua Hoyt said...

Great story Kathy!

knancy said...

The ultimate holiday for shennanigans in Almost (Hillbilly) Heaven West Virginia is Halloween. The t(p)ricksters here cut trees down along the side of one lane rural roads so they fall across and block what little access you have to your humble abode. Of course, if you don't see it in time you really do make it to Hillbilly Heaven!

Val said...

Kathy,
Well, it looks like one escaped again. You may keep him, our little holiday gift to you.

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Jo,
Thanks. Sometimes I write for me and the internet vacuum, sometimes I write for actual readers.

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Josh,
I don't like it when the waitresses sweep under my feet with a Bissell while I'm sitting at the table still eating.

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knancy,
That's hard-core! Around here, they merely steal functional outhouses.