For those of you who can remember back that far, 1968 was the year that home barbequeing became really popular in the city of Belleville, Ontario where I was living at the time.
I was young and newly married, as were most of my friends, and most of us lived on cheap wine and Kraft dinner---Hell, nobody could afford beef, and the only time we got to eat it was if we showed up at our parents house for Sunday dinner, or if somebody was lucky enough to be married to a farmers daughter.
I was living in a small town called Stirling, about 15 miles north of Belleville, and there was a really great, old, old, hotel over in Tweed, about 10 or twelve miles east of Stirling, across a bunch of old dirt sideroads. There weren’t many houses along these dirt roads, but a lot of farms backed onto them, and a lot of Hereford and Angus beef cattle were turned out to pasture there, all summer.
I was driving ny 1960 Chev Impala that year, which doubled as my daily driver and my weekend drag car.
I had a friend who will remane nameless (But his initials were Harry) who was a big fat fellow, (I was much smaller back in theos days), and Harry and I would occasionally spend a Saturday afternoon in the Tweedsmuir, solving the problems of the world and drinking vast quantities of draft beer.
We had been talking about barbequed beef, and the sad state of our grocery buying abilities (somehow we still had money for beer), and Harry mentioned to me how nobody would miss a one year old calf if one happened to find its way into our respective freezers. That 60 Chev had a HUGE trunk, so Harry and I decided to steal a cow on out way home that afternoon.
The plan was simple---We would stop by one of the herds on our way home and find a young cow and Harry would grab it, and I would hit it between the eyes with a tire iron---then into the trunk and away home quickly to butcher it!!!
Now this sounded good in theory---but we had drunk quite a lot, and we weren’t terribly steady on our feet. We drove half way across the sideroad, and found a likely herd of young cattle, and singled out a one year old that appeared to be “about the right size”—and for the non farmers among us, a one year old cow is a damn big cow!!!
I grabbed the tire iron out of the trunk, and Harry stealthily sneaked up behind the cow and grabbed it from behind. The rather alarmed cow stepped backwards onto Harrys foot, and Harry promptly fell backwards onto his butt, still holding the cow which was now setting in his lap, screaming “Hit it Hit it!!!” at the top of his lungs. This further alarmed the cow, which then began to sh#t---and sh#t---and sh#t !!
Now maybe I have a perverted sense of humour, but the sight of my big fat friend, seting on his butt, covered in cow poo, with a squirming, kicking, sh#tting cow held on his lap was more than I could stand. I went into uncontrollable fits of laughter, and couldn’t have hit the damn cow if my life depended on it.
Finally the cow was desperate enough to make its escape, giving Harry a good trampling in the process. Then, to add insult to injury I told Harry that there was no way that he was getting into my car covered in cow poop!!
There was a good sized stream and a pond beside the road in the corner of the pasture, and I made poor Harry wade out into it with the snapping turtles and wash his hair, himself, and his clothes before I would let hin back in the car. By that time we were both beginning to sober up a little, and Harry was not overly happy about my inability to carry out my side of the beef gathering expedition.
Eventually he got over it, and we remained friends for many years afterwards, but I have to publicly admit, I was a failure as a cattle rustler.
Brian Rupnow---March--2009
