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Archives for April 2021

What Cattle Do At Night (or Until the Cows Come Home)

April 1, 2021 By admin

cattle with hornsAnother in a continuing series of articles about what exactly animals and marine life are up to, that you always wanted to know.

We’ve all seen it. About an hour before sunset the cows come home. If we’re talking milk cows, they head for the barn because there’s food there and a place to get out of the wind. But what about cattle on open grazing land? Where are they heading? How do they spend their nights?

First of all, we’ve all heard the expression “herd mentality” and when it comes to cattle, there are always some dominant animals that decide where and when the herd moves. They are after all prey animals, so there’s safety in numbers. So after a hard day of grazing, cattle will seek out some lowland out of the wind and elements and find bedground for the night. You would be surprised at how much body heat an 1,800 pound cow can generate and they do have a whole lot of insulation, so I would not get too hung on whether or not they are cold. Ask a rancher in North Dakota how low the temperature has to get before a cow freezes.

There’s usually a lot of gossip about who saw what (Did you see that rusty old pick-up truck go by?), how much forage everyone had, and some of the goofy things the calves were up to that day. There is a lot of talk about the quality of the forage, so much like humans, cattle will drone on and on about where the best forage was, or complaining about the scarcity, or how long it took to chew cud.

Cattle are very social, so it’s not unusual for some of the better storytellers to break out a story that’s been handed down for generations for the listening pleasure of the rest of the herd. On some rare occasions, the herd will come across some Jimson weed and on those nights the cattle have a riproaring time getting high as kites (perhaps not the best comparison when you’re talking about an 1,800 pound animal) and having some really wicked hallucinations. If you’re wondering what kind of hallucination a cow might have, one of the most common ones is that a cow will think that the ear tag is some kind of radio controller that’s following every move the cow makes. Creepy yes, but not out of the realm of possibility.

So the next time you see cattle making their move around sunset, you’ll have a pretty good idea that the party is about to get started.

Jay Harrison is a writer and creative consultant for DesignConcept. His mystery novel, Head Above Water, is available on Amazon and Kindle. You can also visit his author page here.

Filed Under: FICTION

Bridgeport

April 1, 2021 By admin

bright light flashBridgeport Connecticut does not have the right side of the tracks—both sides are the wrong ones. South of the tracks is the Connecticut Turnpike, storage areas both outdoors and a cinderblock building with a row of stores which houses the Lucky the Clown shop where we got our orange wigs, spring-loaded books with a pop-up penis’, and next to that is the gefilte fish wholesaler, He’ll sell retail also but, the owner, Flash Horowitz, doesn’t get much local business. He’s got two refrigerated trucks, Flashes Fish, with a water scene and two baited hooks painted on one side and a man in cement shoes with his fedora floating above him on the other.

The north end of the tracks has the Marina Village projects with broken glass filled parking lots and another cinderblock building housing a liquor store, Liquors in a Flash “the city’s largest selection of pints and half pints” and it’s owned by the gefilte fish guy’s father—also called Flash.

There a cigarette store that sells girly mags, makes book, and posts the pink sheets with the Daily Number in the window as soon as they’re delivered—usually around 3 PM after the third race for the day is run. At the end of the building is Dr. Horwitz, the Tooth Doctor—Flash’s brother who’s semi-retired. There are two empty stores that are being held for Flash’s son, Sparky, for when he graduates from the University of Bridgeport’s law school which may be a while depending on how his trial for arson goes. The sign had been made as a bar mitzvah present from Zeyde Flash. It reads, Horowitz, Horowitz, & Horowitz attorney at law. It’s made from red oak and the letters, filigree, and flames are real gold flake.

Rumor has it that Sparky’s going to need a lawyer most of his life rather than be one.

Paul Beckman’s a Connecticut writer whose latest flash collection, Kiss Kiss (Truth Serum Press) was a finalist for the 2019/2020 Indie Book Awards. Some of his stories appeared in Spelk, Connotation Press, Anti-Heroin Chic, Necessary Fiction, Litro, Pank, Playboy, WINK, Jellyfish Review, and The Lost Balloon.

 

Filed Under: ESSAY

Less is More

April 1, 2021 By admin

hygge relaxation feet on warm radiatorMy granddaughter is talking to me on FaceTime. I’m so pleased that she calls and is willing to share with me. But sometimes it feels like she is still the one-year old baby handing grandma a soggy corner of her cookie that I can’t refuse and have to pretend to eat. See, she is upset over Covid isolation and the enforced solitary confinement she faces. ‘They,’ ‘somebody,’ ‘the government’ is depriving her of an essential and irreplaceable part of her young life. She’s missing out on graduation, prom, the final track meet and all the processing with her best friends about boys, over burgers.

I try to listen and absorb and acknowledge without offering advice. It’s hard. Because she hasn’t been constrained, yet. And well she shouldn’t be, after all. She’s just a young woman whose body hasn’t been hijacked by pregnancy for a year at a time. Can’t tell her that. She has to go through it herself. Maybe more than once.

And as she moans and whines, I remember the time my girlfriend Inga and I went to visit her Danish grandparents on their farm. We got stuck there in a blizzard. For three days. At first, I was frantic, felt trapped. Then her grandmother lit candles. Got out blankets and warm wool socks and hot cocoa and a big fire in the fireplace and we snuggled in. Her grandmother called all this hygge (hoo-guh). And I got the feeling that the word meant cozy, getting cozy. Like the way it feels so good to hunker down in a warm dry house in a pounding rain storm.

Or maybe like my Italian grandfather did one lazy summer day when he sprawled out on his postage stamp lawn, pants rolled to his knees, socks down to his shoes—his idea of sunbathing. He puffed on his Chesterfield cigarette, eyes closed but not sleeping. When I asked him what he was doing, he replied, ‘dolce far niente.’ It wasn’t until I took Italian in college that I figured out the words but I got the sense of it right then…to sweetly do nothing.

But how can I tell her all that. She would just say, “That’s easy for you to say…you’re old. What have you got to do that’s exciting anyway.” But she won’t because…well, because. And she has her whole life to learn that sometimes less is more.

Retired trainer, and writing instructor, Joe Novara and his wife live in Kalamazoo, Michigan. Writings include novels, short stories, a memoir and various poems, plays, anthologies and articles. Read more at https://freefloatingstories.wordpress.com/

Filed Under: ESSAY

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  • What Cattle Do At Night (or Until the Cows Come Home)
  • Bridgeport
  • Less is More
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