Double "A" Dog Doo and the "Hiyaaah" Principle.
Scafremon said:
RE: Bill's Raisin Bran Air Boat story
" ...furry little poop factory was my ticket to electricity" 
Great story Bill! :thumbsup:
Maybe you can answer two questions that have perplexed modern man for ages:
How many 'D Cell' sized dung droppings does it take to build an AA sized powerplant?
and
What
exactly do you put into vitagoo?
Thanks Scaf, I was in the groove and having a little moment. There will now be a short hijacking of this thread. You will not be harmed!
Frisky the family dog was one of those ferocious little Pekinese's. He could often be found hanging from the neck of some befuddled giant neighborhood dog and refusing to let go. Truly a stuffed toy with the heart of a lion. Frisky hated my guts as he was actually the first baby in our family. Later in life I forgave him as I realized that I had usurped him.
So the answer to the the turd to battery ratio is a lot! It was of course my first experience with a piece work pay scale. It was my only income source, and naturally dog turds are a fixed natural resource. You only get so many over a given period of time. Sacrifices had to be made with regards to downsizing the military, AKA less green army men to torture, and limiting my candy intake. The early sixties were hard times.
His offerings were generally a little over "AA" batt diameter. A "pooportional" relationship if you will. My extraction kit consisted of a coffee can and a clam shovel. (For our landlocked readers; a clam shovel is slender, tapered, blunt nosed, curved in both directions; a trowel on steroids with a conventional handle)
The summer bounty on a dog's turd was a nickle a pop. Note: This was considered high cotton as during the rainy season (Sept. to June here on the peninsula) the bounty on slugs was a penny a head. Ironically the turd market dried up, as dog doo is impossible to extricate from the lawn after one of our daily monsoons.
The slugs were harpooned with a sharpened coat hanger that was straightened out. They were then de-shishkabobed into a can and mercilessly salted in a mass grave type ceremony. It still makes my mom squirm to this day just thinking about it. The PacNW gang will back me up here. Slugs are a scourge here, like a swarm of greasy slow moving locusts.
Be they slugs or turds all my kills were scaled and inspected by the paymaster. That of course would have been dad. God blessim', he found a way to combine a little boys love for spearing things with something sharp and his need for income. It was a win win arrangement; the yard was free of pests and land mines, I got paid, and he coughed up pocket change for a valuable service he didn't have to do. He played upon what I now call the "Hiyaaah!" principle, the natural instincts of the young male hunter child to jab, bludgeon, lacerate, or spear any target imagined or real. John Wayne was once quoted, "Every one wants to make a bulls eye!" Dad just gave me something sharp to do it with and set loose in our yard the mercenary heart of a first grade boy.
Looking back I realize that not only did dad Tom Sawyer me into whitewashin' the fence but the sumbitch indoctrinated me into the concepts of an honest days pay for an honest days work, the give and take of sacrifice, and the initiative to see something through to acquire worldly goods. He tricked me again!
*Note: I had often postulated on the "Hiyaaah" principle, but my daughter Billie was not a viable test subject.
However I was delighted to witness the "Hiyaaah" principle first hand in our grandson Jimmy. He had been sheltered from all forms of TV violence and whatnot.
One of those touchy feely new age concepts.
So one day while sitting out in our sun room ( a moss room out here) I gave lil' Jimmy his first stick, actually all on his own he found the sliding glass door jam stick that my wife always insisted on. Rather than interfere I caught myself in time and kicked back.
Jimmy was still tottering around in diapers and barely makin' his first words.
He observed the stick laying in the door track. He then squatted down and extracted it with ease. Shocking unto it self, cuz the little bugger could hardly hold on to his two handled sippy cup.
He stood up and held it in his hands eyeing it carefully. I could see by his look that he was pleased. And why not? It was a good straight oak dowel with good weight and nice balance. After some careful study and running it through his hands, he suddenly grabbed it in the middle, held it above his head, and shouted very clearly "Hiyaaah". He feinted a few javelin type thrusts and began a circular aboriginal dance, weapon held high and chanting some nonsense that I understood on a primitive level but couldn't directly translate.
I think it went something like this, "I never saw TV violence, I'm not allowed to hit, they took away everything sharp, but still I am a manchild. It's kill or be killed then live and let live."
He whirled around and whacked me on purpose. I was his first kill.
He's now goin' on six, addicted to slot cars, and giving it good to his new age parents. I couldn't be prouder.
Bad Grandpa! :dude:
