Brains are Gone

Seems to me the manager at the Jacksonville Christus  Trinity Mother Frances Health and Fitness Center just said: stomp the business plan, client satisfaction, and disease prevention in the ground.

I just tried to renew our annual membership at the center and asked for a print copy of the agreement and the manager told me she could not give me that. So I said no renewal.  I don’t understand saying no to hundreds of dollar over printing 3 sheets of paper!

Leroy the Bacon Shedding Hog Goes to Georgia

     It was in 1964 that Ben Koerber encountered Leroy the bacon shedding hog.  It was in south Georgia on the banks of the Okefenokee swamp  that they crossed paths.  Ben was picking up pecans underneath a humongous tree.  It was in the fall, likely November.  He had a toe sack three quarters of the way full when he heard behind him what sounded to him like an African log drum.  Ben was in the Navy for twenty years and spent some time in West Africa.  It was there he grew to love the sound of those log drums.  Needless to say he stopped and went  to investigate.  He could not believe his eyes.  He saw a huge hog with his tail in a knot hole of a half submerged cypress log.  That was where the drumming sound was coming from.  Mr. Koerber’s eyes and ears were at full alert from seeing the giant hog and hearing the drumming.  It was at this time that the aroma of perfectly prepared bacon filled Ben’s head.  Beside Ben on a sassafras twig were 4 pieces of the best looking bacon he had ever seen. It was warm like just out or a frying pan.  The hog suddenly raised his head.   It seemed to Ben that the hog’s eye was at the same level as Ben’s and he was a six foot tall man.   Ben grabbed the bacon and ran for the safety of the massive pecan limbs.  There he ate the bacon and sat quietly until there was no sound of that hog.  Mr. Koerber lived to be a very old man and always said it was the best bacon he ever ate.

Railroad Man Receives PPB in 1973

     In 1973 a railroad brakeman named Doak Rogers found Leroy's perfectly prepared bacon on a track switch handle.  In 1973 there was much flooding up and down the Mississippi River.  Trains slowed to a creep.  It made for some very long work days.  The flooding was bad, not like in 1927 when the river got be 80 miles wide at Vicksburg but bad.   In late may a Missouri-Pacific freight was traveling through Lee County Arkansas when Doak met Leroy.  Doak and the engineer L. L. Lindsey were the only ones the 12 car train.  L. L. Lindsey was extremely safety conscious.  He had Doak walking every trestle looking for washouts.  On those long days Doak called L. L. Lindsey Lob Leg Lindsey because when he first stepped on the train he would always use his right hand to lift his right leg.  Lindsey was in a logging accident as a youth near Alto, Texas.  Perhaps that was why he was so safety conscious.  Lindsey also was very waste conscious.  He made sure folks on his crew did there jobs in such a way that they did not waste a step or minute.  It was about 2 p.m. and Doak was walking another trestle when he heard a splash.  He looked to see if one of the giant cypress trees had fallen into the swamp.  To his surprise he saw big bacon shedding Leroy swim by.  He knew if he stopped to watch Lindsey would be on him about wasting time.  So he didn't give Leroy a second look.  Then about 10 steps later he saw on the track switch arm just 3 steps out of line 4 pieces Leroy bacon.  Doak knew L. L. was watching and would give him a speech about waste if he stepped over and got the bacon.   He got the bacon!  It was great bacon!  Doak says he has thought about Leroy many times since 1973.

Very Handy

Both Willie Bee and usda8ahs8/9 could have used this in 1965!

The Saga of Shed Bacon Moves East

     Another early sighting of Leroy was near Homer, Georgia.  A fellow named Willie Bee McCall  reported the encounter.  Willie Bee worked for the Tennessee Valley Authority operating a large mower, clearing brush under power lines.   It as on a hot summer day in 1965  when Willie Bee found perfectly prepared bacon!  It was about lunch time and  Willie Bee was mowing a line east of town when he saw an old cemetery.   He loved history and decided to stop, walk through the cemetery, eat his sandwich and drink some of his sweet tea.  Willie Bee loved to imagine what the people's  lives must have been like as he read the names on the headstones.  As he walked he began to notice hog tracks in the sandy soil.  They were very large hog tracks. It was at 11:53 a.m. when behind a tall headstone Willie Bee saw a pig's tail wiggling.  He slowly moved toward it, watching his feet trying not to step  on a twig.  Suddenly he heard what sounded like a cow running through the brush.  Looking up the pigtail was gone.  He went to where the pigtail had been and got a surprise. There lying  on a near by headstone were 4 slices of perfectly prepared bacon.  He put the bacon on the tomato sandwich he had brought for lunch and had a grand meal sipping on his sweet tea.  After lunch he took one last look at the headstone where he found the bacon and noticed it was one of the types sold by Sears Roebuck and Company.

Orvis Encounters PPB (perfectly prepared bacon)

     Orvis Alvester Windsor III lived in Muscle Shoals Alabama.  Orvis Alvester was also one of the first to encounter Leroy the bacon shedding hog.  Orvis Alvester loved to fish.  Better said Orvis Alvester really loved to fish.  Orvis Alvester would tell people when he first met them to just call him Al.  Then he would tell them a fishing story.  Al was a math teacher at the local high school.  In the spring of 1965 like many years before he would stop by an oxbow lake on the way to school.  He didn't do this every day but did a couple of times a week.  It was March of that year when Al got his first Johnson Century fishing reel.  He was sure it would catch a state record Bass.  At 7:10 Al realized he had better get a move on it,  to get to the schoolhouse on time.  He hadn't caught a fish but had hooked a good one, maybe that state record.  As Al was putting his rod and reel in the turtle hull of his car he felt a little pain in his stomach.  Something about the cup of black coffee, link of sausage, and the pint of Tang didn't seem to be settling  just right.  He knew 2 of the cafeteria ladies giant rolls would fix what ever was wrong but it was a long time until 12:45 lunch.  As Al reach for the car door handle he saw out of the corner of his eye 4 pieces of perfectly prepared bacon hanging on the limbs of a huckleberry bush.  Orvis Alvester ate all 4 of them.  His stomach quit hurting and he smiled every minute until lunch time,  even through the algebra I class with Ricky Bohunkus on the front row.

Early Shedding Reports

One of the first reported encounters with the shedding of bacon was by a rural letter carrier in Washington Parish Louisiana.  George Boudreaux Williams was his name.  It was a cold February Monday with north wind and no blue sky showing.  At 7:00 a.m. George had his 1961 GMC truck loaded with the route 1 mail.  That days mail included 2 tires from Sears and Roebuck for one of his stops.  George was a tall boney fellow  about 6 feet 3 inches tall.  Each day as he started his route the store keepers would grin when they saw him sitting in the middle of the truck seat waving to them with one hand out each window while steering with his left knee.  Well to make a long story short George had a flat and  had to change it in the mud.  He only had a cup of coffee before starting the route and there hanging on a rattan vine were 4 beautiful slices of Leroy bacon!  George ate them and told half the Parish about the next day.  Few believed but George enjoyed.

     The bacon from Leroy is very uniform,  always delightfully the same.  Nine inches long and 3/16 of an inch thick.  It is as though it was sliced with a Globe Foods Bacon Slicing Machine set on 3.  It is always 70% lean and 30% fat.  It seems to have a hickory smoked maple taste, only better.  The frequency and the mechanism of the shedding is not known.  It is thought that 4 slices are shed every 24 hours but it timing between sheddings is unknown.  Even with all the unknowns the bacon is wonderfully appreciated each time it is encountered.

     Leroy is unlike any other feral hog.  No question about that.  He can travel great distances rapidly. In only 3 or so weeks he can go from North Carolina to Texas.   Leroy is far more intelligent than other known feral hogs.  Even more unusual is his ability to shed 4 pieces of bacon every day.  The bacon is safe and ready to eat.  The bacon spoils 24 hours after shedding.

The Leroy Story Begins

     Becoming a grandfather brought to my attention the need for this blog to be more entertaining.
Thus begins the story of Leroy the mutant bacon shedding feral hog.  The origin of Leroy is not known but some believe this most unique creature comes from South Mississippi. He was first discovered in Lamar county near Westphalia shortly after the October 22, 1964 nuclear test.

Hogs

There were 14 hogs in view out my window Saturday morning.  This time of year they are feeding on dewberry roots.

The Trip South

This morning I heard geese going south for the first time this fall.  My son in Chicago sent pictures of the season's first snow fall yesterday.  The seasons first 32 degree  night is predicted for tonight.

Planted 3 Fig Trees

Thanks to supplemental watering the figs planted last month are doing well.

Dewberries ripe

We are finding a few ripe dewberries.  They don't have much size to them. We are again in need of rain.

Spring Blooms

Today I saw wild verbena and oriental magnolia blooming for the first time this spring.

dreamliner

I read today that soon United will be flying the new dreamliner jets out of Houston. I wonder if there will be more room for feet and legs?

Air Travel

My body no longer enjoys long flights.
Slow walks in the woods are great.

Another Photo I Enjoy

I think it is the form, line and color I enjoy.

A photo I like

This was taken a few years back in a landscape in the Bullard area best I remember. I love the form and color.

Dewberry blooms

I'm seeing dewberry blooms along the fence lines.
Best I can recall they should be ripe in mid to late April.
The drought will have surely had an effect.