It is said that some academics or lawyers relish a good debate and can be quite ferocious, yet it is all done without malice. This story about John could sure be true. . . . I knew his brother.
SEMI-TOUGH
Jack was lamenting the way pro rodeo had changed. He said in the old days it attracted a “less sophisticated” participant, though certainly a more colorful one! Back in the days of six-and-a-half-foot bareback riders and bronc riders, who drank the champagne and ate the glass!
He told me a tale about a Montana cowboy. He told me several tales, but this one is fit to pass along.
John was big, slow talkin’, and easy to entertain. He’d been workin’ his way home and had made a hundred miles in two weeks. This particular afternoon, he was passing time in a cowboy bar in Whitehall.
A tourist came into the bar and ordered a beer. Since John was the only other patron, the tourist slid over and opened the conversation. “Whyn’t we push arms for a round?” John looked at the big ol’ boy and drawled, “By gosh, sounds good to me.”
They put their elbows on the bar and clasped hands. John thumped the tourist’s hand on the bar so hard, the cigarette fell outta the moose head’s lips!
“I wuddn’t ready,” complained the tourist as he looked at his bleeding knuckles. “Let’s do it again.”
“By gosh,” says John, “sounds good to me.”
This time, John bent the tourist’s wrist into the shape of a G and flattened his class ring!
“How ’bout a finger pull?” challenged the good-natured tourist. “By gosh,” says John, “sounds good to me.”
They locked fingers, and John jerked him off his bar stool and outta his Acme stovepipes!
“Maybe you’d like to rassle for a round?”
“By gosh, sounds good to me.”
John thrashed the poor feller around the bar, tipping over the pool table, breaking the front window, and scattering chairs all the way to Three Forks! Finally the puffing tourist raised a protesting paw, and John released him. There was an 8.20 X 15 tread imprint on his forehead and a tooth mark on his right ankle where John had chewed through his boot!
“Do ya box?”
“By gosh, sounds good to me.”
The tourist squared off in time to see a big fist at close range. He went backwards like a bent sapling, sprang back, and took a left cross in the other eye.
The tourist stood there with two black eyes, a bloody nose, sawdust stickin’ to his sweaty back, and nothin’ left of his shirt but collar and cuffs!
“I guess I better be goin’.” The tourist smiled and offered his hand.
John shook it and said sincerely, “By gosh, if ya ever git back . . . stop.”