Redneck Sledding.
Note: A prologue from my upcoming autobiography, Life’s Too Short to Smoke Cheap Cigars (Or to Drink Cheap Whiskey.)
Sledding
Let’s talk for a bit about one of every American’s favorite winter pastimes.
By Way of Background:
In the wooded hills of Allamakee County, one of the best things about winter was sledding. Well, after hunting, ice fishing and running the trapline, anyway.
Granted our equipment wasn’t always up to par. Broken-down old sleds that may well have predated the one famously referenced in Citizen Kane were the norm, and occasionally trash-can lids, sheets of plywood and other such things were pressed into service.
In our younger years, our sledding was pretty traditional, though, aside from the antiquated and sometimes homemade equipment. The heavy timber on most of the Allamakee County hillsides made it a bit dicey at times, but we managed to find safe places like the farmstead lanes where we could make our descents without slamming into a trunk.
Of course, once we had drivers licenses, another local tradition came into play, which involved tying a sled (or a sheet of plywood, or a couch) to the back of a car and “sledding” at what was more often than not a reckless speed.
Not the best idea.
This didn’t always go as planned. One afternoon we spent a good thirty minutes digging Mark Malek out of a drift after a sharp left turn sent his sled into the drifted-shut ditch; his size made the excavation a considerable project. Broken bones and concussions weren’t unusual, but we took that with aplomb; such things were accepted as part of a normal country childhood.
But then there was the time we tried it in the summer.
This One Time:
It all started one July afternoon the year I was sixteen, when the temperatures were in the nineties, the fish weren’t biting, and my old buddy and partner in malfeasance Jon and I seated on my parent’s front porch, reminiscing about the nice cold winter before and laughing over some of the sledding antics from that season.
“Say,” Jon suddenly piped up, “You know, we could probably figure out a way to sled in the summer. All we need is a nice grassy slope.”
“Where are you going to find one of those?” I asked. I inclined my head to indicate the heavily forested hill across Bear Creek from the folks’ house.
“Don’t worry,” Jon replied. “I know just the place. Gristle Canyon.”
A few miles from my folks’ place, on one of the expansive Duffy farms, Waterloo Creek ran for a couple of miles through a deep cut between two hills. While hills and valleys were usual in that country, this one was both steeper and deeper than most. For some reason, the locals called it Gristle Canyon.
The slopes of Gristle Canyon were indeed mostly treeless, mostly because the slope was so steep that trees couldn’t easily take root.
“Come on,” Jon urged. “I’ve got an old tarp in The Van we can use to sled down the hill on. Ole Duffy’s back pasture track goes right up to the top of his hill. I’ve got permission to shoot woodchucks on his place, so he won’t mind us driving in there.”
I wasn’t too sure, but it was a pretty dull afternoon. I decided to go along with it, just to see what would happen.
In retrospect, I should have known better.
An hour later, we stood at the top of the precipitous slope of Gristle Canyon, looking down.
“See,” Jon pointed, “It can’t be more than a couple hundred feet down.”
“I don’t know.” I was decidedly doubtful. I leaned over the edge of the bank and looked down. “It looks more like four or five hundred. Pretty steep, too.”
The actual by-gosh Waterloo Creek, only in summer.
“It’s nice and grassy. Nothing to run into until you hit the creek at the bottom, and you’ve got plenty of room to stop before that. Go on, try it. Fold that tarp in half – there, like that. Now set down on it. Indian style. Cross your legs, yeah, there you go. Get a hold of the front edge – get a good grip. Hold it up a little. Yeah, just like that.”
“This isn’t a good idea.”
“It’ll be great. You got a good grip?”
“I suppose. But first, don’t you think we ought to…”
Jon put his right boot in the middle of my back and shoved.
From up on the hillside that overlooked Gristle Canyon, it hadn’t looked like there were that many rocks hidden in the grass. I hit the first of them about twenty feet down the slope, a particularly large and hard rock that left a sore spot on the part of my anatomy that was placed on the canvas. I knew he’d have a colorful bruise there later, but other things commanded my attention first.
About fifty feet down, at about thirty miles an hour, I hit a small bench. I skidded across it, trying to brake with my behind, but it didn’t work. As I shot across the small grassy bench, I had the fleeting image of a mound of dirt and a flash of brown fur just before the tarp hit the edge of the bench and resumed the plummet downwards.
There was suddenly a feeling of weight in my lap. I felt something move. I looked down to see a terrified woodchuck in my lap. The groundhog looked up at me, eyes wide in terror.
“Hang on,” I heard Jon’s voice, faintly, calling down from the top of the slope. “You’re about to hit the steep part.”
The canvas folded up in the wind, plastering itself flat across my face. There was a slight chirp of terror from the woodchuck, which dug its heavy, burrowing claws into my lap, uncomfortably close to some rather sensitive areas.
A series of rocks left a series of bruises in my already tender fundament as the woodchuck and I skidded across them at forty miles an hour – maybe fifty.
“It can’t be much farther,” I shouted to the woodchuck. That was pure bravado, as the leading edge of the tarp was still covering my face. The woodchuck let out another terrified squeak. Together, we managed to fight the edge of the canvas down, just in time to see the one tree on the slope looming large.
Thwack.
The impact knocked the canvas, the woodchuck and me sideways.
Now we were rolling, not sliding, down the slope. The canvas wrapped itself around me and the woodchuck. Bound together like two frightened peas in a pod, we rolled, bouncing over the rocks, down the slope to the creek at the bottom.
A large splash announced the end of the ride.
As Jon watched from the top of the slope, I dragged myself out of the water, the woodchuck under one arm, dragging the canvas behind. I set the woodchuck down and patted it on the head. The woodchuck looked up, staggered in a complete circle, and sat down.
I looked up the slope, frowned, and started climbing.
Finally, after about forty-five minutes, I made it back to the top. I was dragging what was left of the tattered, sopping wet canvas tarp. I looked down; the woodchuck had followed me up the hill, apparently feeling some bond due to the traumatic experience we had suffered together.
“Well?” I demanded.
Jon looked at me thoughtfully. “I’ll have to try that myself someday.”
“Oh,” I said to him through gritted teeth, “I don’t think so. I think you’re going to try it right now.”
A few moments later, after we threatened Jon with mayhem, the woodchuck and I watched his descent. He didn’t make it past the tree, hitting it squarely rather than the glancing blow we had managed. But he did get out of it with nothing worse than a couple of cracked ribs and a few teeth jarred loose. The woodchuck and I conferred after Jon regained consciousness and headed back up the hill; when he arrived, we informed him we had decided he rated an eight for the difficulty of the routine attempted, but only a six for execution.
Years Later:
Eventually I grew up and had kids of my own, which was nature’s way of repaying me for the headaches I caused my parents.
The sixty acres of hardwood timber where I grew up had two meadows ‘up top’ on the top of the hill, while the house sat along the creek in the valley. The flat creekside bottomland was connected to the upper and lower meadows by the Woods Road, a simple graveled track the Old Man maintained by tractor with grader and bush hog.
In winter, the Woods Road made surprisingly good sledding, save for a sharp right turn at the bottom, where we had made a cut through the steep bottom slope of the hill. Snow tended to drift in the cut in winter, and on the outside of the curve where the hill provided a windbreak. Sometimes that stretch just outside of the curve would drift up feet deep, just to the side of the road where we kept a path cleared.
Came the winter when our oldest daughter was about seven. The folks had purchased an old wooden toboggan that the older grandchildren used on the Woods Road. Our daughter was not yet one of the ‘big kids’ allowed to use the toboggan alone, but one afternoon she convinced her grandfather to take her sledding. I trailed along to watch.
Our oldest loved her Daddy (and still does) but she absolutely worshipped her Grandpa, so she ran ahead and grabbed his hand, chattering away. The Old Man pulled the toboggan behind by a length of rope. I clumped along after, but when we passed the first bend in the road I spoke up.
“Dad,” I said, “we usually only sled down from the bend by the blackberry thicket.”
“I know,” the Old Man replied. “But it will be a nice long ride if we start at the top by the big oak.”
“You’ll be going pretty fast by the time you hit the bottom.”
“I know,” the Old Man said. “It’ll be fine.”
“OK,” I said. I was feeling somewhat doubtful. “I’ll wait here and watch you go past.”
A few minutes later, they blew past me at a considerable clip. The Old Man was in front, holding the piece of rope attached to the front of the toboggan, a sternly repressed look of alarm on his face. My kid was behind him, clinging to his coat, squealing in delight.
A few moments later I heard a thump from the bottom of the road. I walked on down to find the Old Man extricating himself from the snowdrift. His glasses and open coat collar were full of snow. My little girl, smaller and lighter as she was, had flown over the Old Man’s head when they hit the drift, bounced, and rolled, and was now standing atop the drift giggling wildly.
The Old Man, deadpan as always, just looked at me and said, “Well, that wasn’t how I expected that to go.”
Suddenly I didn’t feel so bad about some of my own similar lapses in judgement.
lol, this one was top notch!
I’m still laughing thinking about the terrified woodchuck…
I’ve found that you can talk to just about anyone about a) being bitten by a dog and b) foods they will or will not eat. I’ll bet sledding accidents are another one of those things. And yet we still keep going back and doing it.
Great story, as usual. I needed a laugh today.
I’ve never been in a sledding accident. Now if you want to talk about boats and accidents, that’s another story.
#metoo
I can say however, that skis + mangroves or skimboards + ankles = trouble.
It is miracle any of us can walk. lol
Almost as if human beings are not as frail as parts of society want to make us out to be.
SSSHHHH!!!
We don’t want people thinking they can go outside into the Lil Rona ‘Pocalypse. They might even think they don’t need to wear masks!
The woodchuck really makes the story. ??
Seconded.
Excellent story.
I am impressed that you got your buddy to follow you down that hill, since he convinced you to go first.
I convinced him that a hospital stay was likely in either case.
Such a good read. Sledding, snow, sand or grass is always a great time.
While not as excitement filled, the first time I took my oldest out sledding was at White Sands dunes. We had a basic sled, but there was a guy there that did it all the time and he had some slicked up, super sled. He offered it to my then 6-year old on a steep 50-60 foot sand dune. Bravely, my son grabbed the rope, laying face first, zoomed down the dune. At the end, rather than a snow drift, he smacked into the soft sands, mouth wide open from screaming with glee. We spent the next 30 minutes washing out his eyes, mouth, eyes, and ears of packed sand.
Once all cleaned up he asked the gentleman, “can I do that again?” He was happy to oblige.
Thanks Animal for helping recall that memory of mine.
I love these articles, Animal.
The problem is, they are written in the context of fun still being allowed. The bad old days, when fun was not regulated by woke perpetually aggrieved blue haired androgynous fugly butch dykes.
Fun is no longer allowed. Please revise all future articles to be neither fun, funny, interesting, or completely ignorant of the NEW NORMAL.
I’m calling a lid.
Joe Biden
15 days. Let’s finish strong.
Outstandingly good read. Thanks, Animal.
“occasionally trash-can lids, sheets of plywood and other such things were pressed into service.”
Old car hoods off 1950s vehicles, the ones that are curved in the middle and weigh 200 lbs, are great. One of my cousins and I nearly committed suicide on one of those. We knew the creek was coming up soon and were traveling at a great deal of speed. Somehow, my cousin must have gotten a glimpse of the creek bank ahead, through the curtain of snow being thrown up by the sled, or maybe he was just guessing, and rolled off the sled, I followed and a few moments later heard a great crash when the car hood hit the ice in the creek bed.
Fun days.
You know, it’s funny now back in the days of our youth, we were so care free that we were always trying to figure out something to do that would let us narrowly escape certain death.
The newer generations are so coddled that they will never know that joy. It’s sad.
It isn’t just kids. Most adults don’t go out and do anything. That’s why obesity is such a problem. DoorDash & Netflix.
^^ This is me if I don’t actively force myself to put things on my calendar.
I’m very cognizant of the fact that I’d be a couch potato sans specific, targeted planning
“Of course, once we had drivers licenses, another local tradition came into play, which involved tying a sled (or a sheet of plywood, or a couch) to the back of a car and “sledding” at what was more often than not a reckless speed.”
When not winter time: Fresh tilled soil, a tractor and a flipped over car hood. You’re welcome.
What a story!
Thanks, Animal. Brought back a lot of good memories. We made some pretty epic (ok, stupid) jumps back in the day!
Probably no surprise that sledding resulted in more injuries for me than 40+ years of hockey.
My boxer has to wear a cone because he tore his dewclaw off. It’s sharp plastic and he has learned in under a day of to use it as a weapon. He is terrorizing the pit bull and stabbing me in the legs. The joy of owning dogs.
it’s bad when they’re clever, you admire their craftiness but are also the victim of it
Florida dog.
YES! It is a double edged sword. He is easy to train, but it is impossible to trick him. He can always smell a trap.
My boxer had to have a cone for a while because he scratched his cornea and wouldn’t leave his eye alone to heal. He decided he wanted to play with the cat, who under the best of circumstances is merely tolerant of his shenanigans, and somehow scooped her up into the cone. The confused and very angry cat, in trying to get away from him, slipped her leg under the cone and twisted it into a link in his chain collar taping herself against his face. The trapped cat did what trapped cats do and started mauling my dogs face, and the idiot started blindly barreling through the apartment bowling and slamming his head against things trying to get the cat off.
Several minutes of howling, yowling, screaming later, and with only a lamp and end table completely broken, I managed to tackle the dog and free the cat. The animals are still less destructive than my kid.
Holy moly, that’s a crazy story. Boxers are the clowns of the dog world.
That brought to mind something our two current dogs did as small puppies. They are litter mates, so exactly the same age, and were roughhousing. The female always liked to grab the male’s collar and drag him around. The sounds they would make were horrifying – like they were both consumed with rage and trying to kill each other.
I happened to be home, and they were going at it, and then I heard something that sounded off. I go into the next room, and she has managed to get his collar twisted under her chin and hooked behind her lower canines. Completely stuck. Unfortunately, that wrap around her chin also cut off his neck major arteries. He as completely unconscious, and actually shit himself as I was trying frantically to get it off. I did get it off, and he got up after a little bit and was just fine.
I am convinced that he was within seconds of dying.
Not unlike a previous pup (also a pit bull). Brand new pup, maybe 10 weeks old. We were visiting the in-laws, and put her in the basement at night. For some reason, I woke up and had the feeling something was wrong and went to check. She had managed to fall into the sump for the basement, which had water in it, and was just barely keeping her head above water. If I hadn’t woken up, I am certain I would have found her drowned in the morning.
É[pée]-collar
Yup, and he likes to get you in the calves while your not paying attention.
Something like this?
https://postimg.cc/K3zWPBNW
A survivor of a STEVE SMITH encounter speaks his peace.
LOL
THAT’S NOT FUNNY!
“My little girl, smaller and lighter as she was, had flown over the Old Man’s head when they hit the drift”
Forever branded in my mind was taking my daughter down a double innertube water slide with the big whirlpool spinning top in the middle. She was in the front when we started. When we reached the middle area where you swirl in what looks like a giant top and then exit it out the bottom drain into the last portion, we got spun around in the top and went down the last part backwards. When we finally hit the pool at the bottom of the water slide, I dead stopped into the pool and my daughter was launched, she’d turned in the tube to face me, over my head to the edge of the pool and into the water next to where the lifeguard was standing.
I’ll never forget that squealing, flying, gleeful smile as she flew over me.
“Now we were rolling, not sliding, down the slope. The canvas wrapped itself around me and the woodchuck. Bound together like two frightened peas in a pod, we rolled, bouncing over the rocks, down the slope to the creek at the bottom.”
LOL
That poor woodchuck would never know that much adrenaline again.
In the town where I grew up we had ditches that were dug in the 1800’s to drain the swamp land for farming. They were basically creeks with very steep sides. Once while I was in high school my dad took me and a friend of mine sledding, down the steep side of the ditch and over the frozen water. About 20 yards down there was a break in the ice and you could see the water rushing by. I think my dad would get arrested if if we did that today.
But as a kid my dad used to ice skate on frozen lakes and purposefully whip other kids into a hole in the ice.
So he was a multiple attempted murderer?
It was like that movie “A Christmas Story”, except the kids were meaner to each other.
LOL!
So woodchucks and groundhogs are the same critter? I honestly did not know this.
I’m surprised that Animal didn’t get his belly ripped open. Maybe those critters are more tame that I’ve been led to believe.
The ones around here are nasty belligerent things that you do not want to grapple with.
I just saw the claws on one and decided that.
I aint scared of no rodent
I remember a Time sledding with my siblings where we hit a drift. I was the youngest, yet somehow still ended up at the bottom of the resulting pile.
He can try.
Democrat presidential nominee Joe Biden’s proposed gun control policy includes a provision that could require Americans to sell back their so-called “high-capacity magazines” to the government or be registered under the National Firearms Act of 1934 (NFA). The latter, unless there were some form of carve-out, could mandate that American gun owners pay a $200 federal tax for every high-capacity magazine they currently own.
In addition to the $200 tax, owners of high-capacity magazines under Biden’s view of the NFA, could also be required to register them with federal authorities, submit their fingerprints and photograph, and potentially submit to an FBI background check.
Yeah, I’m going to have to tell you to fuck all the way off with that nonsense.
They will try, and that’s just one more step towards their goal of prohibiting Americans from owning firearms.
If you don’t want to lose the 2nd amendment, do not vote for democrats. Not sure what else to say. Of course that means I’m a Trumputin bot, well so be it.
As I said earlier, I don’t like this kind of realpolitik, but that’s what we got.
Yeah, he can fuck off with that. How would he even do that under the NFA?
Since he’s been in politics since before 1934, maybe he knows.
The democrats do not care how they are going to do something as far as it being constitutional or not. Both parties have been experts at that for at least decades.
And now with run away executive orders, it’s all easy peasy.
The bigger thing we had better worry about in the short term is being locked in our homes until they decide you’re safe from the commie cooties and various other hobgoblins. Which might be never unless they decide letting you out of the house is some form of political advantage at the moment. Otherwise get used to staying put, forever.
Rules are for Republicans.
Great story as always Animal. I have experience much of the same kind of hijinks. We always had some type of deadly or scary barrier at the bottom of our sledding hills. There was the creek, rive, railroad tracks, cliffs, and roadways.
My buddy Deaner and I created a bobsled like track down his hill with the garden hose and some shovel work. With the American Flier sled rails you could keep it on the ice if you had the skill.
If you kept it from wiping out, you were greeted by the concrete and brick building at the bottom. So once we got good at navigating the course we started playing a game of chicken and human shuffle board with the school. I won and lost by bailing 5 feet from the school and proceeded to roll and skid into the bricks with the sled sparking on the concrete. I managed to only knock the wind out of my self.
You think you are better off under Trump? I’ll prove it!
emphasis mine. I’m sure the study was done by people who are anti biden, but Still, that would be devastating.
Feature, not bug. You can’t make a self reliant and prosperous people completely dependent upon government. We have to make those economic omelets, for your own good, comrade.
I’m sure the study was done by people who are anti biden, but Still, that would be devastating.
No doubt, but I’d believe it. Biden said in the first debate that he intends to repeal the corporate tax cuts, which means he’s promising to raise taxes on all American companies by 7 to 14 points. That’s not going to be good for economic growth.
Federalist Society is opening their annual conference to the public this year. IMO, this is one of the best sets of topics that I’ve seen. Some libertarian friendly names appear on the speaker list, too.
link
sounds like a bunch of fascists to me. how is their security? an antifa group should go there and bash the fash
I can tell you first hand that hitting a tree while laying down on a 2 runner sled – head first steering with your hands instead of sitting upright and steering with your feet, is painful. I didn’t have regular bruises but deep ones with hard painful lumps that turn pitch black and are painful to the touch. We destroyed 2 sleds trying to see who could be the first one to make it all the way down that windy, tree lined path on a steep hill. No one made it.
Years later when I was in my teens we used car and truck tire inner tubes to sled on…. on the right snow that took sledding to whole new level, like Chevy Chase on that saucer sled fast with lots of air time when you hit a shelf. But there is no way to steer it. One of our party required a trip to the ER for a dislocated shoulder. Only use an inner tube to sled down completely treeless slopes.
Man were we dumb…..
Tubing is one of the more terrifying methods of sledding. We used to go up the mountains and sled down the passes. Passes that were crisscrossed with trafficked roads.
I’m not sure how none of us never ended up being hit by a car.
But man is it ever fun….
River tubers are the fucking worst. Back in my whitewater kayaking days, we used to drag those dildos out of class V rapids with the regularity of the tides. Usually minus PFDs, helmets, and sobriety.
I’ve tubed rivers, but non that ever get to be “Rapids”.
Tubing on flatwater is a different matter. Floating down a nice calm river on a sunny day, with a few beers, that’s cool.
But running serious whitewater in an inner tube is involving other people in your suicide.
head first steering with your hands instead of sitting upright and steering with your feet – wait, what is 2 runner sled why don’t you steer with your feet?
A sled with two runners underneath and that is just boring steering with your feet.
we did not have all sort of fancy sleds when I was a kid all of em looked sort of like this just more beat up and not new
https://s.cdnmpro.com/320445122/p/l/7/sanie-cadru-metalic~237.jpg
we would sit on our bellies head first and use our toes to steer
Flexible Flyer.
My dad passed down his and we lived at the top of a very steep hill. I’ve gone down that hill head-first, steering with my hands, many a time. We took turns being stationed at the bottom of the hill/cross street to watch for cars and stop them. So we could go two full blocks on one turn.
fortunately not many cars in the romanian countryside where we were sledding. Not like you decadent polluting Americans with your trucks and heated houses. Although houses were much warmer in the countryside where they had wood stoved than in the city where there was city heating
We always rode them head first – steering with your hands. Feet first – luge style – would have have been a lot safer. Like I said, we were dumb.
our hand were used to hold on…
Haha, so were ours…..
That sled has tall runners — we used something like this one: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flexible_Flyer#/media/File:The_Childrens_Museum_of_Indianapolis_-_Sled.jpg
https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/philmatier/article/Rampant-shoplifting-leads-to-another-Walgreens-15654730.php
Good job, Dems.
Dems?! clearly this is Trumps fault. If he wasn’t such a bad president, people wouldn’t be rioting and stealing everything with impunity, because the Dems wouldn’t be letting them do it in order to score political points. No matter how you cut it this lands squarely at the feet of the President.
Huh, apparently that black fellow that got his teeth knocked out has been banned by Twitter and Instagram:
https://youtu.be/CZEpJNynPJU
SMITE (Social Media BTW)
Yes it looks like he did get Smited…
Smote?
Smitten.
He got uppity with Dems.
Smut.
He ain’t black, so he doesn’t matter.
I am starting to be vaguely uncertain whether these tales are the whole truth or they contains some embellishments so to speak.
Just be on the lookout for any woodland critters that behave like the gopher in Caddyshack.
the facts should not be sacrificed for the sake of mere entertainment.
All stories are true.
For some values of “true”.
#!/usr/bin/python
False = True;
/ There now everything is True.
/usr/bin/python – Not Found.
what linux distro are you running?!
We don’t install such things by default. Users might think it’s okay to use them.
Have you never gone fishing or had your dad or grandpa tell him about “that one fish” they caught.
Pronouns…who needs them. tell you about…
no. neither fished.
I read it as if I were youthful and it all makes perfectly clear sense and is 100% believable.
That Jon fella needs to do a guest post
I will admit to nothing other than changing some names to protect the… uh… well, let’s just say I changed some names and leave it at that.
Me and my cousin would go down a steep hill in summer. We had a large piece of plywood we would ride together. there were some rocks, but no trees just some large bushes. at the end there was sort of a ditch we wanted to fly over. it did not work. One of us was the break man, had basically a piece of iron which was to be stuck in the grown to stop. usually the beark man stopped while the other one would go on with the plywood.
Well, duh, you need to tie the brake man to the plywood.
Did you not study basic childhood engineering?
I don’t even remember what the iron thing was called… it was a basically like a long piece of metal with 2 90 degree bends at each end which was sharpened, was used in old timey roofs to whole wooden beams together.
now its gonna kill me all evening don;t know what to search to find it
it looked like this
https://cdn.leroymerlin.ro/image/2000/2000/108950/5ed91a888fec7_20200604070008.jpg
but made of iron and this one is wider, that was less wide and thicker, almost square in cross section. Anyways I will never remember the word, it may have been regional to that area.
Oh this is too damned funny – lefty jackass Jeffrey Toobin has been suspended by The New Yorker for whipping his dick out during a Zoom meeting. He said he thought the camera was turned off.
Wait, you are supposed to wear pants on Zoom calls?
Company had us work from home for a few weeks near the beginning of the panicdemic. It was nice to mosey out of the bedroom and into my home office…in my underwear. I didn’t do any video chatting though.
I keep a piece of post it over the laptop camera.
From the sound of it, it was slightly more than just sans pants.
What, were the anal beads visible? NTTAWWT…
Probably started boning his waifu pillow.
Hey man, don’t apologize. when you gotta pee, you gotta pee.
He apparently thinks that muting a Zoom call turns off the video. How stupid would you have to be to think that “mute” means “video off”, not “sound off”, as has been the function of mute buttons since they were invented?
When he mutes the Pron on TV they never see him fap. So he must of thought that it worked the same.
Well, the NSA does, but he doesn’t mind.
The real question is “What does Jeffrey Too in fap to?”
Who else was on the Zoom call?
A bunch of New Yorker columnists. Kind of an unattractive group to be wanking it to, but hey…
This is why they invented camera slides, so you can physically block the lens. Nothing less is safe.
True, but in no universe does muting anything turn off video anything. Or even purport to.
Goddammit, SMOD, try harder
An asteroid with a diameter the size of a refrigerator could strike the Earth the day before the November election, according to celebrity scientist Neil deGrasse Tyson — but it’s not large enough to do any serious damage.
What if it hits the San Andreas Fault? Will it chip California off into the Pacific/
At that size, it’s likely to burn up in the atmosphere. Maybe some pebbles make it to the ground.
+1 Que Sera, Sera
What if it lands on Donald Trump or Joe Biden?
1. Asteroid lands on Trump and Biden
2. Constitutional crises
3. Jo Jo President!
If we’re really lucky, it will strike a certain celebrity scientist.
a diameter the size of a refrigerator
WTF does that even mean? A refrigerator has dimensions of length, height, and depth, and I’m even willing to assume they are pretty standard for most refrigerators. Which measurement are they using here?
Karens, start your engines!
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/trump-slams-idiot-dr-fauci-every-time-he-goes-tv-its-bombbut-theres-bigger-bomb-if-you
Trump calls Fauci an idiot (sorta).
Trump isn’t wrong here.
He’s absolutely correct but I’m not sure it’s good politics. Hopefully win the election and fire him or even just strongly encourage him to retire after that’s done.
Thanks, Animal. Judging from the comment(ers) it appears most kids are similar. We needed a little excitement in our other wise tame and mundane growth to keep us healthy. If we only did what our parents expected we’d had boring lives. Most of us knew some of the those kids, always had their homework done, neatly and on time while others were busy looking to copy a friend’s (who often had copied his and poor;y at that.)
We somehow grew up with most of our fingers/toes and now worry about out own kids/grandkids doing some of the same things. That’s why kids like going to grandpa’s house, ’cause he has lots of neat ideas and experiences.
“Mom, Mom, guess what? Grandpa let me shoot his gun. Can I get one like he has?”