Cowboy Stories

Still, that didn't seem to damage him none when it came to romancing. Women folk around our little town did everything but have gunfights over him because he was so danged good looking--sort of a combination of Tom Selleck, Waddie Mitchell and Giraldo Rivera. Girls just couldn't resist him when he got all duded up. And I have to give him credit, he did clean up right nice on Saturday nights. He had a long handlebar mustache that he stroked so much we all thought his fingers would fall plum off. And he kept his thick, curly black hair all greased up so that it glistened like morning dew on bunch grass.

Fact is, Romeo was so stuck on himself that he strutted like a peacock in heat when anyone wearing calico was around. On special occasions, like a dance or a rodeo or a two-for-one taco special at the Dairy Queen, he wore a bright red western shirt with fringes on the sleeves. And his Wrangler jeans were so tight...that he looked like he'd been wrapped in wet rawhide and hung out to dry. And his belt buckle, well it was so big... that it looked like a moon hubcap off a '48 Chevy. He was dressed fit to kill, and the rest of us buckeroos at the ranch were about ready to do it, too.

You see, Romeo was the biggest braggart in the four adjacent counties. If anybody had ever given out a trophy for the World's Greatest Liar, he would of won it hands down. This fellah was born to stretch the blanket, and he never missed a chance.

One hot August night, all of us cowhands were sittin' outside on the bunkhouse porch, relaxing and drinking Texas tea. That's when Romeo began to tell us how he had been a member of the international jet set, back before he went to cowboying. And then he told us, in vivid detail, how he had made love to a large number of beautiful, rich women. Now, here's something for all you girls to remember, and there's no extra charge for it: Don't worry about the boys who kiss and tell, worry about those who kiss and exaggerate. That's the kind of gent that Romeo was. He laid it on thick for us, even though the rest of us buckeroos were snickering like we'd been eatin' loco weed.

"Now, that ain't the half of it," Romeo said, serious as a could be, as he strung us along. As you might expect, we were fairly certain that the cow chips out in the holding pens weren't stacked nearly as deep as what we were wading in listening to Romeo. But he just kept on going.

"Any of you boys ever been to Nashville?" he asked. Heck, two of us had never been out of the county much less the state. So after surveying our geographical ignorance, he cut loose with how he once had been a talent scout in Nashville and had gotten to know Dolly Parton, that is, to know her in the Biblical sense. Well, right there is where we drew the line. We knew for a fact after that story that he was as full of hot air as a grass-bellied yearling.

The next night, while he was in the outhouse meditating, us other four cowhands came up with a brilliant plan to cure Romeo of bragging or to kill him, either one. And right then we weren't real particular. We decided to do something that would prove, once and for all, that despite his good looks and luck with some local yokels, that he was not the suave ladies man that he thought he was.

Here's what we came up with. We decided to pull this little trick on him in full public view at the County Fair in three weeks. We all knew that Romeo just loved to strut through the carnival midway and show barns in his fancy outfits, impressing the young ladies. So we arranged to take over the ever-popular Lions Club kissing booth for a few minutes. We lined up four girls who were knock-down-and-drag-out beautiful. And then we caught ol' Romeo and bet him that if he was blindfolded he couldn't tell which one of the girls he was kissing. Why, his ego was puffed up real big ..., an ego bigger'n a constipated bull buffalo, and he took to that challenge like a duck to a June bug.

Romeo bragged, "Shoot-fire, I've been a lip-wrangler for so long that I can tell how a girl is going to kiss just by the shape of her lips and the smile on her face. Let me look at each of 'em up close, then it will be pucker up time."

There musta been forty or fifty spectators standing there when we lined up them lovely ladies in a row and let him take a good look at them. Then I blindfolded him and gave him a half-dozen spins to keep him honest. Of course, the fun came in right here in that we weren't being exactly honest. While I was gettin' ol' Romeo ready, the other fellahs ran over to the stock show and borrowed a spotted pig from her pen. We christened that pig, "Juliet". And the other fellahs who were in cahoots with me on this held that pig's snout right up there where the chosen girl's lips would have been.

I turned to that smiling, blindfolded fool and said, "Alright, Romeo, tell us which girl you kiss just now, and you'll win a stack of money a foot high."

"Sure hate to steal your money this way," Romeo grinned. " Lead me to the little darlin'."

We led him to the little darlin', alright. Juliet, the spotted pig, was still as she could be. I might add that her owner had her scrubbed up and perfumed real nice, so there was no way for Romeo to catch on until it was too late. He leaned forward and his lips touched Juliet's lips. And then Romeo put a juicy kiss on that pig, just as passionately as he had seen them movie stars do down at the Ritz theater on Saturday nights. The corker came, though, when he finished kissing her and said triumphantly, "I hope, darlin', that it was as good for you as it was for me."

Now, the minute I removed his blindfold, reality set in about what it was that he had kissed. Romeo's eyes got as wide as chewing tobacco tins. And his nostrils began to flare like bat wings. And bystanders later swore they could see smoke venting from his ears. I have never before or since seen a man spit as much as he did that night. Why, he was beginning to get flecks of foam around his mouth and we feared for a moment he was comin' down with hydraphoby. He was sure 'nough mad, alright, but it wasn't because of no hydrophoby.

He turned and for some reason looked right at me and said, "I hope you've given your heart to Jesus, 'cause your butt belongs to me!" He lit into me with his fists swingin' like a windmill. And I'm here to tell you, he may have been a pretty boy and he may have had an IQ half of his boot size, but he was rough. How rough was he, you ask? He was rougher'n a petrified corn cob. He had knocked about a square foot of bark off of me by the time three sheriff's deputies pulled him off of me.

Yes, sir, that was a night to remember. And our plan worked out even better than we had hoped. Because Romeo finally quit braggin' about his romantic encounters. But we found when things got too quiet back at the ranch bunkhouse, we could sure liven things up by one of us asking, "Say, Romeo, you had a date lately with Juliet?"

_____________________________________________________________ End.