Friday evenin’ was pouring rain, with tornado watches and thunder-boomers all around — so Polimom wimped out on those now-famous pig races on Baker Road. Since I’ve been real interested in all the hollerin’ and carryin’ on over there about that new mosque thing, it was a real disappointment to me, but ya know, it’s hard enuf to keep this big hair lookin’ right on a good day, and a girl’s gotta have her priorities right, I always say.
Ain’t it lucky that blogger Lou Minatti captured this tender bit of local joie de vivre and released it via YouTube:
Looks like they was havin’ them a serious good time, and if’n I’d come across sech a thing out in the back of beyond someplace on a clear Texas night, I’da thought nothin’ of it. In fact, I might even’a bummed a plug of chaw and joined right in!
I cain’t hardly tell y’all how friendly-like it all looked, and I’m just pleased as all git out that Katy has been put on the map like this. Ain’t nuthin’ worse than sittin’ out here on the prairie and havin’ folks think we’re all civilized or sumthin, ya know? ‘Cept… well… there’s a little bitty problem with all this that’s been nigglin’ at me — kinder twitchin’ around in the back’a my mind fer awhile now.
THEM PIGS AIN’T RACIN’ IN KATY!
Now I recognize that most folks might not care much where them pigs is a-racin’, but since Polimom’s mailing address IS Katy, I’m findin’ all this publicity a mite embarrassin’.
And ya know what else? It ain’t clear that Craig Baker knows where he’s racin’ his pigs, either… cuz on his website, he says they’re all set up in Barker, TX, which’d be jest dandy, ‘ceptin’ ole Baker Road ain’t in the zipcode he’s got with his directions.
Ain’t that a puzzler? How kin somebody be a-livin’ on the same spread fer nearly two hundred years, and not know where they’re at?
Fact is, them pig-handlin’, fireworks-shootin’ Friday nights are goin’ on in HOUSTON! Yup — they’re out thar in 77094, and when I plugged that number into my handy-dandy mapquest, a big red star is a-settin’ almost smack dab on top of Baker Road.
A-course, it don’t really matter, since ain’t nobody tryin’ to give no offense to them Muslims. It’s all about the principle of the thing, ya know? I mean, Craig Baker probly woulda decided to have him some Friday Night Pig Races if there’da been a regular ole church goin’ in next door, right?
It ain’t got nothin’ to do with religion, or tryin’ to deliberately offend anybody’s sensibilities — as Houston’s own local rag (the Chronicle) shows ya:
Katy-area resident Phil Canavespe was one person who was willing to talk about the community’s concerns. He said he purchased land and a ranch house from the Bakers, and he backs the stance Baker is taking with the Muslim group.
“This is not a racist or a religious issue,” Canavespe said. “It’s a two-lane, unmarked road with no shoulder or support for any type of church.”
His wife, Susan Canavespe, said what Baker is doing with the pig races is not “mean-spirited, it’s just Texas-spirited.”
There! Told ya! (Ain’t that Texas spirit sumthin’?)
So y’all just go on, now, and hev yerselves a big time over there in Houston, k? We’ll come visit real soon and join in the hollerin’, cuz we know y’all are just a buncha good ole boys.
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Others noticin’ the goings-on just up the road:
:
The Debate Link
Crooks and Liars