Another oldie but goodie from me...hope your holidays were a delight.
-Spragoo
They steal your roadkill in St. Elmo (May 28, 2009)
Blink and you'll pass it.
The only thing you see is the road sign stamped with the same name as a "Brat Pack" flick from the '80's...
It's St. Elmo, Illinois. Lying in evil wait just off of Interstate 70 past the graffiti capital of the Midwest, Effingham, Illinois.
Don't let the simple sign nor the idyllic surroundings fool you...they steal your roadkill in St. Elmo.
Just ask my friend Luke. Ole' Luke was birthed in St. Elmo and is quite the country man. He has a truck that is lifted high enough with large enough wheels that he has contemplated running over my house a few times during fits of anger.
Luke smokes AND dips and the same time, swallows his tobacco juice instead of spitting it out - "Makes yer stomach cast-iron!" - and has a velvet painting of Waylon Jennings spotlighted on his living room wall.
He also enjoys the fine country delicacy of roadkill...
I can't really blame Luke for this...times are tough and the economy is shit nowadays. I have contemplated a continuous diet of SPAM and boxed wine myself. So I don't criticize him for living off the road instead of off the land.
I figure if dumb, beastly critters want to get in the way of his truck from the film "Maximum Overdrive" and want to play chicken, them fuck 'em. They received their just desserts.
Luke told me this ghastly tale the other night, over some jungle juice at a friend's house. Set against the backdrop of St. Elmo's dirt roads and the wafting scent of cow manure, Luke told me how he mowed down an opossum in the roadway. "Thumped it one good," he exclaimed.
In fact after running over it forward, he proceeded to back up over it in the American spirit of double-tapping your enemies.
At this point, what is a country boy to do? They are brought up by half-Cherokee and Choctaw - sometimes Chippewa - folk that teach them not to waste anything.
So Luke tossed the carcass into the bed of his truck and went home with drunken visions of opossum, eggs and grits for breakfast dancing in his head.
"It's a fine hangover food," Luke said.
Forward to the next morning...Luke stumbles outside to his beloved Dodge Ram 560000000 Cummins Turbo Diesel Rocket Fueled Double-Extended Cab truck, looking to retrieve the prize from the night before.
And it's fucking gone...
I asked Luke if it was possible that he ran over Super Opossum...one that could haul its broken body out of the bed of the truck and stumble away to have Lois Opossum mend its wounds.
Luke reassured me it was impossible.
"Man, I creamed that sumbitch," he drawled. "Its fuckin' head was popped like a balloon and it had intestines hangin' out its ass. The fucker was D-E-A-D!"
That left only one option...some scoundrel poachers had stolen Luke's breakfast.
I called the Effingham County Sheriff's department the other night. A department of three sturdy men often tasked with putting out meth lab fires, breaking up bar fights and tracking down and executing bastards that steal roadkill.
I spoke to a Deputy Sowenhoffer and asked him if the thievery of roadkill in St. Elmo was prevalent.
"You got roadkill, you better lock it in your car or throw it in your freezer overnight," Sowenhoffer huffed. He sounded fat. "We gotta cult out here dressed in pink robes, scraping the shit off da road, taking it from your truck, whatever."
He didn't stop there. I almost wish he had.
"These hoods have no regard for good, honest, clean country folk trying to eat. Hell, they even broke into old man Beener's house and stole the stuffed badger off the back of his shitter."
"Could it be those pinko liberals from PETA?" I asked.
"What the Sam Hill is PETA?"
"Never mind, sir. I hope you catch the varmints stealing the varmints."
"Who you with, son?" Sowenhoffer growled. "Why you wanna know about this?"
Shit. What do I say, I'm writing a fuckin' retarded blog about your retarded town?
"Ah, I'm with Field and Stream, deputy. I'm doing an article. I'll send a free years subscription for your cooperation."
That changed the tune. "HOT DAMN! You're a good man, son. Anything you need, just call."
That was a dead end, fo' sho'. I'm no farther along in helping Luke reclaim his beloved opossum or finding the fuckin' degenerates taking the roadkill out of babies mouths in St. Elmo.
One thing is for certain, however. I'm never stopping for gas in St. Elmo. Any town where people are stealing rotten, decomposing rodents is not somewhere I want to become acquainted with. I like to leave my kids in the car while filling up the gas tank.
The last thing I want to see is a gaggle of pink-robed Nazi's storming out of the woodline, stealing the fruits of my loins and screaming "We dun't like yer kind 'round heer!"
Some peoples children, I'll tell ya.
-Spragoo
