All Entries in the "Fractured Opinion" Category

Elk Not State Employees Says Court

(Gunnison – Large Horned Mammal News –March 12, 2016)

Elk cannot be classified as state employees in Colorado according to a federal circuit judge here. Citing the part-time working status of the elk Judge Andovera Rutte denied a motion by flamboyant attorney John Doe that his herd clients receive full employment benefits retroactive to 1876 the year Colorado entered the Union.

According the Rutte’s decision elk and other “harvest species” are productive only during late summer and fall during hunting seasons. They are already well compensated for inconveniences accrued since the state often feeds them on heavy snow years and protects them from armed predators the rest of the year.

At one point in the hearing federal attorneys challenged several elk to present evidence of “even one good day’s toil during the spring or winter. Doe jumped in vehemently denying implications of laziness adding that foraging and migration were no walk in the park and should be considered honest labor.

Rutte disagreed insisting that while these endeavors were “quite commendable, they were primarily instinctual,” (and) “would not qualify as work or fiscal reward on even a marmot’s ledger sheet.”

The Elk Mountain herds had filed a civil suit against the state seeking retirement benefits and cost of living adjustments.

Mule deer and bighorns and mountain goats have been closely watching these proceedings. They are slated for a general walkout before the next hunting period in support of the elk.

“If all the animals who say they support the elk walks we will have no animals in the forest at all,” challenged Doe, perilously close to contempt charges.

Rutte closed the session by restating her position and instructed prosecutors to “take steps to insure” that what she called “disruptive, rebel factions” are on the job come black powder and bow season in 2016.

– Diego Paradise

Cowboy Final Exam

Colorado City  Cowpuncher Shavings & Student Loans  March 4,  2016

(The following is a copy of the final exam administered to potential graduates of the Dinty Moore Cowpuncher College here in Spit Basin. Feel free to test your savvy by answering all questions in the allotted eight seconds. There are four sections: Grammar, History, Science & Math and Reading Retention. No sense spouting anymore chin music. Get to going!

Proper Use of English Grammar
1.) Is it proper to say Hoss or Horse?
2.) Which is correct? He looked like he’d been weaned on a pickle or he looked as if he’d bean weaned on a pickle?
3.) Which is correct? She had a nose in which one could store a small dog or She had a nose one could store a small dog in?
4.) Identify the subject and predicate in the following sentence: Skinny Al sat there, surrounded by egg crates and sheets of insulation, grinnin’ like Old Mister Weasel, peeking’ through the hen house door.
Western History
1.) Which of the following men is widely known as a great artist of the American West?
a. Fredrick the Great
b. Fredrick Remington
c. Fredrick of Hollywood
d. Fredrick the Freeloader
2.) What Black and white western featured Jimmy Stewart, John Wayne, Lee Marvin and Andy Devine?
3.) Were Hoss and Adam Cartwright really brothers? What about Hop Sing?
4.) Was Doc Holiday arrested while sitting in the first base box seats at Wrigley Field in 1909?
Science and Math
1.) If you carried 15 feet of baling wire, two boxes of three-penny nails, two sets of leather gloves and three rolls of barb wire how many miles of fence could you build before lunch? How many excuses would you need not to return to work after a lazy, post-meal snooze?
2.) If a cowpuncher of the 1880s earned two dollars a day and a cowboy today is paid $10 per hour, who will become a millionaire first.
3. The physical law that most completely defines the concept behind irrigation is:
a. Newton’s law of Gravity
b. The Pythagorean theorem
c. Robert’s Rules of Order
d. Murphy’s Law
e. All of them
4. How cold is a knot at the North Pole?
General Knowledge
1. The most popular name chosen by North American cowboys for their horse is:
a. Bronco
b. Kitty
c. Spot
d. Sundance
e. Chester
2. Cowboy translated literally means…?
3. How did the wagon masters convince the tribes to ride in circles around the pioneer’s Conestogas while shooters picked them off, like carnival ducks, from under the cover of the wagons? (5000 words or less).
4. Is petit chien really translated as land bass in French? Can it be served with chives, cream and butter sauce and white wine?
5. Bonus Question: If the Hindus in India don’t eat meat why are they going to all the trouble to raise cattle?
ANSWERS IN THE STARS

Crested Butte Stamp To Honor Coal Mining Culture

(Elk Avenue  The Jack’s Cabin Punch and Postal  February  24 , 2016)

Residents and significant others will be treated to a new postage stamp recognizing the contributions of coal miners to the town and the nation. The first blocks are expected Friday in time for the weekend.

First day of issue stamps, featuring a lump of coal against a solid black background, will go on sale at noon.

“It looks a lot like a square off a checkerboard only smaller,” said one mailperson.
A gov’ment pamphlet described the stamp similarly, adding that “although it’s a bit abstract we are certain people will figure out what it represents after a while.”

A design to commemorate the fathers of skiing was dropped as was a jokester theme venerating the town’s famous two-story outhouse culture. Federal officials, in town on “other” business decided in favor of the coal-mining motif when several hundred paternity suits were filed in just 12 hours. In addition the owner of the outhouse refused to cooperate with the federals, threatening to shoot them if they “so much as wander onto my digs up here.”

In 1869 mercenaries loyal to Lloyd Woodrows-Harlan overran stockyards, stills and chicken coops up and down the East River Valley. Then the ragamuffin legions stopped the onslaught high above the town and immediately began constructing ski lifts. However after a few hours of digging they discovered incredible quality anthracite and sub-bituminous coal and opened mines instead, setting skiing on the back burner for 100 years. After another hour behind their respective shovels most of Harlan’s troops went to the bar for the rest of the day.

If sales of the coal mining stamp are as brisk as expected the feds will print a second stamp, which honors the sport of skiing in 2017. Officials are searching for a simple, yet symbiotic design that compliments the first stamp. Public input is not particularly welcome.

– Gabby Haze

Good food in Jerico, Colombia

We have the tools to satisfy your culinary appetite! Just come up the stairs to La Gruta Restaurant and Bar in Jerico, Antioquia, Colombia. Buen provecho!  (February 14, 2016)

Census Tough on Schizophrenics

(From the Buffalo Bill’s Buried Here Too News* — Feb 9 , 2016)

Lookout Mountain — The United States Census, conducted every ten years in appointed jurisdictions all over then nation, is painful, sometimes even devastating for the more than 200,000 registered schizophrenics in Colorado.
The line of questioning, simple enough to most of us, often causes confusion, disorientation and depression.

“Most of us are distrustful of anyone associated with the federal gov’ment to start with,” said Dr. Orem Quacken-Quacken, Chair of the Psychology Department at Buffalo Bill Marine Academy here.” Then they show up at your front door asking questions and writing on their clipboards. Most people deal with the intrusion while schizophrenics often run and hide, preferring not to answer the door at all.”

In addition Quacken-Quacken takes issue with the entire process of collecting information on population, saying the figures collected from many households are invalid and do not reflect distinctions between number of persons and number of personalities.

“Face to face episodes are often perceived as confrontational which skews the data,” continued the academic. “The census people should consider a secure mail-in form to avoid spinning out of control. Then all personalities might participate in a more protected environment.”

– Xeno Phobicette

*According to the 2010 Census the schizophrenic hero, Buffalo Bill is buried in decorated graves in Colorado, Wyoming, Montana and Utah. Rumors of another memorial resting place in New Mexico were extinguished when it became apparent that a tombstone bearing Bill’s epitaph was that of an actual buffalo slaughtered by railroad sharpshooters for its hide in 1877.

Plan to Widen Canyon Gets Senate Nod

(Montrose, CO — February 3, 2016)

A long-awaited decision on whether or not to widen the Black Canyon of the Gunnison was tabled today in Congress as all of the members fell asleep.

These right-after-a-big-lunch sessions never amount to a hill of beans, say unreliable sources that added that there was far more snoring than discussion on the issue.

The monumental construction, which was slated to begin in May, represents the federal government’s response to the transformation of the Black Canyon into a National Park by the federal government. It eyeballs the expansion of the dusty, rock-strewn old canyon into a 21st Century, four-lane chasm capable of handling run-off like that experienced millenniums ago. A series of foot bridges culminating at the apex will allow unheard of access to the surrounding wilderness as well as the state-of-the-art steel suspension natural land bridge, modeled after the one at Mexican Hat, Utah.

This harnessing of rock and water will connect Montrose to the rich peach fields of the North Fork Valley and beyond.

“The construction will give the over 4.8 billion federal employees something to do as they prepare for retirement,” said Earl DeHaviland, “and keep them the hell out of my office.”

Environmental groups, vehemently opposed to the project will be rounded up on the first day of summer and hurled from the heights into the raging Gunnison River far below. A peaceful, quiet dedication ceremony will follow.
When asked by a young reporter if the work was really necessary, DeHaviland appeared to take offense.

“Since when does necessity dictate action?” he blasted. “Since when does logic play the leading role? We’re just happy to have all this federal money flowing in our direction for a change. Now either stand aside or gab a shovel.”

– McKenzie Butte