Tuesday, October 26, 2004

 
Well-hung Doves?
Or: Alarums! The Pheasants Are Revolting!
Or: When Doves Putrefy*
Or: "Turning stomachs Japanese,Think I'm turning stomachs Japanese, It really stinks so...."**
Or: No Penalties For My Unsportsmenlike Conduct?

From today's NRO:"...According to the clearly traumatized Ms. Blumenfeld, this cornfield Krueger likes to watch doves "flutter and dart" before he fires. Then (PETA folk, look away) he will, he says, eat them. "You clean them. Let them hang. It takes three or four birds to have a meal. You might eat it at a picnic, cold roasted. I love dove."
The inbox of Andrew "Sten Gun" Stuttaford is probably bulging with tips from regular guys on "hanging" members of the clade Aves.(At the risk of causing the feathers of sportsmen to be *ruffled* or incurring the wrath of others who might *grouse* about it, I should note that I once dispatched a game bird which had been scurrying around in a heavily wooded area. The weapon used was a Colt 1911 45 automatic pistol, and, as was my practice many years ago(there's gotta' be a statute of limitations on this), I left the carcass to r- I mean-as fodder for nature's scavengers. I also used to slaughter birds with BBs and pellets in what was then my secluded suburban backyard, bagging them up only when the stench was noticeable. One of my brothers also bagged a pheasant with a 22 rifle fired from inside my house. No apologies for that either, given that one of them (pheasants)had broken a basement window pecking at its reflection. ) I've never cracked the copy of "Shogun" around here, but half-way watched some of the television series. And recall something icky happening or almost happening because the translator assigned to Richard Chamberlain's character, as well as other villagers, were torn between their loyalty to him and their revulsion for the smell of pheasants which he left hanging until ripe enough for his delicate english palate. I don't know if the article Googled from the Newfoundland Herald was a synopsis of the book or adaptation or both: "The significance of his word as the head of a house­hold is impressed upon Blackthorne when the Old Gardener (Akira Sera) is put to death for removing a rotting pheasant that the Anjin-san had ordered left alone until he was ready to eat it."

*Apologies to the ruffled&renamed, "Prince"
**-Hope that this here post didn't give nunna' y'all the *Vapors*.