Bull in a China Shop

[chubbyalaskagriz]

Went into a fancy knick-knack shop this afternoon to help my sister look for pieces of a discontinued china pattern she likes... at the counter I saw a cute sign that read: "Unattended Children Will Be Given an Espresso and a Free Puppy."

[StickyPirate]

Oh, that rocks. Can I quote it?

[chubbyalaskagriz]

Absolutely, SP- Ha!

[KYHeirloomer]

I love signs like that; ones that get the message across in a sly way.

Y'all ever been in a campground, and see all those "no smoking" signs bolted to the doors of motorhomes? I mean, come on! Who's going inside unless invited, and you can tell them individually that there's no smoking in your unit.

So, after mumbling about that in campgrounds across the country I find, at Wall Drug, a gread sign that sat right on my dashboard. Visible from any direction it said:

"Thank you for holding your breath while I smoke!"

Another one I always liked was the poster with the black cat and white rat. The cat has its paw around the rat in a friendly manner. They're obviously buds. The legend on the poster: The rat race is over. The rats won.

[Cook Chatty Cathy]

I just can't help but jump in on this sign "thingie": I live in the deep south and it never fails to amuse me how there are NO TRESPASSING signs hanging in front of home places where these really trashy dumpy looking yards are. The yards usually sport 3 to 5 or more old rusted-out cars and several piles of trash in various sections of the yard and where even grass will not dare to grow and there in that yard bold as day a huge "NO TRESPASSING" sign or several are hung!

Don't these people who live there realize that their yard is the very last place on earth I want to step!!!

[chubbyalaskagriz]

Exactly, Cathy! I once saw a sign on a tree in such a yard that read: "Nothing on this property is worth your life! signed, gun-owner"! Great sign, but this dude clearly was all about protecting assets that not too many folks woulda ever been too intersted in monkeying around with, anyway- Ha!

[KYHeirloomer]

There is a tradition in the deep south that may be involved here.

In many cases it has to do with keeping the PVA guy at bay. You look at a place and think it's a junk yard. Old cars as lawn decorations (except there ain't no lawn); siding ten years past due for paint; etc.

Then you get invited in and it's like going through a star gate. The inside is like the Taj Mahal.

What's happened is the outside is kept intentionallly junky, and everything is put into the actual living spaces. And the taxes are kept low.

Of course, some of those places are no more than what you see; eyesores inside and out.

"No Trespassing" signs can be culturally based. In Montana, for instance, they don't put up signs, as such. Instead they use yellow paint and draw three parallel rings around trees, fenceposts, etc.

Hell on strangers who don't know the code!

And who was it that pointed out the landowner's seriousness could be judged by the age of the paint. Three faded rings might mean he was open to discussion. But bright paint, with drip marks still showing, might mean the crosshairs of a .270 were on your temple even as you tried to figure out what the rings meant.

[Cook Chatty Cathy]

Originally Posted by KYHeirloomer

Hell on strangers who don't know the code!
But bright paint, with drip marks still showing, might mean the crosshairs of a .270 were on your temple even as you tried to figure out what the rings meant.

Yeah, and round these parts it would mean a belly full o' buckshot

[KYHeirloomer]

Out there, Cathy, in places where they seriously question whether or not a
.300 Weatherby Mag is enough gun, they don't concern themselves with anything as effete as a scattergun.

[chubbyalaskagriz]

In Alaska when I worked for Princess Cruises, one benefit to employees was we got to register at the hotel tour desk, and possibly tag along on land excursions and tours with resort guests on our days off, if there was space available due to unsold seats. Many times I went on free whale watching day-cruises, helicopter galcier tours, rail rides on the Princess cars of the Alaska Railiroad, etc in this manner.

Well, me being fairly chatty and quite open and approachable- I often found myself playing tour guide, sharing tid-bits of info and my experiences to questioning tourists... and there was always a slight amount of embarrassment as we meandered through some of the world's most pristine scenery just to happen onto some privately-owned land that might look like a total junk-yard! (It's common in outlying areas to see exactly as Cathy describes, yards full of piles of crap... rusted-out boats, cars, trucks, barrels of this 'n that, mountains of sh#t under plastic blue tarps, etc. You get the idea!)

Always some red-lipped, blue-haired, high-heel-wearin' well-to-do socialite from New Jersey or Charleston or Santa Barbara would ask me why on earth these n'er-do-well savages would want to pollute the scenery in such poor taste like that?

I usually just explained that A.) in remote locales outside of cities and towns there might not be any formal garbage or re-cycling pick-up methods, so getting rid of stuff wasn't as easy as one might think in such areas... and B.) when one has a cabin on a wooded lot in a valley surrounded by mountain ranges, national forests, ice fields, rolling rapids and blue-ice glaciers... it's easy to consider your tiny yard just your "storage shed", and the outlying countryside your actual "back-yard". And if one was to ask the home-owner, he would consider that he had the most flawless, lovely back-yard in all the world.

Sometimes this explanation (ie; "excuse") worked to satisfy the blue-hairs and sometimes not. But I can assure of one thing... at some point during that glacier tour or nature hike it was gonna be up to ME to bend my happy-azz over and pick-up the empty one liter Aquafina bottle Mrs. Blue-Hair forgot and left behind on a boulder... or pluck the plastic price-tags removed from the 9 sweatshirts for her grandchildren and the plastic gift-shop bag they came in that she tossed into a stand of purple lupine trailside... I guess "litter" is all in the eye of the beholder!