When folks hear we live in the Southwest, they are apt to start spewing myths and sending us all kinds of kooky and kitschy knickknacks.
We become proud owners of things like a spoon rest shaped like a cowboy boot, salt and pepper shakers in the form of a cowboy boot and hat, and dish towels adorned with cactus.
We get lots of coyote everything and even some creepy kokopelli.
Now we can fight back.
Let’s give folks a real taste of the Southwest with Arizona Gecko Poop and Arizona Javelina Patties. Yes, these are real products on the market and just a few in a fine line put out by The Huckleberry People.
Leave it to a company in Montana to come up with Arizona Gecko Poop.
Actually, these folks have poop from all over the nation. Some from their home state includes Montana deer, elk and bear poop. They also sell Iowa Pig Poop and the mysteriously located bat guano.
Of course, the little boxes and bags actually contain chocolate-covered candies, not excrement, but we like the Huckleberry people’s style.
We can also include a note with our gift that clears up some Southwest myths. When folks hear you live in the Southwest they often think:
It’s always hot. This week’s 40-degree morning temperatures should clear that one up, as should the snow that hit Tucson in 2007. And to think I nearly gave away all my fur coats as I was packing to move from the East Coast.
It’s sandy and barren. Yes, it is. But the desert is much more than just a grand expanse of sand. There is plenty of shrub, brush and strange growths and even more wildlife to go with it. We especially dig the tumbleweeds as they make great art projects.
It’s full of cowboys. In my several years in New Mexico and Arizona I’ve only met one person who introduced himself as a cowboy. He was a 19-year-old at a rodeo in Clovis, N.M. He said, “I bet you never slept with a cowboy before,” right before he spit a wad of chew juice near his boot.
Gunfights are the norm. Well, this one is pretty much true. But the gunfights aren’t some dramatic event at the O.K. Corral but rather mundane and usually gang-related.
One more note: When I was moving from New York to New Mexico, more than one person asked if I was excited to be on my way to a foreign country and did I have a valid passport. No kidding.
[tnipoll]
What do you think?
Do you get kitschy gifts in honor of the Southwest?
What other Southwest myths have you heard?
Which ones irk you the most? Which ones make you laugh?
“I bet you never slept with a cowboy before,” right before he spit a wad of chew juice near his boot.
How could you resist? Sounds like the start of a long and meaningful relationship. Nothing like ropy brown saliva to pique a girl’s interest.
hahhahahahahhaha!
let’s just say i declined…but i will NEVER forget that moment, that’s for sure – hahahhahahha.
Rattlesnake eggs are a favorite of mine. Mornin’ Rynski! This reminds me of the Stuckeys you used to see everywhere; what a tourist trap those places were. Oh, and the ‘Thing?’ another crappy disappointment.
PS- so…you never told us whether you launched into a torrid romance with said cowpoke…do tell! 😉
Darn, I wanted to see how this all unfolded on Rynski’s Dating Game… 🙂
ha! sorry – if you like, i could instead hypothesize how it would have turned out:
not well.
hahaha.
hiya radmax –
i am so sad i’ve only been to one stuckeys – or so i think – i remember a giant rest stop with really cool sandals that didn’t fit but they had turquoise on them and i wanted to buy them anyway.
only heard murmurs of the “thing” – but did forget to include that other demonic thing that is always supposed to be running around killing people – what the heck is it called again?
Ahh the “Thing” was pretty disappointing, I agree. Just another mummified dead thing, if I recall correctly. 😛
that does sound kind of lame. why do i have to run all over to see the “thing” when i have mummified dead things in my own house?
Jenna, I think it was a monkey skull stuck on a fish body with rabbit bones for limbs…pretty damn goofy lookin’ ‘thing’.
sounds dumber than the jackalope even.
HAHA jackalope! I forgot about that…I change my vote from “it’s always hot” to “other” and the jackalope is my new favorite superstition. I totally believed that thing existed when I was a kid, and I’d always look out the windows trying to spot one, lol.
It sounds like a dead ringer for Mrs. Leftfield’s dog. I think I’ll put up some billboards and start charging to see “The Thing”.
Haha! Geez Lefty, there used to be a zillion of those billboards, all over the southwest. Can’t say as I miss ’em.
Chupacabra?
I hear tell that they thought they had found a living specimen. Turns our it was just Pat Robertson.
Too funny!
Yeah, the chupacabra seems to elicit lots of questions and concerns from those living in other parts of the country.
yesssss! the chupacabra!
like your jest on it.
i also like to mix the chupacabra up with the capybara. i paid a dollar at a coney island side show exhibit to see the “BIGGEST RAT IN THE WORLD.” but alas, it was a capybara.
Beelzebub incarnate, no doubt. 😉
the chupacabra or the giant rat?
Pat Robertson. Back in the day, my pals and I used to get high and laugh our asses off watching this fool and his ‘guests’ on the 700 club. I, to this day, have trouble figuring out just exactly how gullible one would have to be to buy this guy’s spiel.
In my day, the thing was to get high and watch Soap Operas; the one with Luke and Laura. I forget the name of the show. What a waste of time.
Groan…General Hospital…my 1st ex-Radmax loved that brain melter.
Hi Ryn! People in the Northeast section of the US are pretty funny when it comes to myths. My dad used to live in Maine, and while I was visiting him there, his friends and family would always tell me that I sounded like a hillbilly. How nice of them, huh?
Speaking of silly little gifts, my mom used to have an “Arizona Bean Spoon.” It was a wooden spoon, and the handle looked like a ladder. The little note attached to it said that if you left the spoon in the pot of beans while they were cooking, the little “farts” would climb out using the ladder, therefore getting rid of the possibility of getting gas after eating the beans. Haha 😀
hey jenna!
love the fahrl-reducing bean spoon! too funny. it would sit well in my cowboy boot spoon rest. hahahah.
the southwest does have a fine array of myths, for sure. and if it’s any consolation, i doubt you sound like a hillbilly since you don’t type like a hillbilly at all. haha.
i lived briefly in the northwest where the biggest myth is BIGFOOT – had to hear about sightings every other minute. bigfoot gives me the creeps.
jenna – just fixed typo in my above comment – it should have said i DOUBT you sound like a hillbilly –
Haha, thanks Ryn! I know that I most definitely do not sound like a hillbilly. I sound a lot like a “Jenna” I’m told. 😉
And yes! That bean spoon would go perfectly with your spoon holder! I wonder if my mom still has that thing, as I haven’t seen it in years!
This is interesting. Although Arizona is not the most sophisticated place on earth, neither is Maine. I’ve been there. Like Arizona, the place is stunningly beautiful, but you don’t have to get very far outside of the few urban centers to run into some pretty interesting characters who seem vaguely like they’re speaking English, but you can’t really understand what the heck they’re saying.
I know EXACTLY what you mean. It took some getting used to, that’s for sure. I’m so glad my dad left that place far behind…he’s back in AZ now.
the only maine i’ve experienced is through stephen king movies – they are ALL set in maine, it seems.
so i think the place is full of evil clowns in the sewers and aliens in the woods.
Sounds about right, Ryn, hahaha
The one Southwest myth that I want to clear up right here and now is that Rocky Mountain Oysters are too tough and chewy to enjoy.
Not true. They used to be a non-menu item at Pinnacle Peak in Traildust Town, but the last time der Frau and I were thru the Old Pueblo, they were no more.
Too bad. Breaded, deep fried and dipped in a cocktail sauce, they were just the thing to start a great rare Cowboy steak dinner with.
Back here we have poickled squirrel nutz, but they’re to damn small to enjoy.
Yer Redneck pal, Ferrari Bubba