May 13 2006

Well gang, this is the last week end for the Spring turkey hunt in Texas, and those Texans that haven’t already bagged their turkey are giving "Mom" a special Mother’s Day present this year by getting out of the house and going turkey hunting.
Bill Goebles who likes to be called "Gobbler" because his name is the same as that nazi from WWll, got his hunting done last week, so that he and his wife could spend Mother’s Day with his wife’s mother. A woman that he says he adores, but he won’t look at you when he says it.
At any rate, when "Gobbler" and a couple of friends got to their hunting patch last week, and had finished fixing the pipes that had frozen and broken during the winter, and had patched the roof which was leaking by the chimney, they settled into an evening of hunting stories and drinking beer.
As the evening wore on, "Gobbler" decided to show the boys his new turkey call, and even gave them a demonstration or two. He also showed them a couple of new turkey decoys that he planned to use.
He was really ready for them this year, and awoke the next morning full of confidence and nursing a hang-over that would have brought a bull elephant to his knees.
Fortunately there was plenty of "hair of the dog" laying around and he self-medicated in the traditional manner.
Just before dawn, he staggered out to a place near the fence line. When the ground proved too hard to push the wire legs of the decoys deep enough to hold them up, he carried the decoys over to a ground stand that he had chopped into a clump of bushes.
After catching his breath, he put his back to a tree and started in with his new turkey call.
It must have been pretty effective, because after a couple of minutes the decoy under his right elbow was viciously attacked by a mottled ball of tawny fur, that turned out to be a thirty- pound bobcat.
"Gobbler" instinctively struck back at the now spitting and screeching ball of fur. For every blow that he landed, the bobcat landed about ten.
When the shotgun went off (both barrels) the bobcat went straight up in the air and vanished.
"Gobbler" looked dazedly at the fence line in time to see one of three tom turkeys give his last couple of flaps. He was the one with the twelve and a half inch beard.
When the rest of the boys asked what had happened to his right arm and hand, he candidly admitted that he had lost his balance and had stumbled into the barbed wire of the fence-line.
The boys looked at each other, but didn’t say anything.
What happens on the hunt, stays on the hunt.

Till next week
Helga Biermeister
Secretary