Ricky Harpole column

Published 12:00 am Tuesday, April 3, 2012

Harpole keeps Moccasin Bend crowd sober; encounters sheriff


By Ricky Harpole

It’s sad but true. That down at Moccasin Bend are some sin and Mocca.

I was down there last week trying to keep them rascals sober—at least sober enough to go home to their wives and husbands, and not create an undue amount of carnage and cause interference with the catfish season.

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The only way I could figure out how to do it was to get rid of the hooch. Well, I was raised up to not waste anything. So pouring out expensive commodities like Old Granddad or Evan Williams were not an option.

For one thing Emily Williams works for this newspaper and for all I know she might be a great granddaughter of Ol’ Evan. It might have even cost me my hobby to commit such a disrespectful act. With the general sobriety of the crowd on such soggy ground. I did the only honorable thing. I broke out with my one quart Mississippi redneck shot glass and did my level best to “head ‘em off at the pass.”

Well, I guess I done a fair job on the project because nobody went to jail.

The “stay at home” folks ain’t shot nobody since Saturday night, which is a positive sign.
There is a 30 gallon oil drum full of fruit jars and whiskey bottles and I’ve got a headache that would bust a sweet gum stump but I kept ‘em outta trouble.

It’s a heavy load but someone has to bear it, and all too often it winds up bein’  me. If the “BC Powder” people or “Goodies” or Bayer Aspirin ever goes out of business I doubt I’ll be good for another rescue mission like that. To add gasoline to the fire that was the weekend of the WBLE 100.5 Local Yokel anniversary show which has been an annual event for nine years.

I had two hours to directify and show up for the show. The first vehicle I saw on the lot had a license tag that read S.O. 1. That new sheriff had beat me to the ball game. He got more air time than Mark “Muleman” Massey and me put together.

Now ain’t that a bird dog?

Suffering from sin,
Ricky Harpole