Unregistered Bull in a Hotel Lobby

Choice gleanings from 45-plus years of Unregistered Bull.

John was in a good humor this week, else he couldn’t have held his temper so well when a stranger, seeking conversation in the traditional manner, sat down by him in the lobby and observed that West Texas was certainly having some warm, sunny weather for this time of year.

John politely replied that about six more months of such nice weather would absolutely ruin the country, but this didn’t stop the stranger at all. He began contrasting Texas weather with the kind of weather he was used to back home in the East. Also, it seems he’d traveled a lot in the North and had seen some awfully cold weather, while in Arizona and Death Valley he’d seen terribly hot weather.

Ordinarily, John would have been agreeable with anybody who tried to be friendly by making a remark about the weather. But for a stranger to say that Texas weather was inferior to that in other parts of the country was too much.

"Tell you about this weather in Texas," he said, "it’s nearly always hot as chili in Chihuahua, or cold as a polar bear’s back bumper. You don’t draw any conclusions about the weather here till you’ve had some experience with it. And then you won’t say anything about it for certain except that it’s peculiar.

"Maybe some places can claim hotter weather than we have, though I’ll match Presidio against nearly any of them. Maybe it’s colder in some parts than Dalhart at daylight with a blue norther on, but I doubt it.

"However, we won’t debate whether our extremes are more extreme than places you’ve been. But you will have to admit our extremes are suddener than any you’ve seen elsewhere."

"Oh, I don’t know," said the stranger seriously, still not aware he was committing a grave social error by speaking lightly about Texas weather, "I’ve seen some quick changes in temperatures along the Canadian border."

"I don’t care if you cut your initials on the North Pole," said John. "There’s no place where they have weather like we have in Texas. I’ll give you an example:

"You’ve seen these stuffed bucking horses, haven’t you, which people climb on to have their pictures taken like they were riding a bronc? Well, the original idea for that was produced by Texas weather right out here on a ranch. A cowboy named Shorty went to rustle the horses one morning and the night horse tried to pitch him off. Just then a norther hit and froze that horse right in the middle of his buck. In fact, the horse was frozen in mid-air. Shorty managed to get down off of him, but just then the norther quit, the sun came out, and the horse went ahead and hit the ground. Landed on Shorty’s foot and crippled him up pretty bad, too.

"Maybe you’ve heard of people cutting cattle? Did you ever wonder how that word ‘cutting’ got started? Texas weather was responsible. A cowman up on the Panhandle was going to sort some dry cows out of a herd to ship to market. Just as they got the herd rounded up, a blue norther hit. The cattle froze together. You’ve heard of cattle freezing to death, of course, as much as you’ve been around, but I’ll bet you never saw a thousand head freeze solid like that. The cowpunchers climbed up on top of the herd and walked all over it looking for a loose cow, but there wasn’t any. Finally, they got some chopping axes, hacked out the drys and dragged ‘em off to one side. Pretty soon the norther stopped all at once and you never saw such a mad bunch of cows in your life. They’d been worked without a single one getting to run a race with a cowpony.

"Naw, they don’t have weather anywhere else in the world to compare with Texas. The weather here is just like everything else in Texas — in a class by itself.

"If you don’t believe me, just ask some manufacturer of thermometers when you get back East. This is the only area on earth where thermometers wear out. The friction of that mercury jumping up and down shakes ‘em all to pieces. One manufacturer right now is working on a ball-bearin’ thermometer just for the Texas trade."

The last statement was all the stranger could stand. He eased off toward the coffee shop.

"Now, what do you think of that?" John said. "You try to educate some hombre and he picks up and leaves before you’ve completed the first lesson. However, maybe he’ll be a little more polite next time he starts telling somebody about weather conditions, instead of exaggeratin’ so much!"—(S.F. 11/29/51)