The Las Vegas Strip

Here it was over a month after the big deal, and Dick was still down in the dumps and walkin’ around with this bummed-out frown on his face. He looked a lot like a sheepherder that just got his dog shot.

“Aw come on cheer up,” his ol’ buddy Billy chided, trying to hold back the little giggle that always seemed to sneak up out of his belly when he thought about it. “You’ll pr’obly never see her again anyway.”

“Just clam up,” Dick snarled back, ignoring his chuckling pardner. “I’m goin’ ridin’.”

As soon as Dick had stomped across the kitchen and slammed the door, Billy just couldn’t hold it back anymore. With his ol’ buddy finally out of earshot, he broke out in a big belly laugh just thinkin’ about it; so tickled that the tears were rolling down his stubbly cheeks.

You see, Dick and Billy, those two old bachelor cowboys that ranch way down by the river, had made another trip to the National Finals Rodeo in Las Vegas last fall. They’ll probably go back again sometime, but right now Dick swears that he’ll never set foot in that town again. “‘Cause it’d be just too durn embarrassin’.”

Billy popped the top on yet another liquid refreshment, and reared back in his chair to relive the moment. He’d had the time of his life.

There’s a lot going on in Las Vegas when the NFR is in town, and a hick country boy can get in trouble without even tryin’. The boys had bought some brand new shirts and overalls, had sold a couple of old dry cows for a little extra money, and off to the big doin’s they went.

They had quite a time too, but being a couple of buckaroo bachelors from out in the sticks that knew a whole lot more about cows and horses than about the female members of their own species, it took them a while to get the hang of things. In fact, I’m not too sure they ever did.

They went to the rodeo the first night they got there, and I’ll tell you what, she was a dandy. After the big show, the boys headed back to their glitzy hotel down on the strip to see what else they could find. They soon found out that a feller could find just about anything he was lookin’ for down there and a whole lot of stuff he wasn’t. There were lights flashin’ and bands playing and action every place.

“Boy, I’d sure like to do a little dancin’,” Dick remarked, as the Texas Swing band in the crowded lounge struck up an old Bob Wills tune.

“Me too,” slurred his partially inebriated partner. “But I ain’t lookin’ forward to getting’ the dickens pounded out of me fer askin’ the wrong gal to dance. How’s a feller s’posed to know what’s what around here?”

Their dilemma was soon solved when they saw an ad for female escorts. Because Dick is a better talker, Billy made him do the callin’.

“Hello. We was readin’ yer ad and we’re in town here for the rodeo, and we’d like to see about a couple of gals to go dancin’.” There was a long pause as the lady on the other end of the phone filled Dick in on all of the details.

“Five hundred dollars! A piece? We don’t want to buy ‘em, we just want to dance with ‘em.” Dick held his hand over the receiver. “Billy this is a dumb hair-brained idea you got! They want us to pay ‘em five hundred dollars a piece just to go dancin’! Fer that much money they oughta let us take ‘em back t’ the ranch!”

“Well,” Billy burped, “I really doubt if they’ll let us take ‘em home fer that, but ask ‘em if they know how to dance. Heck, this only comes around once a year. I don’t mind tradin’ that pot bellied old cow I sold fer a night o’ good dancin’. I say if they know how to dance let’s just go fer it.”

Dick just stared at his pardner for a second or two and then took his hand off the receiver and made the deal. About a half an hour later they met the two dancin’ girls in the hotel lobby, and headed down the street to where they’d heard the band playin’.

Doggone it, but those gals were friendly; a couple of sort of fancy thoroughbreds. They were a little on the long legged side, and their dresses might have been a little too tight and maybe just a tad too short, but then the boys reasoned with legs that long, maybe they’d sort of grown out of ‘em.

They danced the night away, and had themselves a time. For some reason the girls kept lookin’ at their watch and wondering if the boys wanted to go back to the hotel.

“Are you kiddin?” Billy wondered out loud. “I ain’t heard a band this good since I seen old Bob Wills hisself down in Fort Worth.”

The problem arose when they headed out for the pickup to go to another dancehall down the strip. Dick, bein’ the athletic showoff that he is, got himself in a real pickle that he won’t live down for quite a while. He told Billy and the gals to just wait out in the street in front of the casino, and he’d go back and bring the pickup around to give them a ride.

The problem was, when he cut across a little piece of grass to where the outfit was parked, there was a ten foot high security fence between him and where he needed to go. He could see his pickup over there not fifty yards away, and it was either walk all the way back around or just shinny over the fence.

Well, shinny over he did, but he ran into an itty-bitty problem. There must have been some poison in all of those refreshments they’d consumed while they’d been dancin’, because he lost his balance right as he went over the top. His brand new overalls hung up on the top wire, and there he was, hanging upside down with his head five or six feet off the ground.

“Now what in the dickens am I gonna do?” Dick thought to himself. Try as he may, he couldn’t wiggle free, and those new overalls weren’t about to give up. There he hung…. and there was no gettin’ loose. It was in a fairly dark isolated area, with not a soul to help. He was just plain stuck there.

That’s when he got the bright idea. “I know! I’ll just undo the buckle on my jeans and slip right out of ‘em. Then I’ll climb back up and unhook ‘em and put ‘em back on.”

By rights, that does sound like a plausible remedy, but he ran into a little hitch. When he undid his jeans, he only slid about three feet further down, until his boots hung up in the legs.

Now, he’s in even worse shape than before. His BVDs got caught in his jeans, and his shirttail is up around his neck. Now he’s hangin’ upside down with his shirttail covering his head and naked as a J Bird from his hocks all the way down to his armpits.

That’s where Billy and the two girls found him. For some reason, the girls didn’t even seem to be embarrassed by such a sight, but poor ol’ Dick sure was. Fortunately the pounding in his head was loud enough he couldn’t hear their giggles.

“Just think, Muffy,” one of the dancin’ girls giggled to the other, “we haven’t seen anything like that since we saw ol’ Bob Wills himself down in Fort Worth.”

Keep Smilin’….

and don’t forget to check yer cinch.