A bunch of cows standing together definitely look like hoodlums waiting for someone to beat up. (I did wonder how one tipped cows. 20% for good service?)
Ha! Apparently cow tipping is an urban myth (not that I would ever get close enough to a cow to find out). But a bunch of cows looking like hoodlums? YES.
Argh, I think my previous comment about how much I loved this post vanished because I got distracted by the other great comments. Anyhoo, I loved this post. SO MUCH. Thanks for bowing to the will of the people. Also, as an undergraduate at Stanford, I totally bought into this urban legend and thought people went up to the Dish to do it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cow_tipping
I'm so glad you commented again! When we next meet for coffee, I'll need to tell you a story involving cows and the Dish (but not cow tipping at the Dish). And I don't know if it will make you feel better or worse if I tell you that I too thought cow tipping was a thing (mostly because I wanted it to be true) until a friend of ours who grew up on a farm was like, "Uh, do you understand how cows work?" Needless to say, I did not.
Summers when I was small, we visited a farm in upstate PA. It was owned by a German communist who had fled to America in the '30s and married a woman from New England. During the war, they had said that, should the Nazis win, my parents should come to them immediately to be hidden. It was a farm of the time, small, somewhat mechanized, and with cows. Not cattle, which I'd see later when living in ranch country, but cows. Having an excessive love for animals, I demanded to see the cows up close, so my father lifted me over the fence and I ran toward one. The grass was green, the sky was blue, but what my foot got stuck in was most decidedly brown. I froze and screamed and screamed until my father climbed that fence and rescued me, losing a pair of his shoes in the effort. But I still love cows: the charming Jerseys and Guernseys of England and, most especially, the miniature Highland cattle people keep as pets.
What a vivid memory -- blue sky, green grass, and... some other stuff. 🤣 I think I might be able to get behind the miniature Highland cattle but only because I could probably take one in a fight.
When I was 3 or 4, we were living in some tiny village while my father was doing his military service, or kolhoz, or something where urban-dwellers like us were forced to go live in dirt.
I, too, was attacked by a cow on said farm, which I cleverly hid from by going to run and stand behind a ladder. Ladders being so solid and all. My mother, who likely fears and loathes cows even more than you do, ran and started yelling and hitting the cow on the rump. Because... mothers.
Also, my brother, when he was little, would see the signs on the California highways indicating that cows would be crossing the road, and somehow got the idea that those signs meant "Attacking Cows." Which is what we have called them ever since.
There is so much I love here: your cleverness in standing behind a ladder (at least you ran—I just froze and then got stuck in a tree), your intrepid mom, and, most of all, attacking cows. Cows are malevolent and dangerous and more people need to know!
"Mirror" is now on my to-watch list. Even that short clip is so incredibly evocative and piercingly nostalgic that I wanted to cry. And given that Tarkovsky is a legend I'm flattered to be in the same sentence with him.
First of all, thank you so much - I laughed out loud at the picture bit, esp as it was truly a reveal b/c I didn't see them on my screen at the same time. Secondly, I feel your bovineaphobia is well-justified - that would have been terrifying at any age. Here in the UK, it's common to refer to a woman as a "cow" if she's being horrible, so further proof that they are not to be trusted.
A bunch of cows standing together definitely look like hoodlums waiting for someone to beat up. (I did wonder how one tipped cows. 20% for good service?)
Ha! Apparently cow tipping is an urban myth (not that I would ever get close enough to a cow to find out). But a bunch of cows looking like hoodlums? YES.
Argh, I think my previous comment about how much I loved this post vanished because I got distracted by the other great comments. Anyhoo, I loved this post. SO MUCH. Thanks for bowing to the will of the people. Also, as an undergraduate at Stanford, I totally bought into this urban legend and thought people went up to the Dish to do it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cow_tipping
I am nothing if not gullible.
I'm so glad you commented again! When we next meet for coffee, I'll need to tell you a story involving cows and the Dish (but not cow tipping at the Dish). And I don't know if it will make you feel better or worse if I tell you that I too thought cow tipping was a thing (mostly because I wanted it to be true) until a friend of ours who grew up on a farm was like, "Uh, do you understand how cows work?" Needless to say, I did not.
Apparently I don't know how they work, either. Looking forward to hearing your Dish/cow story. (Sounds like the name of an alt-rock band. "Dish/Cow.")
Summers when I was small, we visited a farm in upstate PA. It was owned by a German communist who had fled to America in the '30s and married a woman from New England. During the war, they had said that, should the Nazis win, my parents should come to them immediately to be hidden. It was a farm of the time, small, somewhat mechanized, and with cows. Not cattle, which I'd see later when living in ranch country, but cows. Having an excessive love for animals, I demanded to see the cows up close, so my father lifted me over the fence and I ran toward one. The grass was green, the sky was blue, but what my foot got stuck in was most decidedly brown. I froze and screamed and screamed until my father climbed that fence and rescued me, losing a pair of his shoes in the effort. But I still love cows: the charming Jerseys and Guernseys of England and, most especially, the miniature Highland cattle people keep as pets.
What a vivid memory -- blue sky, green grass, and... some other stuff. 🤣 I think I might be able to get behind the miniature Highland cattle but only because I could probably take one in a fight.
They look so much like doodle dogs but you don't have to walk them and their poo is good for the garden!
I guess the point of my story is: no fear of cows, just fear of cow manure/flop/shit/pasture pies.
This a-moooo-sed me greatly. 🤣I dunno, that tiny calf pictured at the end there looks distinctly demonic to me…
They're all demonic, I tell you! Every last one of them.
So who knew we had this in common, too?
When I was 3 or 4, we were living in some tiny village while my father was doing his military service, or kolhoz, or something where urban-dwellers like us were forced to go live in dirt.
I, too, was attacked by a cow on said farm, which I cleverly hid from by going to run and stand behind a ladder. Ladders being so solid and all. My mother, who likely fears and loathes cows even more than you do, ran and started yelling and hitting the cow on the rump. Because... mothers.
Also, my brother, when he was little, would see the signs on the California highways indicating that cows would be crossing the road, and somehow got the idea that those signs meant "Attacking Cows." Which is what we have called them ever since.
There is so much I love here: your cleverness in standing behind a ladder (at least you ran—I just froze and then got stuck in a tree), your intrepid mom, and, most of all, attacking cows. Cows are malevolent and dangerous and more people need to know!
Always love and look forward to your content.
Irena’s bovinophobia is perfectly understandable. I couldn’t help but think how perfectly this story would have fit in a Tarkovsky film, specifically his masterwork “Mirror”, which is largely set in rural Soviet Russia. I can imagine just how he would have filmed it. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=qicqUpLTrtE&pp=ygUcTWlycm9yIHRhcmtvdnNreSBmaWVsZCBzY2VuZQ%3D%3D
"Mirror" is now on my to-watch list. Even that short clip is so incredibly evocative and piercingly nostalgic that I wanted to cry. And given that Tarkovsky is a legend I'm flattered to be in the same sentence with him.
First of all, thank you so much - I laughed out loud at the picture bit, esp as it was truly a reveal b/c I didn't see them on my screen at the same time. Secondly, I feel your bovineaphobia is well-justified - that would have been terrifying at any age. Here in the UK, it's common to refer to a woman as a "cow" if she's being horrible, so further proof that they are not to be trusted.
Two Britishisms I'm adding to my lexicon thanks to you: "mental" and "cow."