They didn't know I'd stolen the cows.

"Brrrrrrrrrrap"

However, the delightfully fresh smell ought have tipped them off.

(Let us now continue this story one sentence at a time.)

It was perhaps their own fault; when livestock one owns starts laying golden pats, it's not as if one should go around telling everybody.

"i did not steal the cows."

Because of the wang.

I had a bucket of purple paint at hand and was ready to be remarkable.

hahaha

But soon I was to be found out, I feared, because of certain evidences mounting against me.

... But they did ask a lot of questions about my new leather jacket and pants.

xpost

Truthfully, the bronzed cowskull around my neck would've been a tipoff to anybody but the blind. But a man deserves to boast a little after eating a seeing-eye-cow sandwich.

Or the bottle of Lea & Perrins.

HOOS, aren't you in an MFA program?

...said one cow. Yes, these cows were not yr ORDINARY cows.

Extra-ordinary though they may have been in life, the steaks these stolen cows made were not really up to par. They were more like bogey steaks, or birdie steaks. Little delicate birdie steaks, like a sparrow t-bone. And the ribs? Subprime. Dangerously subprime. The kind that'll bring your bowels crash to your ankles like an unpayable mortgage.

Frankly, the whole endeavor had taken a certain kind of shady guts. Loose guts. You might even say loose morels. But morels were in short supply in these parts, so I used truffles instead.

<p>

I should probably introduce myself.

They call me cap'n save-a-cow.

But enough about me, Big Hoos the CATTLEDRIVER. Instead I'll introduce the main character of this tale. His name is Connecticut P. Lockjaw, and he's got a face like a week-old trout.

But where it counts he's all man.

Where it doesn't count he's got two udders and a dangling sack of roe.

I was up over Bumpass Pass before they found the prints from my Starburys.

Now that's what I call a thread title. Made me click.

...said another cow. "WTF is up with these talking cows?", said cow #3.

Fearing the Starburys connected me to the crime, I pulled out of Bumpass Pass so quickly I left the condom still inside him.

I would show them, these art world fakes and their model hanger-ons. I would show them all the most visionary work of the age. Me. Ed Zablotnik.

"UH," replied my faithful squire Hunter, age 3. He seemed to believe his work was most visionary. It was true; his works were dazzling, yet sublime.
I knew this could only mean one thing: Hunter and Ed would have to duel with revolvers at dawn.

Ed Zablotnik is the name it said on my stolen I.D. Ed Zablotnik didn't say much, because he was buried beneath the porch.

Since Ed was dead, and I didn't much feel like dueling with a toddler, I shot dawn at dusk to hurry things up.

But soon all of Fort Worth would wake up to news of the biggest vanishing act in Texas history, and it wouldn't be long before I was proclaimed from coast to coast as the Harry Houdini of livestock, a galloping ghost on the range, the greatest cattle rustler of them all.

HOOS, aren't you in an MFA program?

-- nabisco, Wednesday, January 2, 2008 7:14 PM

It's in the plans, but you'd never know it from my writing.

Oh, okay. I was gonna be disturbed if you were seriously all "LOL I has a sentence" about workshop submissions and stuff

Why would you be disturbed? Forgive me, I'm not familiar with the mechanics of MFA programs. Disturbed because I'm throwing a sentence I might be publishing up on the internets or what?

I would show them, these art world fakes and their model hanger-ons. I would show them all the most visionary work of the age. Me. Ed Zablotnik.

-- gabbneb

Gold.

Disturbed because I'm throwing a sentence I might be publishing up on the internets or what?

I don't want to speak for Nabisco but you start a lotta threads/yak a lot about your writing when maybe you should be working on your writing instead of posting on an Internet message board about your writing? I dunno, my 2 cents, grain of salt etc etc etc

True enough, Mr. Que. I just thought this was an amusing line and figured it'd make a good post title too.

c'mon dude get to work on the next sentence dude. it IS a good post title though

Umm actually I shouldn't have said anything, because this will just sound like rampant snobbery on my part, or something, and really you should have whatever the hell writing habits you want to have! I just thought for some reason that you were currently in workshops, in which case there is usually a kind of pre-existing focus/planning on what you're Seriously Trying To Do that precludes messageboard "LOL guyz should I start a story with this sentence" type of stuff, K THNX BAI

Yeah it had occurred to me that you meant something along those lines. I'm "workshopping" some stories in the creative writing program at the undergrad level at the moment. I do have an aim for what I'm Seriously Trying To Do with my writing, and this goofy opening line is actually part of a SERIOUS STORY believe it or not, but perhaps I should understand your point as saying that the work should be taken seriously?

(i blame the line on that steve martin book i just read btw)

No, dude, you're absolutely fine. Comment probably has more to do with my own habits than anything. And undergrad workshop =/= MFA workshop.

Gathered.

really? like, how?

undergrad workshop : MFA workshop :: being 20 : being 30

?

Ahhhhh. Gotcha, that makes total sense now.

And the ribs? Subprime. Dangerously subprime. The kind that'll bring your bowels crash to your ankles like an unpayable mortgage.

-- remy bean, Wednesday, January 2, 2008 7:32 PM

i lol'd

This story (once finished) won me a small prize for fiction on my way out the door of Texas State.

Deadly.

\m/

congrats!

Thankig u!

WOOT!

This didn't end up being the opening line after all, but it does still appear.

what is opening line

"I hadn't slept well in a while. It made this kind of work natural."

Admittedly not as distinctive as the thread title, but in workshop it was generally agreed that "This is a fantastic opening line for a story, but it's the wrong opening line for this story."

hmm. hard to tell w/out reading rest of story but yeah, less flashy, not as distinctive, but i've read a lot worse. and i'm a sucker for first person

^that makes it sound i don't like the lines, but i do HOOS.

If you are not in TX now, where is a HOOS?

A Hoos is still in Texas, just not at Texas State University. Matriculated in May.

Disgusting.

^^^ good use of ambiguity there

I think Hoos that you've got something there. But I'm not sure what. I look forward to the next installment. How is the class like? Do you have any smugs that are all "yeah I pretty much wrote my magnum opium (and they say it completely with conviction) when I was six. I'm just here to 'refresh' my ideas"