Monday, April 21, 2008

• boy howdy live

  Back in the day when I was a traveling salesman, I used to do some of my selling in a beauty shop right in the middle of nowhere but kind of close to the geographical center of Texas.  Caldwell, I think.

  The owner of the beauty shop was a real friendly and beautiful woman.  She was a runner-up in a Mrs. Texas contest and you would believe it if you saw her.  She was delightful and charming as well.  As dreary as spending 3 or 4 hours selling photos in a beauty shop could be, it was made almost tolerable by spending the time with a charming and beautiful person.  Her husband was also a delightful person.  I can't speak to his looks naturally, but, as a couple, they weren't a horrible mismatch or anything. 

  He would always make a point to come by while I was there and say howdy to me.  He would also say the same thing to me about my job, "Woooweee, you got some job!  Sitting around here lookin at purty women all day."  All you can do in a conversation like that is just shake your head and agree.  He's just wanting to be friendly and I would just respond as friendly as I could.  "Yeah, it sure is nice." Or somesuch.  What could I say? "Well really, you can't imagine the painful humiliation I feel in knowing that my children's comfort relies totally on whether or not these empty-headed rubes will like a photograph of themselves or not".

  No. You can't say that. So you just nod and agree.

  I wish I could remember his name, but I wouldn't be surprised if it was Jim Bob or something like that.  Billy Clyde. Fuzzy Ray.  Jim Tom. JD. RJ. You know.  It couldn't have been Steven or David.

  Whatever his name was he would jaw with me for about an hour while I was trying to work.  I didn't mind it, because he really was a pleasant fellow and it killed the time.  But he had the oddest speech pattern.  Every other sentence would be some variation of "Boy howdy live" which was, of course, a shortened version of the full exclamation, "Boy howdy man alive".

  So it would sound like this:

  "Boy howdy live, you sure got some job here, don't you?  Boy howdy man alive, you just sit around looking at purty women all day.  Boy. Howdy. Live. Boy. Howdy. Man. Alive. Boy howdy live, this is some job you got. How was your drive down here?"

  "It was nice.  I ran into a little rain around Waco, but it was fine"

  "Boy howdy live.  That's hard drivin thru the rain.  Boy howdy man alive. I don't like it at all. It gets plum scary on 35 when it rains.  Boy howdy live, boy howdy man alive, boy howdy live."

  *continues for the next 55 minutes*

  So that's a picture of my favorite person, I guess.  He made inane conversation just a fascinating prospect.  How many times and in which variations would he exclaim, "Boy Howdy Man Alive".  There's got to be a name for that. I wonder what it is?  Where would that expression come from?  What does it mean? I don't have any answers but boy howdy man alive, I got some good memories.  What's your favorite expression crutch phrase?

  AU~out

  • 5:31 PM
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