The Redneck Guide to Raisin' Children Read Free Page A

Annie serves soup beans, onions, and cornbread for supper at our house, sometimes the kitchen table is plumb abandoned. We’re all out in the yard, just a-blowin’ in the wind.
    One night Rufus McKinney heard our loud poots and figured we was shooting off firecrackers. He ran outside and raised his American flag, thinking it was the Fourth of July.
    â€¢ Don’t fart in a truck or car when all the windows are rolled up. If you’ve just got to ease out some gas to relieve belly pains, crack your window first.
    Somebody probably will notice the foul smell anyway, so be prepared to say, “Whee-ooo! Must be a lot o’ dead rats over at the dump this time o’ year!”
    Don’t worry about people on the street smelling the stink coming out of your car. Redneck pedestrians are used to drive-by pootings.

    Redneck drive-by
    Passing Gas for Fun and Profit
    Tell your kids it’s all right to fart on a date if they do it discreetly, or if they don’t really like their companion and never want to see him or her again.
    Passing gas also is perfectly acceptable once your young’uns grow up and go out socializing with buddies.
    After a few Buds at the bar, some rednecks even have contests to see who can fart the loudest—and the winner gets free beer the rest of the night.
    Farting is such a tradition among rednecks that Glen-Bob’s daddy even wrote a poem about it. Here are his actual words:
    How well I know—and you know, too—
    Just what a stinking fart can do.
    You’ve got two choices—to hold your breath
    Or breathe in and be gassed to death.
    I’ve let ’em myself; they smelt like a dead rat.
    I couldn’t stand to be where I was at.
    You take this polluted air, where did it start?
    It started from people letting soup bean farts.
    Our whole family is proud of that poem. We figure Henry Fartsworse Longsmeller couldn’t have said it better.
    Heed this warning, parents: If your young’uns don’t pass a little gas every now and then, they could blow up like a balloon and bust wide open.
    So don’t let anyone tell your kids that passing gas is wrong, or that it means they’re not refined and cultured.
    We’re sure Miss Manners would turn up her nose at this advice. But if she wasn’t constantly turning off people with her snooty rules, she’d be Mrs. Manners, wouldn’t she?

Grime and Punishment
    When our son Wimpy once borrowed a neighbor boy’s bike without asking permission, we punished him by making him cut that family’s grass all summer with a push mower.
    Some people thought that was a little harsh for Wimpy’s first offense.
    But Aunt Alma—who, God bless her, sometimes gets her thoughts tongue-tied—sided with us. She said, “He knows which side his bread is buttered on, and now he must lie in it.”
    So we stuck to our punishment. And guess what? After that sweaty, terrible summer, Wimpy never again ventured into the dark underbelly of the criminal world.
    The point of this here story is simple: When your kids cross the line, make the consequences hit ’em as hard as a Mack truck. A slap on the wrist ain’t going to keep any young’un straight, but a trip to the woodshed sure might make him think twice the next time.
    However, don’t be too cruel when you physically punish your young’uns. Our saying is: Children should be seen and not hurt.
    Also, teach your kids to respect the law. If it wasn’t for deputies, police, and game wardens putting their lives on the line every day, not a single human being or deer would be safe anywhere in the USA.
    These brave men and women deserve to be called “sir” by kids. Drill that into your offspring until they do it automatically.
    If they don’t, they could head down the wrong path and their high school yearbook pictures might have front and side views, with their height clearly marked on the white