Redneck Boot Scandals

You know the way Uncle Si says ‘no’ on Duck Dynasty? He doesn’t just say ‘no.’ He sort of spits it out, makes it sound like he’s answering the most ridiculous question anyone ever asked him. He flings it like it’s something disgusting.

That’s exactly what my son said, in exactly that way, when I showed him what I was writing about this week. And I didn’t even ask him anything; I just showed him the picture. And the way he said no, like Si says it, was exactly the correct response to the picture. Because Leret is a Texan. And there are certain things Texans don’t do, and certain things Texans don’t wear.

There’s a difference between being from Texas and being a Texan. Anyone can move from someplace else and be from Texas, but that doesn’t make them a Texan. A Texan has to either be born in Texas, or if they were born someplace else, then both their parents have to be Texans who were temporarily misplaced, or something. One Texan parent won’t do it.

This is an important point, although it might irritate some folks. And I can understand that. Who doesn’t want to be able to say they’re a Texan? No one, that’s who. Oh, folks who aren’t Texans claim they don’t care, but they do. They just don’t want to admit it, like Hillary doesn’t want to admit that gun control is a bad idea. She knows it; she just won’t admit it.

Anyway, there are certain things Texans just don’t do, if they’re real Texans, like wear a beret. That’s one of those little French caps that looks like a cow pattie. Texans don’t wear cow patties on their heads, or anywhere else. They just don’t.

Texan men don’t walk through doors in front of women, either. Doesn’t matter who the woman is, or whether the man knows her or not, or even if he knows her and doesn’t like her. He still holds the door for her. Normally, that’s a sign of respect for her, but, if he doesn’t like her, it’s a sign of respect for himself. You can’t respect others, after all, if you don’t respect yourself.

Respectable Texan men also don’t wear a wifebeater undershirt without another shirt over it. It’s ugly and disgusting, like wearing your britches where the waist is way down so your underwear is showing. Nobody wants to see your underwear. That’s why it’s called underwear. It’s supposed to be under your decent clothes. Pull your pants up or go home. Don’t walk around in public like that disgracing yourself and the rest of us.

But the picture I showed Leret was almost as bad as droopy britches. Not quite, but almost. It might even be included with this column, if the editor in question doesn’t think it’s too indecent to show in a respectable family newspaper.

My research department, Pat Wentworth, sent me a story from a website called ‘So Bad So Good, The Best & Worst Of The Web.’ The story is about a fellow named Scotty Franklin, who I sincerely hope is now in prison paying restitution for his crimes.

Scotty was supposedly sitting on the beach at the Gulf one day when he had an idea. Not a good idea. He decided he could dupe a lot of silly people out of their money by making and selling what he calls Redneck Boot Sandals. Please don’t look directly at the picture of these heinous abominations. They might cause permanent, irreparable eyeball damage.

Scotty’s idea was to take perfectly good boots and ruin them. Most people would probably call these boots, before Scotty gets hold of them, cowboy boots. Actually, there is no such thing as ‘cowboy boots.’ There’s just boots. It’s like a water heater. You don’t have a hot water heater, because there’s no such thing. So we’re talking about boots.

Anyway, you can evidently send Scotty a pair of perfectly good boots, along with $75 real American dollars, and Scotty will ruin your boots for you and send them back. He will cut the foot parts out, except for the heel part, and make sandals out of them. The boot tops are still there, irrelevant, sort of lost, and the bottom part looks like a woman’s sandals.

It’s disgusting, is what it is. And a picture of these Redneck Boot Sandals is what made Leret say no like Si says no. Any man who wears these ugly things might as well renounce his Texan citizenship AND turn in his man card. There’s no turning back. You’re done. It’s like being out with your fiancé and calling her sister to ask for a date. It’s over. There are some things a Texan can’t be forgiven of, and wearing Redneck Boot Sandals is about six of them.

If you’re a woman, well, I would never tell a woman what to wear. I would only ask, beg, that you don’t wear those ugly things around me. Sandals are sandals and boots are boots, and ne’er the twain shall meet.

Scotty may make some money with his idea. He may even get rich. If so, it will only prove the old axiom that a fool and his money are soon parted . . .

Kendal Hemphill is an outdoor humor columnist and public speaker who never wears sandals. He has ugly feet. Write to him at [email protected]