A Bicycle for Longhorns

When we pulled into the Old South Pancake House parking lot, I popped out and headed over to the display of longhorns for mounting to the front of your Cadillac. I don’t have a Caddy, but if I did, I’d have horns on the front.

I only noticed the bike after gawking at everything else.

It took Hoss P. Davis about that long to amble over from a truck he was warming up in. I’m guessing he was over seventy. His eyes clear blue and piercing, sun-weathered skin that comes with living in Texas a long time, and a white duster like a good guy in the Westerns. He wasted no time getting to business. For $750.00 dollars, I could take that bicycle home with me to Seattle.

It’s not easy to make a handlebar out of the horns, and it’s especially problematic to attach them to the stem. He cuts the spokes on the wheels to give the ride an uneven lop, and then the tubes are fitted with cowhide. Otherwise, not much is done to the old frame, and perhaps I’d have been tempted if the rest of the components, as they were, were shinny and new. This bike was his third in this Texan vernacular.

Hoss P. Davis buys skulls and sells used cow parts. If you’ve got a need for those, give him a call. I left him and headed into the pancake house, sad that I had no need for horns, skins or a new bicycle.