Monday, November 5, 2007

Bowie BBQ Duel

Balanced on the knife's edge, our pig plays a dangerous game, a game so familiar to suicidal animals around the world.

In this case, the action takes place in Vidalia, Louisiana, as part of a festival held every year in honor of a giant knife.

Of course, the actual namesake of the festival is not a knife, but the man who made it famous: Jim Bowie—longtime Louisiana resident, land-scammer, sheriff-stabber, and temporary Mexican citizen. But our revisionist history is certainly more in keeping with the suicidefoodist mindset. For what better symbol to celebrate than the Holy Instrument, the actual means of pigs' death?

And while we all rightly revere the sporting pig, can we in good conscience allow this duel to go forward? What chance does the pig have against the gargantuan blade, armed as he is only with a cape fashioned from a tablecloth? Scrappy as he is, he's no match for the knife, and the best result he can hope for is medaling in the festival's Whole Hog category.*

Of course, the prospect of receiving the acceptance and approbation of pigmeat judges is probably enough to account for the delight on the pig's face. This is suicidefoodism's very definition of a worthy, honorable death. It's easy to imagine him trotting around the festival grounds, his tablecape fluttering behind him. "I'm blue ribbon material! I'm blue ribbon material!"

*Per BBQ Duel rules: "…[A]n entire hog, whose dressed weight is 85 pounds or more prior to the removal of the head, feet and skin, and which must be cooked as one complete unit on one grill surface. No portion or portions of the whole hog may be separated or removed, and subsequently returned to the grill, prior to or during the cooking process."

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