The View From The Top Of The Food Chain

The Monday after Thanksgiving is the start of deer season in Pennsylvania. This is some serious shit, let me tell you. I dated a guy whose life in the months of September, October and November revolved around where he was hunting, the weapon of choice, and the weather. It's all verrry scientific let me tell ya.

They close the schools. They close businesses. Some hunters leave for deer camp on Thankgiving evening, and spent an entire week there. With their lifelong hunting buddies, drinking, eating, hunting, telling lies, and other bonding rituals. Some of these deer camps have been in families for generations.

In almost any situation, in the weeks following opening day, you will hear the question, "Didja get your deer?" If the person in question didn't get one, they surely do have a story of some monster buck they saw or how they just missed (By this much) a deer. And now that Pennsyvania is trying 'manage' their massive whitetail deer population, some people aren't getting any deer. And believe me, THAT certainly causes a stink. It couldn't be because the hunter was in the wrong place at the wrong time. Or any one of a million scenarios. It's easier to blame the PA Game Commission. Never mind the fact that whitetail deer are the number one pest in the state. And they are freaking everywhere. Boo Hoo, cry me a river.

Speaking of cry me a river, we always will have the polar opposite of the hunters, the anti-hunters.
"Aaaawwwww...how cruel! How inhumane to kill a deer!" "How could you? It's so mean...Poor widdle deer." Kiss my poor widdle white ass. For every deer that is killed by a hunter in Pennsylvania, two more are hit by cars and die alongside the road. Or limp off into the brush to hide and die a long painful death. Or starve to death because there are so Gotdamn many of them, they've grazed all their areas bare. Oh but a bullet to the heart is inhumane. I wonder if deer were portrayed as shaggy, red eyed crazy looking things instead of these cute big brown eyed cuties that the mindset would be different. How many of these deerhuggers have had 150 pounds of deer jump out in front of them, and paid the garage to fix a deer smashed car? Or have they also taken the time and patience to plant and nuture a garden, only to walk out to said garden one morning only to surprise a couple deer wrapping up their morning buffet....of ALL the garden? Oh and are you sending out your no hunting pamphlets from your McMansion you bought that is part of a housing development that was meadows and fields up until a year ago?

I don't hunt. I like to shoot, but I don't have any reason to kill anything. I have a nice chest freezer that has some mighty fine Bambi in it from last year, and I am anticipating more Bambi in it shortly.

I should invite some of the deerhuggers over to the house for my slow cooked venison roast in onion gravy with baby carrots and onions and potatoes. Maybe that would change their minds about the view from the top of the food chain.