Demolition Horse Derby - Don't Miss It

Ambrose E. Burnside. Does anyone else get the irony of his last name. Awesome.


HEY!..... I posted a couple more links over there. Over there on the right dummy. Yes, YOUR right. HAHA! I'm so not funny.

So.. my back feels worse today than it did yesterday. Why. If it doesn't feel at least 75% by this weekends' demolition horse derby I'm going to feel upset and hurt inside. Like a boy who thought his puppy got lost but later found out it just ran away because the boy was so damn annoying. What? Don't ask.

Enough whining about my pussy lower back. You may be asking yourself, "Nickhead, what on earth is a demolition horse derby?" Well, my friend, it's Hopkinton's big summer bash. It was once called Civil War Days and had a parade and was held at the historic Lennox College campus where they did lots of 19th century type things like candle making, bullet making, and this thing called the Fish Pond where kids would cast their 'fishing rod' (a stick with a string tied to it and a clothespin at the end) over a particle board wall where a lady would attach a small plastic piece of junk to the clothespin and then proceed to tug on the line. This is where things got good; the kid would then start violently jerking his rod trying to 'reel in' his worthless trinket and when the 'fish' finally gave up and let go the line would fly backward and the trinket would usually smack some kid in the face who was patiently (yeah right) waiting his/her turn. I loved the fish pond when I was little. No matter how silly or useless my 'catch' was I was still super excited to get it. Because I CAUGHT it! I had to fight this big middle age 'fish' behind the particle board for this tiny peice of crap and I WON. HAHA. And it only cost a quarter. (Oh, and if you're wondering what the Fish Pond game has to do with the Civil War or 19th century life.... the answer is nothing, nothing at all. But since when did 10 year old kids give a shit about history.)

Let me catch my breath after re-living the whole fish pond experience....ok I'm good now. So anyway Civil War Days ceased to exist a couple years ago. Lack of interest and too few people having to put the whole thing together did it in. So Hopkinton legend mullet-head Ricky decided to save us all by putting on a rodeo / go cart racing extraveganza on the first weekend in June when Civil War Days used to be held. About the only thing the same about these two events is that the new one is on the same weekend as the old one.

Civil War Days was great. The whole town had stuff going on and there were people everywhere. Dirty Civil War re-enacters were walking around in their wool uniforms in the 90 degree heat smelling up the place. The whole town felt historic and old for a couple days. Oh and I almost forgot the best part, the streets were paved in horse shit from all the horses in the parade. If you were lucky you actually got to see a horse pinch one during the parade. The very last parade I remember attending was a couple years ago and the horses were almost past and not ONE had dropped load and I was yelling at the last few, "SHIT YOU BITCH, SHIT!" (it's possible I had a few drinks). Well there was also a wagon drawn by one of the horses with some elderly lady on it to celebrate her 90th birthday or something and my friend Predator looks over and says to me, "Nick, you really shouldn't talk to her like that." Oh sweet memories.

The rodeo / racing event is completely different. Instead of being held at the historic landmark Lennox campus, its held in between the cemetary and the old IBP hog station where pigs would hang out and smell like shit for a while before they were picked up to meet their pig deaths and become delicious bacon. Ricky (who has gone bankrupt more than a few times) somehow raised the money to puchase that fine piece of real estate and build a go kart track there. The smelly Civil War re-enacters have been replaced with smelly mullet folk in Git 'er Dun T-shirts. But even though the scenery, tradition, and class are missing from the new Hopkinton bash, two things make this new event the obvious champion and winner.

1. Beer Tent
2. Live Music (Death Metal Country hopefully)

Yes, citizens of Hopkinton, we have finally made it in this society of humans. Last year was drunken funness beyond comprehention. The pool got broken into twice that weekend. Thats basically the ultimate rebel act in H-Town... jumping the pool fence.

So I just realized that I never answered the question above; what is a demolition horse derby. Well, I'm not quite sure. A couple people have asked me what I was doing this weekend and I said Hopkinton was having a rodeo/demolition derby. "At the same time?!?!" , they would ask, jokingly. But that got me thinking. How interesting would that be. It could be a few different things. Maybe they would get a group of pigs and horses drunk and let them run around loose smashing into each other until there was only one left standing. Maybe they would strap saddles to the top of demo cars to see how well mullet folk can hang on while the cars smash into each other. Wait, wait I've got it. They'll train miniature horses to drive demo cars and wear NASCAR t-shirts, then they'll blast "How Do Ya Like Me Now" by Toby Keith while they pulverize each other. I need to be mayor.