Friday, January 9, 2009

Heading to the Big Apple

Having suffered through a long, dreary week of working our tailbones clear off, we at the Stockyard are chomping at the bit for the Built Ford Tough Invitational in New York this weekend. Baltimore was great, except for the part when 24 riders qualified in the first round, which always tells the Stockyard Queen that the bulls were, er, sub par. So we will hope for ranker critters in the chutes this weekend, and meanwhile stock up on the supplies we will need to comfort us, should the action be less than we hope for. Like lots of liquor and potato chips.

Already there's been a fair amount of coverage for the New York event, starting with a story about Luke Snyder in the New York Times. I would not have chosen Snyder, but I guess that's why I work for this impossible b**** rather than the Times.

Reese Cates, who is rapidly growing on me, has a new post up on his blog on the PBR website, in which he reveals that he was going to New York early to help opening the New York Stock Exchange on Thursday. We dutifully dragged ourselves over to CNN to see it, and there he was, in the company of J.B. Mauney and Randy Bernard, who, sans cowboy hat, looked a lot more like a stockbroker than the head of a sports organization involving crazed livestock. And then there are the bulls.

The CNN reporter covering the stock market, who up until now hasn't particularly bothered me, showed herself to be nearly as tiresomely New York as the Times, acting like the very notion of riding a bull was something beamed straight to her from Mars. Since clearly that's where she comes from, you'd think she'd have heard of it before, especially since Bernard and Adriano Moraes rang the opening bell there three years ago, too.

Reese also revealed he'd been asked to come by and tape a sequence for Rachel Ray's television show. There's no information up yet on Ray's website about when we can expect to see that, but I will try to keep an eye open and give you all the head's up for what might be a very entertaining show.

Apparently this is Reese's first trip to New York, in which case all the advice I can offer is, don't get out of the car and start trying to walk to Madison Square Garden, Reese. You may end up in places where a dude in a cowboy hat would not be very welcome.

And finally, here's a picture of Buck Shot, the bull held in a pen outside the Stock Exchange, of whom I've never heard. He's a nice grey Brahma bull who appears to be resting up for the bucking, though, so maybe by Sunday night, I will have his name down on the Stockyard's Wall of Stars. Let 'em buck!

5 comments:

shannon said...

"You may end up in places where a dude in a cowboy hat would not be very welcome."
Or he may find himself in an area where a dude in a cowboy hat would be very welcome, although, I don't think he'd to comfortable with that either. :)

I'm surprised you haven't heard of Buckshot, SQ. They don't buck him. He's just the mascott. I'm pretty sure he was there last year and he was also featured on Dennis Miller's short lived show on VS two seasons ago. He's a sweetheart.

I'll be checking spoilers tonight and will watch it tomorrow evening, but since we have a gathering for the "24" season premiere, which starts Sunday night from 8-10, I may not be watching the final until Monday morning. We'll see. Thank God the regular season shows are on Mondays!

Stockyard Queen said...

I was surprised too, but I suspect it's because he doesn't buck. Where's the new SuperDuty? Why wasn't he out there, since it's the Ford Built Tough Invitational? Buckshot is beautiful, but somehow he doesn't look like a very serious bucking bull to me. That's probably why he's the mascot--maybe they can count on his not busting down the pen and trampling through the Stock Exchange and out onto Wall Street.

Thanks for the head's up on 24. I will probably record that and then watch it on Monday, which will doubtless give me 24 overload and lead to a Tuesday filled with violent flashbacks.

Black Boots said...

I think Buckshot's been around for awhile. I remember seeing some promo pics from NYC a couple of years ago where he was paraded out with Chris Shivers on his back. Guess he's pretty gentle and doesn't mind all the fuss. There's some irony about a bull being a PR rep, isn't there?

JACK IS BACK! I can hardly wait. We're having a viewing party too. I'll probably record the bulls and watch Jack live. (Mmm, Jack, live. But I digress...) Out here on Eastern time I can finish with "24" at 10 pm and watch the bulls immediately after. A friend and I watched the DVD of "24:Redemption" and there was a bonus trailer of the first 10 minutes of the new Season 7. All I'm going to say is--put your drinks and popcorn down before the clock starts ticking!

Jay said...

Your English/grammar skills are infinitely more powerful than mine, S.Q., but I believe the phrase should be "Champing at the bit." (As compared to "chomping" at it.)

Me, I still struggle with the difference between "it's" and "its."

:-D

Stockyard Queen said...

And so it would be, if I weren't using a hillbilly idiom, ma'am. Nobody I grew up with would ever say "champing."