Kickass eats a pig ear 2

Kickass, the doorstop dog, turns it over to the keeper today for a bow to Black History Month which is best done by remembering his good friend Bob Sheppard whom he met on a cold, snowy Korean hillside when they buttoned shelter-halves together as out-going artillery fluttering overhead.  The friendship endured and grew through the decades to involve family member who came to love Bob for the man that he was and for his unique ability to make skin color disappear into thin air.  During his Chicago Trib days, the keeper frequently stayed overnight at Bob’s cozy South Side home, and Bob would often prepare dinner with a soul food bent.  On one such occasion, the set table included a plate of pig ears, unmistakable to the keeper given his farm boy childhood.  The keeper, though surprised and curious about the pig ears, did not comment on them, nor did Bob.  As the meal progressed, the keeper ate one of the ears, finding it gristly and rather tasteless, but he still did not say anything about the unusual “side-dish.”  Finally, with the last of the wine, the keeper said, “Thanks for an excellent meal, Sheppard, but don’t ever serve me another pig ear.”  Bob almost fell off his chair in an explosive fit of table-pounding laughter. The keeper would eat another pig ear if he could hear that laughter again.  (See Billstokesauthor.com for more blogs and books.)