I'm sure you heard about that little thing over in Dryland a while back, where a bunch of cows broke loose and stampeded the Dairy Princess headquarters? Well, bubba, you're 'bout as ignorant as you look if you believe everything you read in the papers or see on the idiot box. Me n' Lulu was in Dryland when it all went to hell in a handcart, and them news folks didn't tell half the story. Reach me a beer and I'll set you straight on what really happened.

See, Lulu has this thing about ice cream. Not just any ol' stuff, mind you, but Dairy Princess Genuine 100% All-Natural Farmland Best Ice Cream. Comes in the damndest flavors, too. Like Raspberry-Boysenberry-Potato Chip Swirl, or Pickles n' Cream (a real convenience food for them times when a woman's got a bun in her oven). I'm partial to the Chocolate-Pretzels and Beer, myself. But Lulu, bless her heart, has a positive mania for the stuff. Hell hath no fury like a Cantrell standin' in the middle of the frozen foods section at the Piggly Wiggly when the Dairy Princess is sold out and new delivery ain't till next Wednesday. I swear, that manager's eyes haven't quit buggin' out since the last time he got caught on the wrong end of Lulu's tongue. I ain't heard language like that since Do-Right McAllister got his nipple pierced in a fly-fishin' accident.

Anyhow, whenever the Piggly Wiggly don't come through, it's time for poor ol' Butterbean to jump in the truck and head over to Dryland. They always have a passle of ice cream to sell at the Dairy Princess headquarters. Son, they even have a drive-through window. Can't beat that with a sack o' catfish. Usually, Lulu stays at home doin' her hair or nails or reading a magazine whilst I cruise down Route 278. On the way back, I stop and pick up a sack of Krystals. Ain't nothin' can keep them itty-bitty belch-burgers down better'n a bowl of cold Dairy Princess.

This time Lulu decided to come along for the ride. That might've had somethin' to do with her momma, Dolly Cantrell, who was goin' to pay us a visit the followin' Sunday. Lulu's convinced that I'm so dumb, I could be tossed inside a barrel full of titties and come out suckin' on just my thumb. She just had to have a gallon of Dolly's favorite flavor ice cream (Praline & Hot Chili Pepper Surprise) and a gallon of her own favorite (Cheeze Whiz n' Jellybean) and I didn't have brains enough to keep that straight, accordin' to her. Why we had to do this when the sun went down, I don't rightly know. Lulu's so stubborn she'd argue with a stop sign, and I know when to shut my mouth and hop frog.

You know when Route 278 kind of peters out and runs into this gravel track up to Dryland? There's pasture all through there, both sides of the road, and everywhere you look there's cows. Big ol' milk cows chewin' cud as far as the eye can see. At night, the Dairy Princess herds get rounded up and bedded down in barns. Yep, there's a point here, son, so pay attention. When me n' Lulu was drivin' down that track in the moonlight, we could see cows lined up along the fence.

That's about a half-bubble out of plumb already but there's more. Them cow eyeballs was reflectin' in my truck headlights and they weren't normal. No sir, those eyes was fiery red. I mean like blood. Reminded me of the time when a bunch of us gals went over to Hooter's Holler to give Mary Lou Grabbit a hen party at the downtown hotel. That was one hell of a shindig. I do believe we drank every margarita in Flathead County. I dimly remember some dancin' fellow dressed in one sock and a bow tie. I've been told that I don't look bad in a lampshade with a plastic flamingo between my teeth. I don't recall startin' a naked-but-a-feather duster conga line, and I'm pretty sure Lulu lied to me about why I woke up with some Yankee woman's business card stapled to my ass.

Jose Cuervo is no longer a friend of mine, that's for damn sure. You try standin' on a step-ladder at six o'clock in the mornin' to harvest bras and thongs off a chandelier in the Tiki-Wiki Ballroom when you've got a hangover that could stand flat-footed and screw an elephant, whilst a few dozen women stare up at you with bloodshot eyes and faces like seven miles of bad road. Enough to gag a maggot off a guts wagon, and the reason why I've sworn off tequila forever.

Anyhow, had I the sense God gave to a goose, I'd have turned around and lead-footed it out of there. I do recall asking Lulu if we ought to go home and try again in the morning.

"Butterbean Shirley McCall," she says to me, giving one of them looks, "if we don't get that ice cream tonight, I will slap you so hard, you'll be coughing up bones."

And then I had to stand on the brakes 'cause there was a herd of red-eyed cows in the road.

They stood there starin' the truck, which is fairly normal for a cow, except I swear them critters had a real hungry look. Like me n' Lulu was two chunks of Spam in a can, and they was tryin' to figure out how to operate the opener. Gave me a serious case of the heebie-jeebies, the jim-jams, the willies and the jitters, all in one go. My flesh didn't know whether to creep or crawl.

Lulu latched onto me and says, "Butterbean, them cows have got fangs."

Shit.

Vampire cows in Dryland.

I should've known this weren't no ordinary milk run.

Now, there's a deep ditch on either side of that track. I knew there was no way on God's green earth that I could bulldoze my way through that herd in a twenty-year old Chevy pickup held together with baling wire and bubblegum. Once I pried Lulu off my leg, I started backin' up the truck slow and steady. Them vampire cows kept pace. I went a little faster. They kept comin'. I panicked and floored it. Brother, you ain't lived till you've been flyin' backwards on a narrow gravel road at eighty miles an hour in the middle of the night, with a squalling Lulu who's trying to cuss and pray and hang onto the suicide strap and swat you a good one at the same time. And still the damned cows were keepin' up!

I got to a turn-off and took it hard, one foot on the brake and t'other on the gas. The truck was on two wheels at one point, and Lulu like to have pitched the conniption fit of the century. Lord knows, I love that woman, but she can swear a blue streak that'd put shame to a jacked-off longshoreman in a cussing contest. Between her chewin' out my ass and them vampire cows catchin' up in the rear view mirror, I was up to my armpits in trouble with a capital "T."

Goin' bass-ackwards like a bat out of hell, we was headed for the headquarters. Dairy Princess Inc., it said on the sign. The placed looked solid as Fort Knox so I drove through the gate, put both feet on the brakes, hauled the steerin' wheel around, and spun that Chevy at the front door. We come to a halt with not an inch to spare. The engine ticked over and died.

I ain't seen Lulu turn so pale since she took a bite of what she thought was leftover Chinese noodles, only it turned out to be a carton of my best bait worms.

"Butterbean," she says, suckin' down air like it was goin' out of style, "if you ever do that again, I'll jump down your throat and run through you like a bad dose of castor oil."

There weren't no time to be nice about it. "Lulu Lee Rubella Cantrell," I says, "you'd better haul ass, fool woman, or I'll leave you here for vampire fodder!"

I popped out of the truck, jerked Lulu along with me, and beat feet into the building before the shock wore off. No security guards or alarms, so we went in the elevator and took off to the top floor. I was operatin' on the assumption that vampire cows weren't smart enough to figure out how the damned thing worked, and they sure weren't light enough to climb. If we could keep out of their way till dawn, I figured them blood-lustin' critters would have to leave us be, on account of the undead bein' allergic to sunlight. Of course, everything I know about vampires, I learned from drive-in movies. Most of the time, though, I was paying way more attention to Lulu and her glow-in-the-dark drawers than the picture show.

Anyhow, by the time we got to the top floor, Lulu was swole up like a bullfrog on helium. "Butterbean," she says to me, "I ought to jerk a knot in your tail for speaking to me that way."

"Honey-pie," I says, "if we live through this, I'll make it up to you with Goo-Goo Clusters, Moon Pies, RC Cola, boiled peanuts and dinner for two at the Finger Lickin' Rib Shack. And I'll help you tie the knot."

As I was speaking, I seen something movin' outside the window. We was on the eighth floor, so I figured that it couldn't be nothin' but a bird. The biggest damn bird I ever seen. The biggest damn bird I ever seen that had an udder, two glowing red eyeballs and fangs. You guessed it, bubba. Vampire cows can fly! It looked right at me and went, "Blooooood." I was glad my Chevy was parked on the other side of the buildin'.

I jumped back a foot, but Lulu just got mad. That girl would charge Hell with a bucket of ice water. "Shoo! Shoo!" she says, flapping at that vampire cow like it was a chicken underfoot. "Go on, git!"

The cow didn't take kindly to bein' fussed at. It went, "Bloooood," again and crashed through the window. Behind it, the rest of the herd was coming up fast. Son, I don't mind tellin' you that I was nervous as a fart in a hot skillet. I grabbed Lulu and made for a door. We wound up in a cooler full of ice cream tubs. You'd have thought that Lulu had struck the motherload. The only thing she lacked was a spoon, and she was off to the Promised Land without no help from me.

I had shut the door, but them vampire cows was persistant as gum in your hair. They commenced to whackin' and bangin' on the door, raising cain with a vengeance. Lulu was too busy shoveling ice cream in her face to get het up about it. Spoon, hell. Lulu had found a popsicle stick in the corner to use as a scoop, and she was workin' on her second pint like she hadn't a care in the world. Which she hadn't, you understand. Whilst I'd druther be known as somebody who couldn't slide off a greased log backwards, Lulu's got faith. Somehow, scrawny ol' Butterbean will save the day.

"Butterbean," Lulu says to me around a mouthful of Snuff and Dandelion Wine Ripple, "you do something about them vampire cows, or by thunder, I will jar your preserves."

Right about then, the door busted open. There we were, trapped in a walk-in cooler with vampire cows fixin' to come walkin' in and partake of the feast. I grabbed a pint of Chicken ala King Sherbert and would have chucked it at 'em, except Lulu took it away from me. She couldn't bear to part it, ammunition or no. There was a box to my left and I ripped it open. Frozen T-bone steaks. I thought I remembered somethin' about vampires being allergic to steak, so I took one up and prepared refuse the line.

The lead cow goes, "Bloooood," and I shoved that steak in its mouth. Ever seen a vampire cow look surprised? Brother, that critter couldn't have been more astonished if I'd stripped off and square-danced naked with a plucked duck on my head. It went, "Bloooood?" and then its head exploded.

Talk about a mess! Guts and grease and God knows what all over the place, and Lulu sat there givin' me one of them looks. Seems she caught some of the backwash and her hair-do was plumb ruined. Not all the spray in the world was going to fix that thing. I didn't have no time to deal with her hissy fit, though, 'cause the next cow was coming through.

I grabbed another T-bone and says, "Git, bossy, or I'll steak you but good."

"Bloooood," that vampire cows says. "Bloooood."

Vampire cows ain't the sharpest crayons in the box, so I reckoned I'd have to do this thing the hard way. Soon as that thing opened up its mouth again, I shoved in a steak. Boom! The score was Butterbean: 2, Dumb-Ass Cows: 0. Vampire number three came trottin' along and got the same treatment. Boom!

Lulu weren't too happy, 'cause them short, sharp showers of cow had really put her off the ice cream. On the other hand, we was both still alive, so long as I didn't run out of T-bones. There wasn't but one box, though, and a whole herd of vampire cows, and I had to hold 'em off till dawn.

At last, I was on my final steak. There was still a dozen of them red-eyed bitches outside. The situation looked mighty grim. Even Lulu had stopped grizzlin' and started worryin'. The cows come closer, crowdin' inside. I could feel that hot vampire breath on my face and knew it was the end.

"Bloooood, bloooood, bloooood!"

And then the sun came up.

Hallelujah!

Them vampire cows didn't so much explode this time as they did just sort of peter out. They shrank up like worms on a hot sidewalk, and by the time they was done, there weren't nothin' much left. Me n' Lulu took some tubs of ice cream and beat feet on out of there. A bunch of rent-a-cops met us downstairs, but after Lulu gave 'em eleventy-dozen different kinds of hell, they let us go in a hurry.

Don't ask me how come Dairy Princess had vampire cows. I ain't got no damn idea, son. Maybe they was working on a new flavor or somethin'. Anyhow, the real traumatizin' part of the business was all that ice cream. We didn't eat nothing but ice cream for breakfast, lunch and dinner for three weeks. Like to have spoiled me forever, though Lulu tried adding stuff to it like chili beans and watermelon rind pickles and tuna melt.

Nowadays, I stick to a small vanilla cone, just in case Dairy Princess tries to pull a fast one.

Now get a mooooove on, son.

It's time for another beer.

THE END

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