The Last of the Cheese

A

So, Dog and I ate the last of our Christmas cheese yesterday.

Remember? The eight two pound vacuum-sealed wedges I was re-gifted from my neighbor Jackie, the local, lumber and steel-roofing magnate?

As it turns out, I was probably the last neighbor to get the big bag-o-cheese for Christmas. Understandable, considering I’m not known for my bowel and artery restricting diet. Jackie must have known I was hungry. Thank goodness I eat a lot of oatmeal and raisins. Just sayin’.

Anyway, it also turns out, the big bag-o-cheese has a history.

Jackie sells what you need to build a barn. Not the jumping-from-the-hay-mow, big red, Bridges Over Madison County, where Meryl Streep was about as fine as she has ever been, kind of barns. Just ugly, metal boxes… like my shop.

Some guy was building a big, fancy horse barn and bought the roofing material from Jackie. He had Jackie order him a weather vane, too... a weather vane with a cow on it. It didn’t make sense to me either. But anyway, Jackie calls his vendor places the order: One weather vane… with a cow.

It’s around Christmas, and Kelly, the UPS guy, drops a big box off at Jackie’s.

The box has a picture of a cow on it and the weather vane vendor’s address. Logically, Jackie assumes it’s what he ordered for the big-fancy-horse-barn guy and has one of his boys run it out to the job.

It arrives just in time. The guys are still there, working on the big, fancy horse barn. They throw a ladder to the roof and a couple of them scramble up with cow-picture-having box in tow.

They cut it open.

As you might have guessed, there sat eight, two-pound wedges of vacuum sealed cheese, packed in paper grass.

Now, for the ensuing head-scratching and mystery-unraveling to be as priceless as it was, you’d really have to know Jackie, and the boys working on the barn. But since you don't, picture a blend of The Andy Griffith Show, Green Acres and The Dukes of Hazard, with a splash of Quentin Tarantino, for the R-rated language.

Of course, now the vendor will never, ever stop sending Jackie the big-box-of-cheese for Christmas. Who would?

I’m guessing, too, the cheese has rubbed a bit of a sore spot in Jackie's hide, considering his, “Here... We’ve had about all the cheese we can stand,” when he passed the eight two-pound vacuum sealed wedges on to me.