Future Hamburgers of America

Driving from L.A. to San Francisco, stayin' alive on the 5 (why'd I write that?), takes you past this crazy huge cattle ranch. It may very well be the biggest cattle ranch in the world (which is like, really big). It's a veritable sea of bovine. The smell is what hits you first -- from miles away, that unmistakable farm odor, the B.O. of filthy (yet tasty) animals, hits your olfactory sense like a manly fist packed with a roll of quarters. Then, minutes later, you're upon it -- just outside you windows, right next to the highway. Thousands upon thousands of cows packed together like a can of sardines… except not in a can. And cows are much bigger than those tiny little sardines.

I'm sure there are rules and pseudo-animal rights type groups watching over cattle ranches such as this, making sure our future hamburgers, steaks, and shoes are treated as humanely as deemed legal by our government at any given time, but to me it looked like they could barely even move as they waited to die (or get mechanically raped for milk). Maybe they were huddled together as it was pretty chilly that day. Still. So many cows. It seemed a tad bit… excessive?

We humans being carnivorous and also trying keep the cow population down are no longer viable excuses to me. Vegetarians are arguably healthier (compare Paul McCartney to Keith Richards), and the cow population wouldn't get out of control on its own. Cows aren't all running around humping like rabbits. Rabbits do that. And people… we seem to do that, too. But cows? Those fat, slow, lazy land whales? They're too, well… fat, slow, and lazy to even do "it" more than necessary, I bet. If the cow population is anywhere near running amok, it's because we people breed them for the sole purpose of slaughtering them for consumption!

Lest I sound like one of those aforementioned, ex-Beatle, vegetarian, hippie types, let me state that I am the hamburger's number fifteen fan. (Considering how many burger eaters there are in the world, that's pretty damn high on the list.) Good god do I love a burger. Especially with cheese. Also courtesy, most of the time, of cows.

But seeing all those poor, stinky, defenseless, probably retarded cows huddled together on the fields of that cattle ranch, I began to feel sorry for them. This happens to me occasionally as I chow down on a Double-Double Animal Style from In 'n Out or slap on my favorite pair of leather pants. A night on the town can sometimes be brought down a peg by that good old-fashioned feeling of guilt.

It's a bummer when slamming down a charbroiled steak, getting ready to belt out a bitchin' Bon Jovi tune at the local karaoke bar, balls sweating in the glossy black leather pants under the hot stage light, and suddenly being burdened with the inescapable shame that some fat, stinky, defenseless, stupid cow died for my meal and sexy, sexy pants. Sometimes I even flub the words to "Livin' On A Prayer," a song I've sung more times than Lord Jon Bon Jovi himself, my mind so clouded by images of obese, ass-smelling cows being decapitated in the name of my dinner and hot, hot fashion. Now, I'm not one to let a little bit of humanity ruin a kick ass time in a tiny, hot, sweaty, smelly club with a bunch of middle aged Koreans and an expansive catalogue of hair band songs at my singing disposal, but I do ponder what, if anything, I can do about the bovine holocausts such as that cattle ranch I passed on the way to San Fran-cheesy.

If cows were allowed to live naturally, without human meddling, I wonder how much they could've accomplished. Would their small, dumb, barely cognizant brains have evolved into something worth a damn, like with dogs or cats? Would it have gone further? Perhaps cows could have become, well, not great thinkers -- no way -- but at least decent ones. Maybe a bovine would have figured out a way to drive a truck or run on the Republican ticket for the presidency or something. Of course, given the luxury not to be raised for slaughter, mayhaps an erstwhile cow would have found a way to grasp a pen betwixt her hooves and write something not dissimilar to the Pure Lard you're reading right now… with a better vocabulary no doubt.

But if we didn't eat cows… would they eat us? Surely we taste better than grass or that goddamn cud shit. If cows were allowed to be free, I suddenly fear they might turn the tables! If not all humans for slaughter, they still might cultivate and raise fat people for consumption. Not like me-in-junior-high fat, more Fat Albert fat. A fatty ranch with sorry, morbidly obese bastards grazing the grass, awaiting slaughter to become hamburgers for cows! (Not "peopleburgers" as we don't call them "cowburgers"… Why the shit not, actually? Oh yeah, hamburgers are named after Hamburg or something. Strike this parenthetical aside form your memory. I tried to be clever and as is often the case, failed miserably).

So… would I rather stop living with the guilt of eating and wearing dead cow and possibly end up being food for an advanced race of cattle myself? Of goddamn course not! No more guilt. Better those poor fuckers than me. I'm gonna go slap a burger on the grill right now…