Bubba breaks it down

Bubba McCoy said he’d already voted. I said I hadn’t known there were enough people in his county to make early voting of much use.

“I’ll tell you the truth,” he replied. “I was sitting here in the trailer doing nothing and I heard something on the TV say early voting starts today in Arkansas.

“So I hopped up and went out to the car and pulled out on the highway and then I thought, ‘Where the hell am I goin’?’ I had no idea if we had early voting or where the place to go would be if we did.”

Knowing Bubba, and knowing that recliner, I asked the first obvious question.

“Did you really hop up?” “There are different-sized hops, smart-aleck,” he said, though he didn’t say “aleck.”

Bubba said he decided just to tool downtown to the courthouse and see if he could find out anything. The first thing he saw at the courthouse was a sign saying early voting here.

“I knew the old boy and girl working in there. So, I said: ‘Give me a ballot to where I can vote for Steve Landers. Any man that could sell that many cars might be able to fix that hell-hole Little Rock is.’

“They told me that, if I wanted to vote for a car dealer down here, I’d have to run myself. I said I was too honest a man for politics, though I ain’t all that honest.”

Why, I asked, did Bubba call my city a hell-hole? There is bounty and happiness to experience here. And what made him think Landers could make it any better?

“For one thing, you get shot driving down the freeway. I live pretty near smack-dab between Memphis and Little Rock. I’m afraid to take a step east or west. The best feature of those towns is their widest bypasses.

“As for your mayor’s race and why Landers, one thing is that that boy you like, the one with the two last names who you thought was so wonderful for the schools, is for him and might be his main assistant.”

Oh, yes, Baker Kurrus. There might be a sore-loser element to his position. But, while I often reveal in my columns how I’ve voted, I’m not proud enough of my mayor’s vote — or comfortable enough with it — to claim it.

“Let me tell you something,” Bubba began. “You probably ought to keep all your votes to yourself. Do your guy for governor — what’s-hisname — a favor and come out for what’s-her-name.”

I told Bubba that, even at his ripe 72, Chris Jones was not a hard name and Sarah Huckabee Sanders was a nationally familiar name.

And, by the way, which one of those did he vote for?

“I don’t remember.” Seriously?

“Oh, hell, I’m just smarting off about you saying I’ve got old-timers’ disease. I know which one. But I ain’t gonna tell you because I don’t want you driving over here and hugging me.”

Really? You voted for Jones? “I ain’t saying who I voted for, just like you on mayor. I’ll tell you this much: She’s not a real pleasant-seeming person, is she? And if by some miracle he should win, we’d need truckloads of popcorn for watching him and the Legislature get a load of each other.”

I told Bubba that personal entertainment prospects were not appropriate considerations for voting for a governor.

“I’m just trying to help you have plenty to write about.”

I said that wasn’t likely to be a problem either way, especially with another presidential race hanging like a dark cloud.

“Let me tell you about that: You’re not going to have either Biden or Trump in that race. Biden ain’t got it anymore and even ol’ boys coming in here looking for a pickup are starting to say they’re about fed up with Trump.”

I said I believed Trump was the only Republican nominee whom Biden’s successor — whoever that might be — could beat.

“That’s why that boy down in Florida is going to be your next president,” Bubba said. “He’ll beat the tar out of that governor out in California that the pitiful Democrats are apt to run.

“And he’s not the worst from California they might run. Vice President What’s-Her-Name is.”

Kamala Harris.

Itold Bubba that his political analysis was especially keen at the present time, especially from one who couldn’t seem to think of names.

“I know the names that matter. Toyota. Ford. Landers. Rex Nelson. Now there’s a good col-yum-nist. You mess with me much and I’ll move my business over to him. Then what would you do?”

I told him I’d just write more columns with those up and down arrows.

“Yeah, I like those. I don’t have to read your writin’. I just look at the arrows.”

I wished Bubba a happy Halloween.

“Well,” he said, “don’t you be opening the door to any trick-or-treater over there in Little Rock until you get the car dealer in office.”

I didn’t say “aleck,” but something else, and hung up.