Chapeau Por Vous Mes Amis?

I told Sam this morning, “Mettrez un chapeau mon petit chien! “

If you know French, you probably know this isn’t totally correct, but it’s the best I can do. You savvy?

Sam had been raising a ruckus because a neighbor walked by outside and because he needed to go pee. I was trying to concentrate on writing, and hoped to ignore him. But I’m pretty sure he said to me in fractured Spanish, “No, no senior. I do not have un la gorra. You are loco in the cabasa. And dude, I have to pee!”

So, speaking of putting a lid on it. I dropped Sam off at his doggie daycare a while later and went to the Black Bear Diner to have breakfast. These two good-old-boys came in after I did and sat down at a booth next to me. Each of them was wearing a baseball-style cap. I couldn’t read the cap of the guy with his back to me, but the other guy’s cap said, “Cabelas.”

That reminded me of the time I went out to breakfast with my in-laws in Montana and there were about a dozen good-old boys sitting around the table with us; everyone of them wearing a baseball cap and every cap having something different on it.

It’s pretty rare to find a baseball-style cap these days without a slogan on it or a trademark or some witty/pithy saying. I seldom ever wear a baseball cap though. No way am I going to wear one that says Seattle Mariners (losers) or Seahawks (other losers).

I do have a small collection of baseball caps should I choose to wear one. My favorite probably is the one that says, “Fortuna.” Like a song in The Music Man says, “That’s the town that new me when.” Fortuna is is located on California’s redwood coast and it’s where my family finally settled after following my dad around from logging camp to logging camp every two to three years. I feel so lucky that I was able to complete all four years of high school in one town. I’ll always love Fortuna. Unfortunately, I have no family living there to visit anymore.

Another favorite cap is the light blue one I have that says,” Rocket Donuts” with a picture of a rocket flying through a donut. Rocket Donuts was one of my favorite hangouts in Bellingham, WA, where I lived for many years.

Next up is my Hockey Hall of Fame cap I bought at the Hall of Fame in Toronto, Canada. I also have a tan cap with blue bill that I bought a couple years ago at Emerald Downs racetrack. The jockeys were selling them as a fundraiser for the Don MacBeth Memorial Jockey Fund and if you’ve ever seen the spills jockeys can take in a horserace, you know why they need a memorial fund. One hat I have, a black one, says “Toyota” on it, because my truck is a Toyota. A hat given to me by my son Jonathan says, “ExxonMobil” because he works for ExxonMobil. I don’t wear that hat because I’m afraid to have things thrown at me.

I don’t own any caps with the Nike swoosh or an Adidas logo or any other athletic thingy. I don’t own a sports team hat or college hat. I don’t own a John Deere hat and I don’t have a cap with fake seagull crap on it (those are disgusting.) But I know guys who own racks of hats. Some have them displayed on a wall at home. If you accumulate too many hats you have to buy plastic cap keepers for them. I wouldn’t be surprised someday if I ran into someone wearing a hat commemorating a loved one’s death. Two bags of poop on that.