Jeff Kaley
Waurika News-Democrat
WAURIKA —
Last week, I launched into the tale of the “Islamocommie Gopher War of 2007,” a dramatic moment in American history that’s unknown to many.
Few details of this nearly-catastrophic moment are public knowledge, because it played out three years ago in the backyard of my home in Duncan. And for national security reasons, I’ve stayed mum on the subject.
But after I had an invading gopher in the same yard a few weeks ago, I flashed back on the horrific-yet-inspiring events of the “Islamocommie Gopher War of ’07,” and realized the story needed to be brought to light.
To set the stage: In the fall of 2007, a mysterious burrow system appeared in our yard. I suspected moles were afoot, and so I contacted my brother-in-law, A.J. Clark, and asked if he had a spare WMD (weapon of mole destruction).
Anytime I need something for home repair or upkeep, I call A.J., and it was no surprise he had just the WMD needed — one of those motion-triggered traps, with four razor-sharp prongs that impale the unlucky mole.
I’m a non-violent guy, but I also grew up a country boy and am familiar with the damage moles create. So, I positioned the WMD in a strategic spot and awaited the inevitable gruesome, mole-on-a-stick conclusion.
It never happened. After five days of checking the trap and repositioning it three or four times, the WMD remained undisturbed.
I was perplexed. But on the sixth day, I went to check the trap again and, suddenly, the truth became clear: There in the yard were three mounds of red dirt. That’s when I realized the pest wasn’t a mole, but a gopher.
While I was doing some research on getting rid of gophers, I stumbled onto even more distressing news: According to the Internet, an entirely new species of gophers were hiding out in the Sooner State.
Driven by vengeance and guided by a weird philosophy that combined the teachings of Ayatollah Khomeini with the ramblings of Karl Marx, the new breed had been secretly dubbed “Islamocommie gophers” by our intelligence bureaus. Not only that, since first sighted in the Panhandle, the government had tracked the Islamocommie gophers’ steady march eastward, on what was obviously a rodent jihad.
Then I read something that made it clear the threat had reached south-central Oklahoma: According to a secret NSA report, Islamocommie gophers were so sophisticated and devious that they were getting a foothold on people’s property by disguising themselves as moles!
That’s when I decided to scratch a line in the red dirt — my backyard would become the site of the Islamocommie gophers’ Waterloo. I owed it to my children, state, country and species to nip the invasion in the bud.
Now, there are many methods of eradicating common pocket gophers. You can get down and dirty with normal gophers by using poison peanuts, oats or other food products the creatures can’t resist. There are “kill traps” marketed with macho names like DEATH TRAP and CINCH TRAP, and there’s the automatic weapon option.
Initially, I tried poison peanuts on the Islamocommie gophers, tossing a half-dozen into each burrow. But the next day, the peanuts were gone and there was a note that read: “We perfur salted poison peenutz. Burp!”
Grrrr. Not only were the diabolical gophers tossing down the gauntlet — and revealing they can’t spell — I was horrorstricken to realize Islamocommie gopher scientists had created antidotes for poisoned foodstuffs.
That meant more extreme measures were needed.
I contemplated hiring some barn owls, who have a rep as sure-fire gopher slayers. But I don’t have a barn, and it was possible the Islamocommie gophers — who have no sense of human decency or morality — would recruit the owls into their ranks. Then I’d be fighting a war on two fronts, and we all know that’s problematic.
As the days passed and more gopher holes appeared in the yard, I started getting pretty twerked. It was obvious the invading horde was turning this into something personal. As I surveyed the growing “gopherville,” I began to imagine the little beggars were right under my feet, smiling smugly and chanting, “Neener, neener, neener! You can’t catch us!”
The thought of being ridiculed by Islamocommie gophers made me edgy, and since I’m a guy, growing anger was pushing me toward obsession.
(Next week: We’ll see how well becoming obsessed worked in the “Islamocommie Gopher War of 2007.”)
