Driving back home from our all-hands meeting in Charlotte – and running low on gas. When I get off 85 I see the first gas station has gas! Whoot! So I pull in behind this big F350 at the pump.

Well, I sit there a bit, I can see the nozzle in the truck, and figure the driver is in the store. I get a chaw of tobaccy and sit there a bit longer.

Eventually, I decide this is taking too long, but the dang lot is filled up, and I got a line behind me and to both sides and can’t move – so I get out and go in to see if we can get stuff moving again.

I go into the store and the lady what runs the place meets me at the door and says, “I know, he’s been sitting in here with his friends eating lunch and say’s he’ll move it when he’s done. I called the sheriff and he oughta be here soon.”

I asked her, “Which one is he?”

She says, “The big one.”

So I go saunterin’ into the back of the store where they got the picnic tables and sure enough, there ain’t no question about which one is the big one.

Corn fed country boy! I mean, that boy looked like a Brahma Bull personified, musta been like 6.5′ tall too! Sittin’ and eating a samich with about 6 other guys – all of ’em in there mid-twenties I suspect.

I walked up and said, “Excuse me, reckon that’s your truck out there slowing things down?”

He stood up, looked down at me, and said, “Yea grandpa. It is. Wanna fight about it?”

I said, “Sure. Inside or outside?”

He asks, “Are you serious?” (Friends laughing)

I said, “Well, I was raised in a trailer park in Misipi’. Spent two years in the Army and ten in the US Navy, three of which I served as a drill instructor. On top of that, I got five kids and everyone of them woke up in a bad mood this morning, which didn’t help mine. So, I’m betting I know something you don’t know. Not that I can bench press more than you. Beside which, yer daddy ain’t here to beat yer butt for disrespectin’ your elders, and I reckon he’ll appreciate me doin’ it for him.”

He said (with a skeered look on his face), “You know my daddy?”

I said, “I told ya I know something you don’t know.”

He said, “Excuse me sir. I apologize, I thought I’d just have a little fun with ya, um…I’ll go move the truck right now .. and, um … I didn’t mean nuthin’ by the grandpa statement … I got nothing but respect for my elders and veterans. Please don’t mention this to my pa, I’m real sorry.”

He left to move the truck (which he pulled outa the parking lot and didn’t come back) and the little lady walked over and asked me, “Do you really know his daddy?”

I said, “No ma’am, don’t have a clue who he is.”

His friends was rolling on the floor laughing, and I got a free tank of gas out of the deal!