by kenny

Teedee (today) we branched (left) Mendocino early in the morning and headed to Boont (Boonville). Located in Anderson Valley, which is now becoming known for it frattey (wines) and steinber (beers). Before we hit Boont we japed (drove) thru Barney Flats (The Hindy Woods State Park) which is a little known mini version of the Avenue of the Giants. It is the southern most redwood forest in the US and just as bahl (good).

We were headed towards Boont because we had found out the boonters (locals) have created their own language over time called Boontling. It started in the 1880's as a way for parents to talk around their tweeds (kids) without the tweeds knowing what was being said. And over time it became a boontling. It was even taught as a second language in the heese (high school). The whole town made Boontling a part of their lives and bits were picked up in the neighboring areas. Johnny Carson had boonters on his televeef (television) show as guests and some went on game shows that were popular 40 years ago. All the words come from actual experiences the boonters had, all the words have history. There was a man named Zachariah Clifton Blevins, or Z.C., that was known to make a bitter cup of coffee. So the word for coffee is zeese. A couple in town were caught having sex on burlap bags. The word for sex is burlap. The local doctor had buck teeth. The word for doctor is shoveltooth. The first man to own a phone was named Walter. The word for phone is Walter and a payphone is buckey walter (a buckey is a nickel). Essentially what usually stops with a nickname of a friend, they took it one level further and used the nicknames as adjectives and nouns.

So we stopped in to Boont to see what info we could find. And there wasn't much to be discovered. The local museum was closed. The Horn of Zeese (local coffee shop) is now a mexican gorm sale (restaurant). All that was left was two books about the language in a gift shop. Heads hung low we went to the local gorm sale and chiggled (ate) some breakfast. As we were chiggling, I heard some strange sounds coming from the corner of the gorm sale. Soon those strange sounds formed words, words I had read but never heard. They were speaking Boontling! So I went over and introduced myself and had a really intriguing shattaquaw (conversation). I learned that I had shagged (stumbled) upon and was harpin (talking) to Ite and Deekin, 2 of maybe 6 boonters still alive who speak Boontling. As the codgy (older) crowd pikes to the dusties (die off), so does Boontling. Most of the tweeds think it's hangin' higher n' bolley's fiddle (no longer of use), but apparently Ite's daughter is fluent. I learned that in addition to the televeef appearances, books and audio recordings have documented part of the language, but no documentary has been filmed about the language. Both Ite and Deekin thought is was a bahl idea to do so and in the near future I plan to do just that!

We eventually left the gorm sale and were told to "pike easy". And so we did with thoughts in our head of when we could get back and put the language to film.




As we headed south we kept our eyes at for the first In-N-Out Burger on our route. We had a little difficult parking the moho, but we would not be deterred. 3x3 animal style. It was so amazingly good. I love these burgers!


After our delightful lunch we crossed the Golden Gate bridge and drove through Lombard Street. Downtown Santa Fe, the 1, and San Francisco. The moho can drive through anywhere. Well, not anywhere. We skipped this part of Lombard Street.