About a week after my wife’s recent hip replacement surgery, the orthopedic surgeon came by the house to check on her. After completing the medical stuff, he sat in the living room chatting as he was admiring our view of Mt. Konocti across the lake.

My wife asked him how his elderly father was doing. He said that he had gone to Salem over the weekend and brought his father back so he could look after some medical matters for him. He said he and his wife were enjoying their visit with dad.

He related that as they were relaxing the previous evening, his dad catching a nap in his chair, the phone rang. A neighbor asked if he would like to come over and help butcher a pig. When asked, dad thought that would be fine, so at 11 p.m. they set out to help the neighbor with his task.

The pig, a huge one about 300 pounds, was still in the back of the pickup when they arrived. They helped get it out of the truck and into the barn where everything was ready for the butchering. The neighbor was well equipped to handle the chore as he had done this quite a few times before. It was the surgeon’s first time to cut up a cadaver since medical school, however. He usually cuts on live subjects such as my wife and I.

The operation (on the pig) was a huge success and the good doctor was rewarded with several packages of fresh pork for his freezer.

Sandy survived her operation; the pig didn’t.

Oh, did I mention that the neighbor in this story is a mortician who owns one of the local funeral homes? I guess you could say that the surgeon and the mortician are quite the cut-ups.

It’s great living in a small town.

(Names withheld to protect the innocent, whoever they may be.)

Herman W. (Woody) Hughes, Ph.D., lives in Lakeport.