Underground mining humor is something only Chris Peebles could identify

Most people consider underground mining humor to be a fiction of an oxygen-starved imagination. Chris sees it differently. Chris sees EVERYTHING differently. He once wrote a children's book titled The Comedy Of The Camel. The plot of the book? A baby camel grows up to find out he's actually an alpaca.

Sort of a takeoff on The Ugly Duckling, except that in Chris's book, the young alpaca eventually gets traumatized by having its fur sheared by humans and has to go to a DUH class, which is an acronym for Dealing with Ugly Humans. Worse, the therapist is (you guessed it) a camel.

For some reason, sales never really took off.

Without further ado, we present underground mining humor from the admittedly twisted mind of Chris Peebles. Note: If you don't know some of the mining terms used in the following poem, feel free to click on over to our Contact Us page and drop us a note. We'll promptly email you back a glossary so you can figure out what you missed.

(To dig for the finest web hosting info on the Internet, click on the mine drift!)

=================================================================

The Buzz On The Buzzy
Copyright 2000 by Chris Peebles

When my Daddy passed he left me
An unused mining claim
The stopes once yielded phosphate ore
For Cominco's processing game
They made great fertilizer
And the prills would bang loud, too
But now I figured just a little gold
Would nicely get me through

This was way out in Montana
Where the winters can get cold
But the claim was close to Gold Creek
And although the thing was old
I figured why not take a look
At a vein I truly liked
Never mind the old and rusty tracks
Or the tram dead from dynamite

I got me a well used buzzy
Why shucks, it ran like new
True, it was only a Gardner Denver
Not a Joy like I used to use
But I still had unemployment
And no wife to stare me down
When my battery pack was fully charged
I headed underground

Never mind that the rusty tracks
Could do no bit of good
Or that the stulls holding up the hanging
Looked like pretty well worn out wood
Oh, and just ignore the water
That's knee deep here and there
I had pretty good ventilation
And plenty of compressed air

Never mind old OSHA
Or the hearing loss endured
Now I can't hear bill collectors
When they try to lay on the word
My buzzy ran all winter
There was plenty of spitter cord
Even though I had to muck every ton by hand
I produced a pretty fair pile of ore

Not that we found a single ounce of gold
When the ore was processed in town
But I still came out a million miles ahead
When you analyze how it all went down
It turned out bats had adopted the mine drift
I sell guano in fifty pound bags at the store
Plus I'm no longer afraid to marry Lorna next week
'Cause I can't hear her complain any more!

=================================================================

Publisher's note: Need that glossary yet, folks?

Thanks for reading our undergound mining humor page. I've worked underground myself and once escaped the traditional harrassment accorded any man on his last day of work.

How? On the next to last day, I crawled down through a mined-out stope that was largely caved in, allowing me to exit via an unexpected portal. On the last day, I simply didn't go in. I thought THAT was reasonably hilarous, spoiling the fun for the other guys.

Doesn't sound that funny to you? No? Hm. Guess you had to be there.

Thanks for reading,

Fred

Underground Mining Humor, Underground Mining Images Home Return To Work Humor