• @[email protected]
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    101 month ago

    Maybe this is because I’m swiss and I spent my childhood looking at and taking care of cows.

    But is the joke that “cowatching” sounds absurd.

    • Mossy Feathers (She/They)
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      161 month ago

      It’s a common thing in the US, not unlike birdwatching. My grandfather loved going out and watching for cows. Then he would come home and tell us all about the cows he saw. Did you know there are like, 150 native species of cow in the US? Back in the early days you could just go out and get milk from wild cows. Now, however, they’re overexploited and so you rarely see wild cows.

    • Higgs boson
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      1 month ago

      The “absurd” is usually the whole joke with Far Side. I grew up around cows, too. They’re so dumb and mundane, he plays on that a lot.

      When I was a kid, we had a state park near our house. We would go there and there would be these Japanese tourists abandoning their cars to go try to hand feed deer. To me, they’re just a pest that eats our garden. But to the tourists, they were amazed.

      I didnt get it until I visited Yellowstone and we abandoned our car to chase a bull moose (which is dangerously dumb, don’t do it.)

    • @[email protected]
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      71 month ago

      It’s also a play on birdwatching and a bonus pun referencing the Bird of Paradise flower, and also “yes.”

      • @ylph
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        41 month ago

        Isn’t it referencing the birds rather than the flower? They are known for their impressive plumage.

    • @[email protected]
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      31 month ago

      With all of the different cows in the US a lot of people go cowspotting, or “cowing.” Some people play a Bingo sort of game if they know they’ll be in an area with a lot of different types of cows. It really is amazing the variety of cows that are abundant here.