concern and confusion over a name

copyright ©2001,2019 arden henderson

Company email from an era long lost:

We will be having a lot more company get togethers over the summer months. The next one will be Friday the 4th. A little place called Sea Hunts, the Company will pick up the first $150.00 – tab starts at 5:30.

It’s not well-known how “Sea Hunts” got its name, also referred, at various levels of short-term memory compromise, as Sea Huts, See Huts, See-something, Hunts-something, Jabba The Hut, C/C++ Hut, Hubble Sees, Seabees Hut, and so on.

It turns out that Sea Hunts is located on top of a large modern nuclear-powered aircraft carrier, buried near Burnett (pronounced “Burn-ette” as in “Lunchette” – a road named after Bernadette McHale, the first cousin of an early Austin settler, the notorious J.R. Barton who had dubious ties to the Texas Lege Killerbees).

The carrier is completely buried except some topmost structures like communications gear and whatnot. If you look carefully, you can see those structures blended into the scenery there. Pretty much.

How this carrier got under the ground is, of course, one of those eighties things, and a State Secret but we can tell you that it will rise again someday, when global warming rolls the Gulf up to around Temple, Texas. Legends say.

The fine white sand beaches and clear sparkling waters at Temple and along the rest of the new Texas coast will give rise to a huge tourist industry and towering hi-rises and, ultimately, a take-no-prisoners championship Texas surfer team that will dominate the world the next several decades, thanks to the spectacular waves caused by the submerged Hill Country.

So, on that day when the aircraft carrier rises near Burnett in the flooding waters, and once again its massive shadow falls across the Gulf, Sea Hunts will be on-deck, of this you can be sure, propelled hundreds of feet upwards, safely nestled among the jet squadrons. That will be cool.

Notably, it will be suave to be there that day, raising brews to the sky in a rousing round with a robust cheer, as the carrier comes out of the ground with a roar and waterfalls cascade down, coming to full battle-stations, personnel running about, F–14 Tomcats and F/A–18 Hornets cranking up and slingshoting down the deck, screaming with neck-snapping force straight up into the endless sky, as the waters crash far below, swirling around the carrier in a white froth, as the Gulf thunders inland, a coast-wide 100-story tidal wave, rolling over everything in sight for miles and miles and miles.

We’ll be there, hanging out. On the flight deck. We’ll smoke cigars, have ice-cold brewskies, and loudly sing Dixie Chicks’ “Wide Open Spaces” and Megadeth’s “Almost Honest” and those that don’t know the words will hum along. It will the party of parties, the mother of all happy hours…

If only Sea Hunts had some stouts, though – some serious beer. It seems unseemly to toast the new Texas Gulf Coast with a Bud.

However, Shiner will do in a pinch.

From the June 1, 1999, weekly blip. Ah, the future looked so shiny and bright way back then. C. Hunt’s Ice House lives still today. Alas, the software company that sprung for the $150 beer tab, not so much.