Although I think email is the greatest invention since the Barcalounger or La-Z-Boy, I just can’t develop a fondness for texting.

I am baffled by all these symbols and shortcuts the thumb-typers use to save valuable time they wouldn’t be wasting if they just stopped sending all their worthless text messages.

One of the reasons I don’t own a cell phone is I don’t want to learn all the cutesy letter combinations that people use in their texts. If I wanted to learn an all-new language I’d learn something useful, like Spanish.

It’s bad enough these texting shortcuts have overflowed into letters and emails that people write. I’ll give you an example. For years now I’ve read the letters LOL in emails and for some reason I thought it stood for “lots of luck.”

But one day I asked my brilliant editor friend Ann just what LOL means and, much to my surprise, she said it stands for  “laugh out loud.” Which, I must admit, made a lot of the emails I’ve received make a lot more sense than if it was “lots of luck.”

Ann said if I had questions in the future about texting abbreviations that I should go to a website called Urban Dictionary. I did as she suggested and found shortcuts and keyboard strokes that are supposed to look like animals – no doubt created by people with active imaginations and waaaaay too much extra time on their hands.

The problem I had with the Urban Dictionary is it is just that: Urban. So, even though I don’t text, I decided to perform a service for the little-served cowboy community by creating texting shortcuts just for them.

From now on, if you see the letters LOL in a cowboy’s email, it doesn’t stand for “laugh out loud;” it stands for “lost our lease.” Here are some more cowboy texting shortcuts I came up with:

NSBS: New saddle. butt sore.

UU: Kicked by mule. Funeral Friday (FF).

STARVIN: The wife has been sick for two days now. Can anyone out there in the Cloud, or global village, tell me how to turn on an oven?

BITNV: My buddy just got a brand new Mark Dahl bit and I am envious.

EEEOOOOW!: Some snake put a baby rattler in my boots.

RWI: Riding While Intoxicated.

#$@%&*!: My new horse just bucked me off again and I think I may have a concussion. Come and get me. I’m in the big rock pile.

DandGs: Dudes and Gunsels.

GGNCBKI: Gotta go now. Cookie’s beans are kicking in.

VETCOT: Does anyone have any Vaseline or KY Jelly? Our vet was preg-checking and his arm is now stuck tight in the reproductive tract of a 550-pound heifer.

IQUIT: My new boss expected me to drive a John Deere and pull weeds in his wife’s garden. So I did what any respectable cowboy would do.

CHIPS: This can either mean your horse bucked you off into a fresh cow pie or your wife just got another job in town. Her third. As in, “We’re in the chips now.”

PU: I’m on a trail ride and none of us have had a bath or shower in a week.

NOKIDS: My knucklehead horse kicked me you-know-where and gave me a cowboy vasectomy.

BYOH: Branding Saturday. Bring your own horse.

JACKPOT: I just hit the USTRC jackpot in Oklahoma City and quit my job. I’m gonna rope until the money’s all gone.

CANTCOPE: I’m out of tobacco and desperately need a chew.

TRIGTHWITTWMIWBSIIHTBA45¢S: The ranch is going to heck, while I text these worthless messages I wouldn’t be sending if I had to buy a 46-cent stamp.

The views and opinions expressed in this column are those of the author and not necessarily those of Farm World. Readers may log on to www.LeePitts books.com to order any of Lee Pitts’ books. Those with questions or comments for Lee may write to him in care of this publication.