He’s been here since the Dead Sea was sick.
Texas born and Texas bred, and when I die I’ll be Texas dead.
Yep we used to hear “He’s been around since Hector was a pup.”
Hector I assume was the great hero from Homer’s Iliad.
Used to hear them use that name for any great big buck deer that had eluded hunters for several years too..when I was a kid the rancher whose place we hunted on went up on “Buck Ridge” (he got to go there the first day, and we got to go later) and he bagged Hector at dawn’s first light.
Came down and hung it in the old timber-framed shed he had and the roof caved in...holy crap we kids were in awe....