The sound of a train in the distance

A fellow, who had spent his whole life in the desert, comes to visit a friend. He’d never seen a train or the tracks they run on. While standing in the middle of the railroad tracks one day, he hears this whistle — Whooee da Whoee! — but doesn’t know what it is. Predictably, he’s hit and is thrown to the side of the tracks. It was only a glancing blow, so he was fortunate to receive some minor internal injuries, a few broken bones, and some bruises. After weeks in the hospital recovering, he’s at his friend’s house attending a party one evening. While in the kitchen, he suddenly hears the tea kettle whistling. He grabs a baseball bat from the nearby closet and proceeds to batter and bash the tea kettle into an unrecognizable lump of metal. His friend, hearing the ruckus, rushes into the kitchen, sees what’s happened and asks the desert man, ‘Why’d you ruin my good tea kettle?’ The desert man replies, ‘Man, you gotta kill these things when they’re small.’