This will be my last post until Monday, Oct. 6.
I’m taking a “hurrication.”
What is a “hurrication,” you ask?
Well, a “hurricane vacation,” or a “hurrication,” is when you take time off from work to fix up your house after a blow-by so you can go back to work and earn money for the next tropical storm/hurricane/End of Days.
Three things I have learned about hurricanes:
1) They love to tear down those wooden plank fences all over the region. With Rita and Ike, I’ve had 4-by-4 posts snapped by the force of those winds piling up against the planks like a stiff breeze in a sail. But if the planks are screwed in and not just nailed in, they will not going flying off like missiles.
2) Speaking of flying missiles, it pays to clear your property of flower pots, lawn chairs, picnic tables, etc. before the winds perk up. If you put them in the garage, they’ll be there when you get back and not in your kitchen or living room. Strip that yard!
3) Trees are nice to look at and the subject of a famous poem by Joyce Kilmer (who was a guy, by the way, despite that first name), but they are a pain in the neck in hurricane country. I have one big tree left after several storms. It is going to get a major haircut as soon as I scrape up some cash.
See ya soon.
Friday, September 26, 2008
Be back in a week ... thanks to Ike
Thursday, September 25, 2008
Palin/Obama debate needed
The presidential campaign has become so mixed up that it’s still not clear if Friday’s debate will come off in Oxford, Miss.
John McCain says the financial meltdown is more important. Barack Obama says talking about ways to freeze the meltdown is more important.
Whatever.
I say scrap the format and reorganize it like this:
Let the two old guys — McCain and Biden — square off against each other. They can both ramble on and on about the good ol’ days and make factual/historical mistakes until one of them gives up.
That leaves the two young and enthusiastic ones to face off — Palin and Obama. That’s who voters care about in this election, and they’d probably have the most interesting things to say.
If the debate ends in a tie, let ’em settle it on a basketball court.
It will be Palin’s feisty defensive skills (as displayed at a high school in Alaska) vs. Obama’s offensive shooting abilities (as displayed at a college in Hawaii).
Now that’s something that would not be ignored by voters.
Wednesday, September 24, 2008
Delay the debate ... sort of
John McCain is right. The first presidential debate planned for Friday night in Oxford, Miss., should be delayed because of the financial meltdown oozing through Wall Street.
But Barack Obama is right too. He says the debate should go on because voters deserve to hear from their next president how he would fix this mess -- and avoid the next one.
I know; you’re saying that both of them can’t be right, and you are right.
The solution? Delay the debate … for one day.
As my previous blog noted, on a Friday night in the fall, millions of Americans are not going to be at home. They are going to be at their local high school football field — or that of a rival.
With a one-day delay, the televised debate will be seen by far more people, and voters can decide which candidate is the better economist — or blame-shifter.
Any maybe one of them can explain why cigar-smokin'/helicopter-flyin' CEOs deserve “bailouts” that aren’t available to real people who work for a living and find themselves in dire straits.
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
Friday night ... conflict
Surely I can’t be the only person in the country to notice this:
Why in God’s name are Barack Obama and John McCain holding their first debate … on a Friday night in the fall? (This Friday, in Oxford, Miss.)
You don’t have to be a sports fan to realize that Friday nights in the fall are when high school football is played.
If your child isn’t on the team, he or she might be a cheerleader or in the band or on a drill team.
If not, he or she is probably going to go to the game anyway — to socialize if nothing else.
And many, many parents of high school kids revere “Friday Night Lights” as well.
So again I ask, why did this scheduling conflict have to happen?
If the candidates didn’t realize the importance of Friday night football, they don’t deserve to be elected.
If they think that parents will record the debate and watch it later, they are even worse off.
Incredible. I wonder if their next option was Sunday morning.
Monday, September 22, 2008
After Ike
Bye, Ike. Hello, recovery.
Yours Truly is back a’bloggin’ — after an unplanned trip to Mississippi thanks to a certain hurricane.
Our family’s stay in a church friend’s home outside Vicksburg was nice.
Coming back to property damage you hoped to avoid was not.
You can’t complain though. You know that thousands of people in Bridge City and the Bolivar Peninsula got hit harder.
They need help, and fortunately there’s another way for folks to do it.
It’s called the Texas Disaster Relief Fund, and it has already received more than $4 million in pledges.
If anyone has some cash to spare, this is the place to put it.
By the way, Wednesday is the third anniversary of Hurricane Rita.
Pardon us for not celebrating.
Thursday, September 11, 2008
Irked by Ike
This could be my last post for a while.
Ike has intervened, just when it looked as if we might dodge the artillery shell.
Hang in there and stay dry; we'll all reconnect when the winds die down.
Wednesday, September 10, 2008
Ike's strike
New York journalist Horace Greeley in 1865: “Go west, young man.”
Texas journalist (me) in 2008: “Go west, young hurricane.”
Fortunately — for us, at least — Hurricane Ike seems to be following the setting sun.
That means he probably won’t slam into us … but will slam into something around Corpus Christi or Port Lavaca.
I know the folks down there aren’t too happy with that, but it’s the best possible outcome for Ike.
There are parts of the southern Gulf Coast that are lightly populated. If Ike could make landfall in one of them, the damage would be minimal.
All I know is that we have had our share of hurricane pain. I wouldn’t wish this on anyone, but it’s someone else’s turn.
As for Ike doing what Rita did in ’05 — heading west and veering north — don’t even think about it.
I have a good feeling about Ike. I think that as with Gustav, we’re gonna dodge this bullet.
Thank God.
Monday, September 08, 2008
Ike? Yikes!
Say it ain’t so! Please tell me I'm having a bad dream about … Ike!
Ike. That’s the nickname for a beloved war hero and president. How did it turn into another fear-fest?
Most of us have barely finished unpacking from the last bugout or putting the potted plants back out on the patio. Now we have to go through the same drill all over again. Are we having fun yet?
I know that living on the Gulf Coast means living with the threat of killer ’canes. But we were hammered by Rita in ’05 and had Humberto last year and Edouard this year — not to mention our little scare from Gustav.
What I’m trying to say is … enough is enough!
It’s somebody else’s turn. I know that whoever is in the zone will be praying for a break, but we’ve had our share of tropical trauma.
Ike needs to find a lightly populated stretch of coast and bring some gentle rain inland.
But whatever happens, please, Lord, not us this time.
Friday, September 05, 2008
Quentin/cretin
You are Carlos Quentin, one of the hottest hitters in baseball.
You started this season as a part-time player, hoping to get off the bench.
You were ending this season as the near-consensus MVP in the American League.
That’s because you put up monster numbers, like 36 home runs and 100 RBIs with nearly a full month yet to play.
You have propelled your team, the White Sox, to first place in the tough AL Central.
So what do you do Monday night?
Well, you’re batting against the Indians’ Cliff Lee, the best pitcher in the American League.
You foul off a pitch, so in frustration, you hit the bat you are holding by your left hand with your right hand.
And you break your right wrist.
In one incredibly stupid move, you trash your best season, throw away the MVP award and threaten to keep your team out of the playoffs.
… Jeez, talk about being dumber ’n a box of rocks.
Thursday, September 04, 2008
What should we call Chad?
It’s getting harder and harder for eccentric athletes/actors to get noticed. Take Chad Johnson, for example.
Chad is a receiver for the Cincinnati Bengals, and a good one. He is also an immature, unstable egomaniac, as proved by countless episodes and outbursts.
In his latest stunt, he legally changed his name to Chad Ocho Cinco. In case your Spanish is rusty, ocho cinco means “eight five.” Not “eighty five,” which is his uniform number, and which he is what he means, but “eight five.”
Now charming Chad gets to display “Ocho Cinco” on the back of his jersey.
I think he should have legally changed his last name to something else. Something like:
1) Moron
2) Loser
3) Immature, unstable egomaniac. (OK, that's too long for the back of the jersey, so forget that one.)
Good grief; is it any wonder that fans turn to high school or college sports to get away from spoiled brats like that?
Wednesday, September 03, 2008
Looters, shooters
Two things didn’t happen with the latest hurricane:
Texas didn’t get hit. (Always a big positive.)
New Orleans didn’t get looted. (Also very nice.)
The lack of looting almost got overlooked, until some thieves in Ville Platte in south Louisiana revived bad memories. It seems that a few low-lifes were trying to help themselves to a supply truck loaded with food and water for Hurricane Gustav victims.
When National Guard soldiers approached, gunfire broke out. But it’s not what you think: The looters were the shooters, too.
The Guard troopers returned the fire, but none of the thieves were hit. Or were hit bad enough to be lying on the ground when the Guard secured the truck.
You’ve got to be pretty stupid to shoot at a National Guard patrol.
Those guys are armed with fully automatic M-16s, and know how to use them.
You, being a punk looter, probably have a Saturday Night Special, and you couldn’t hit a Holstein from 20 yards.
But if you’re a looter, your day job isn’t brain surgeon, so you don’t know these things or care about them.
Not to worry, though. I have to believe that natural selection takes care of these little problems eventually. I’m guessing that few looters die peacefully in their old age.
Tuesday, September 02, 2008
Duckin' Gus
If you left and regret it, don’t.
If you stayed and want to gloat, don’t.
Yeah, we ducked Gus. But we came about as close as you can come to missing a big ’cane without actually getting hit. A minor shift by Gustav would have brought major headaches here.
Most of my family relocated to San Antone.
I stayed and prayed. I was hoping the storm would follow the path predicted by the experts, ready to bug out if we became the bull’s eye.
All the while, I had a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach. Storms almost never follow the path predicted by the experts.
This time, it did. Thank God for us — though the folks in Louisiana who got hammered are wondering why they couldn’t catch a break with a veer one way or another.
Now they say Ike and Josephine are patiently standing in line, ready to bring new worries to someone on the coast.
I don’t even know where that will be, but I can’t wait for hurricane season to end.
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