It just dawned on us last night that we haven't posted anything about politics in a while, and we're sure you all miss it.
SIDENOTE - Remember this time last year? Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama were duking it out in the Democratic primary; nobody except for Alaskans and some frightened caribou had ever heard of Sarah Palin; and MEvBLOG was just a twinkle in the Internet's eye. Ahhh...how times have changed.
Anyway, yesterday marked President Obama's 100th day as leader of the nation and both the Teletubes and Interwebs were atwitter with comments, opinions, and pasty white men yelling while flailing their arms about - we're talking to YOU Limbaugh and Olbermann.
In our humid little corner of the country, the economy isn't as bad comparatively, but we still have our share of issues. Most of our issues - like dealing with a sub par education system and continuing hurricane relief - are part of the state and local government's responsibilities.
Yet we still play a big part in national discourse, especially when it comes to energy policy. And whatever happens with health care is sure to affect people in every corner of the nation - whether dry or humid.
That being said, we wanted to know what you think. Are we moving in the right direction? Vote in the Quick Poll below and feel free to share your thoughts in the Comments section.
Thursday, April 30, 2009
101 American Nights
Wednesday, April 29, 2009
If soda was your "thing," could you give it up?
We've got one friend formerly obsessed with cola and another devoted to the diet version.
Recently, the former gave up all sodas cold turkey in a dramatic show of solidarity with her body.
This initially concerned me because, as much as we applaud anyone doing something to bolster his or her health, the stories we've heard of people weaning themselves off soft drinks are not pleasant. Often the headaches and jitters are compared with legitimately serious withdrawal symptoms.
Of course, that's a bit hyperbolic, but we were still curious how and if she would stick with it.
That was two months ago and she seems to be doing fine. Life after soda is refreshing, she says, and swears she sleeps better.
Our other friend would never follow in her footsteps.
"I will never not drink it," she's been known to say of diet soda. "It's my thing."
The "thing" being the one vice that we're all allowed to have - though its unclear when, and by whom, that rule was decided on. In her mind, if you don't fill your lungs with tar or kill your brain cells searching for another kind of high, then drinking liquid calories mixed with teeth-rotting elixir should be given a pass.
We're avid coffee drinkers here at MEvBLOG and shouldn't cast any stones in this particular debate, except we'll lob this one. Coffee lacks high fructose corn syrup. Putting a heaping helping of that - the equivalent to about 10 teaspoons of sugar in every 12 ounce can - every day will take its toll quicker than caffeine.
Therefore, we'll stick with our alertness-increasing-yet-slow-acting addiction, thank you very much.
Diet soda isn't really any healthier of a daily treat, because there's almost nothing natural in it. Drinking it is like pouring synthetic chemicals in your mouth.
A personal trainer once said that if someone is filling themselves with something unnatural that doesn't do anything for them, there's no room left for the good stuff that actually helps.
We relayed this to our still-soda-drinking friend.
She shrugged and repeated, "It's just my thing." Meanwhile our non-soda-drinking friend is thing-less and doing just fine.
What's your "thing?" Could you give it up?
Tuesday, April 28, 2009
Chicken soup for the pigs?
Good morning Southeast Texas! We safely arrived back to work after a wonderful holiday and have been somewhat out of touch with the happenings of the world. Apparently there's this whole swine flu thing going on of which we knew nothing.
According to this article from the BBC, the swine flu is something normally only pigs get, but has mutated so that humans are now susceptible to it as well. We'll trust the Brits on this. They know a thing or two about diseased farm animals.
The symptoms of swine flu are fever, fatigue, runny nose, sore throat, coughing, and nausea.
Not to be confused with the symptoms of the regular flu which are fever, fatigue, runny nose, sore throat, coughing and nausea.
The World Health Organization, Center for Disease Control and Prevention, and a lot of other smart people are on this thing. It's sad that they're too late to help some victims in Mexico, but it seems like we're all ready for it now. Locally, Southeast Texas health officials are prepped in case it shows up here.
Just to be safe at MEvBLOG Central we might switch to turkey bacon for the time being.
Monday, April 20, 2009
Don't be alarmed
We're going to take a brief hiatus from MEvBLOG Central because breaks are good and blogging is hard. So when you don't see anything new posted for a few days, don't be alarmed. We haven't abandoned you, we're just on vacation.
See you next week!
MEvBLOG
Friday, April 17, 2009
Burnin' love
Sometimes, love hurts. Other times, it just burns.
Yesterday, a Jefferson County grand jury indicted 49 year-old Mike Allen Dusharme with arson.
Dusharme recently went on a date with local woman and, at the end of the evening, he did what any lonely, single man searching for his soul mate would do. He walked the woman to her door and proposed to her.
The woman said No, despite the fact that she loves that catchy Taylor Swift song about the young-and-in-love couple who throw caution to the wind and get married so they "Never have to be alone."
The man - who it seems prefers a different Taylor Swift song - didn't like this response and started to view both the woman and her apartment as "Just another picture to burn." So he set her place on fire.
A couple of things here...first, one for the ladies. Don't invite men you just met up to your apartment. No matter how charming or pitiful they are, SAY GOODNIGHT IN THE CAR. If you lead him to your front door, you might as well start practicing putting the lotion in the basket right now.
Now, for the gentlemen...Dudes, no setting chicks' homes on fire. This is NOT COOL. Will it bring momentary satisfaction? Possibly, but if the goal is to get married, one could argue that burning her earthly possessions doesn't bolster your case for being "The One."
Dating is hard enough without the police, fire department, district attorney's office and grand juries involved. Let's not get to the point where we have a "Check here if you every get angry enough to commit arson" box on Match.com.
We're sure Taylor Swift would agree.
Thursday, April 16, 2009
According to Belushi
So last week, we chatted with James Belushi who's coming to The Mont this weekend. He'll be performing with Dan Aykroyd at the 2009 Christus St. Elizabeth Gala. The duo are coming as The Blues Brothers and some people - specifically a certain Irish co-worker of ours - call the resurgence of this pair an "abomination."
"It's not his place, it was his brother's," he said, stamping his foot and waving his hands in small circles.
(We added that last part for effect...but his quote is accurate.)
Anyway, we asked Belushi about it and this is how the conversation went...
"I didn't want to do it. It was John's thing, not mine. I didn't want to do the Blues Brothers or eat a cheeseburger or, you know, any of that stuff he made his own."
So, we asked him...why did you sign on then?
"It was Danny. He needed me. He said that...the partnership was like a great law firm. You know, when one partner dies and a son or uncle takes over? He said, 'Your brother went down. Come on, I need you.'"
Belushi said his brother had a certain perspective on things. One of John's famous sketches from "Saturday Night Live" was the Olympia Cafe, where he played the owner, Pete Dionasopolis. The character was determined to serve everyone a cheeseburger whether they wanted it or not.
One bar in Chicago claims to be the impetus for this sketch and has a prominently displayed sign boasting just that. In reality, John Belushi based the skit on a lunch counter that his father and uncle used to run.
James once asked his brother why he never told the owners of the bar to take the sign down, saying, "It's not fair, that's not their thing."
He said John just shrugged and said, "They must have needed it." And that was that.
"John wouldn't have cared," Belushi said about him stepping in as the other half of The Blues Brothers. "It wouldn't have mattered to him."
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
Would you like some angry with your tea?
Good morning Southeast Texas! All over the country today people are gathering in "Tea Party Protests" - an obvious homage to the Boston Tea Party of 1773 - to express their anger at what they think is too much federal spending on the part of the current administration.
And protests of this sort make sense, because things now are JUST like when the British ruled American colonies, taxed them without giving them elected voices in government, forced people to quarter British soldiers at risk of personal harm and with no compensation, and men wore dusty gray wigs with tri-cornered hats.
Actually, this in no way parallels the reasons behind the original Boston Tea Party. For one thing a small percentage of wealthy Americans being asked to pay a bit more in taxes than everyone else is not the same as being executed for talking back to a redcoat.
However, we applaud people utilizing the First Amendment to express their opinions - one of the rights not given to colonials and an actual reason they unloaded the British tea - and say that, if you want to dress up in colonial garb, borrow your kids recorder, and march against paying taxes levied by the same people you elected, then go for it.
Here are the details:
What - Southeast Texas Tax Day Tea Party Protest
When - 5:30 p.m. - 7:30 p.m.
Where - US Post Office, 5815 Walden Road
Contact - 409-338-0225
Tuesday, April 14, 2009
TCU goes straight
Did you hear the one about the flip-flopping horned frog?
Last week, Texas Christian University in Ft. Worth announced a plan to create themed student housing that included rooms set aside for students interested in gay and lesbian issues - NOT rooms specifically for gay and lesbian students.
This week, according to The Dallas Morning News, the university reversed it's position. The chancellor said that the school's decision was not based on the national backlash against the gay/lesbian issue, but was based on those opposed to grouped housing in general.
Sure. It must have been those jealous geologists protesting the marine biology floor.
Obviously, TCU did not consult our Quick Poll that asked MEvBLOG readers if students should be allowed to live in themed residences. If they had, at the time of this posting, they'd see that a majority of those polled - 46 percent - think that when students are paying the bill, they should be able to live where they want.
Only 18 percent said residences should have nothing to do with sexual preference. The same number also questioned the university's need for more gay housing when it already has fraternity houses.
What? It was a serious poll!
Friday, April 10, 2009
Scary bunny, stay away
We're just gonna go ahead and put this out there: something about the Easter Bunny is...a little off.
More so in the picture to the right, but still...it's a bunny that stalks your children and brings them eggs in the middle of the night. In our book that equals creepy and also doesn't tie to the Easter celebration of recognizing Christ's resurrection.
Or so we thought...we set out to find the origin of the Easter Bunny and it's amazing what you can find on the Internet.
According to a number of websites, including Wikipedia - or "The Wikster" as we call it - the Easter Bunny first came to America with German settlers in the 1700s.
Some of them were Protestants and wanted to retain the Catholic custom of eating colored eggs for Easter, but were torn because they didn't want to force their kids to fast for Lent.
They waited until Lent was over, then decorated and hid the extra stock-pile of eggs that had collected over 40 days and nights. Once the kids found the eggs, they considered them a treat left by the Easter Bunny.
The bunny - a symbol of Springtime fertility - somehow got thrown into the mix, which is where we get confused. But, then again, not EVERYTHING in the both the Catholic and Protestant churches makes perfect sense, so we'll let it go before they sic a Jesuit and a Baptist on us.
The tradition of hiding eggs went on until the Easter Children's Rebellion of 1863 when the German-American tykes demanded that the eggs be made out of chocolate or they would turn all live chickens into marshmallow creatures before they could utter a peep. The Coalition of Adults assumed this was a bluff, and that's how Peeps came to be.
With all their livestock now turned into marshmallows, the adults scrambled to appease the children, so they made chocolate eggs and bunnies and presented them as peace offerings in the form of ornate baskets...hence the Easter Basket was born.
Don't believe us? The Internet doesn't lie folks. Happy Easter!
Thursday, April 9, 2009
A bar with no glasses?
Quick question folks: How can a restaurant and bar have ONLY ONE pint glass?
That is the conundrum we faced last night when we went to dinner at a "Bistro" in Beaumont's West End.
After ordering a Guinness, our waitress - a lovely girl whose name shan't be revealed to protect her job - served it to us in a bottle. When we asked for a pint glass, she said, "I'm sorry, but we only have one and another customer is using it."
"How can you only have one pint glass?" our friend asked. "Don't you have a full bar?"
Indeed they did have a full bar, replied the waitress but it turns out the restaurant only ever had "four or five" pint glasses and all but one were wiped out when someone dropped a tray of them.
All of a sudden we thought of Barney Fife in "The Andy Griffith Show," the sheriff's deputy who carried a gun, but kept his only bullet in his breast pocket.
"Barney...get your bullet," Sheriff Andy Taylor would say if ever faced with the threat of imminent danger - a rare happening in idyllic Mayberry.
However a bullet can be dangerous, and Barney was a bad shot, so keeping it out of his gun in that scenario makes sense. Nothing about a restaurant/bar owning only ONE pint glass makes ANY sense at all.
So here's our advice to the owners of this "Bistro": FOR THE LOVE OF BEER ON TAP, GO SHOPPING FOR GLASSES ALREADY! You can get a lovely set of five for $24.99 at Target and you'll be right back where you started - which was a lame place to begin with, but at least your customers don't have to play "Pass the Glass."
And don't charge another $4 for Guinness in a bottle until you do.
Wednesday, April 8, 2009
Harold and Kumar go to the White House
Well at least Kumar anyway.
Actor Kal Penn - pictured at right with "Unknown Lucha Libre Midget" - recently left the TV show House to go work for President Obama's administration. He 'll be an associate director at the Office of Public Liaison and communicate with arts and entertainment groups on behalf of the President, in addition to Asian and Pacific Islander communities.
Really? This guy? The same dude who made passionate love to a giant bag of weed in the cinematic opus Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle? He's going to communicate on behalf of the White House?
And, since when does President Obama need someone to help him out with the arts and entertainment industry? They already seem to be a locked-in part of his committed electorate.
In interviews, Penn has said he's always been interested in matters of state, which is fine. Were he to join the United Nations as a Goodwill Ambassador, we'd have no problem with that. Bringing awareness to certain global issue, while helping those in need is something he's probably qualified for.
But, in what part of preparing for his role as "Taj" in National Lampoon's Van Wilder, did he study domestic American political policy?
Basically, this is a vanity job. While you weren't going to see Penn on "Inside the Actor's Studio" any time soon, his career was going well. He was on his way to becoming the most successful Indian-American actor in mainstream Hollywood.
Let's just hope he can take this new gig seriously. We'd hate to see his appointment go the way of the IMDB plot description of his new movie, "Under New Management"
Two co-workers send their boss on a sex cruise and then turn the office into party central, causing profits to soar in the process.
On second thought...is this a secret approach to economic renewal?
TCU goes gay?
So...according to the Dallas Morning News, Texas Christian University is now providing special housing for gay and lesbian students.
We'd like to note a few things before commenting on this decision...
1) TCU is affiliated with the Disciples of Christ, a mainline Protestant faith that includes churches on both the left and right side of the political spectrum.
2) Colleges and universities all over the nation have "themed" residences for students who want to live with those who have similar interests. Other such examples at TCU include residences for those interested in patriotism, fine arts, marine biology and Christianity.
3) TCU is the first university in the state of Texas to offer special housing for gay and lesbian students.
More than a few readers probably think this is wrong because it provides a specific situation for a certain group, but we'd like to remind you that TCU is a private school.
It's not funded by public money and can do what it wants. Granted, more than a few conservative alumni may think twice about donating now, but that's the school's fight, not the public's.
We'd also like to remind you all of the kerfuffle back in 2004 and 2005 with Baylor University, when the private Baptist college removed both a student and a board member for being gay. While we think those decisions were spiteful, we also recognize Baylor's right as a private institution to act of its own accord.
However, because we are always intrigued by what you think, we've decided to take a Quick Poll.
Monday, April 6, 2009
Opening Day!
We have a friend - let's call him "M" - who hates baseball. Because of this, we also wonder if he hates babies, puppies and America but we'll take the high road and assume it's just baseball he loathes.
According to M - no relation to Judi Dench - our national pastime moves too slow for his tastes. He much prefers football, basketball and...fishing.
Methinks we can all agree that if you enjoy sitting around for hours, dangling a metal hook from a string and waiting for an aquatic creature to venture by, there's no reason you shouldn't enjoy baseball.
But we digress.
Here at MEvBLOG Central we enjoy most sports, but baseball holds a special place. We grew up going to minor league games and collecting baseball cards. In college, Fenway Park was two blocks from our campus in Boston - hence the reason we're also card-carrying members of the Red Sox Nation.
We love M like a (step) brother, but have to disagree with him. Like our father once said, baseball makes you slow down. You have to conform to its pace - one that allows ample time to hang out, eat a hot dog and drink a beer (or two). It's not forced awesome. It's awesome that just happens.
So listen up Southeast Texas. It's time to awaken your latent desire for peanuts and Cracker Jacks. For the next two months you can cheer on the Cardinals at Lamar University or, this summer, get Astros tickets for only seven dollars each. There's no excuse for not getting out and enjoying a couple games in 2009.
Even if you like to fish.
Friday, April 3, 2009
Tax the ta-ta's?
Right off the bat, we want to apologize if anyone is offended by the suggestive art to the right. We did our best to be appropriate despite the challenges of discretely performing a Google image search for "strippers" from our work computer.
The reason for the pic is that yesterday, the Texas House of Representatives approved a new tax on sexually oriented businesses. In a vote of 141 to 1 - the lone dissenter being Rep. Soprano (D), who came to the Capitol directly from his office at the "Bada-Bing!" - representatives agreed to tax 10% of these businesses' gross profits.
Legislators are calling it a "stripper tax," mainly because "booby tax" didn't play well with focus groups.
It now moves to the Senate and, if they pass it, the law would nullify a pending lawsuit that questions the current rule forcing strip clubs to charge an extra $5 admission fee at the door. In the lawsuit the Texas Entertainment Association - representing strip club owners - claimed the $5 fee was unconstitutional because nude dancing is a form of expression protected by the First Amendment.
So...the "stripper tax" will not really apply to strip clubs? Color us confused.
Don't get us wrong - we in no way disagree with the merits of this tax. We've seen the data and agree that sexually oriented businesses can directly contribute to higher numbers of sexual assaults. But can it really be called a "strip club" tax when it won't apply to nude dancing?
Isn't that like imposing a "cigarette tax" but saying it only applies to cigars? Or imposing a "levy on talent" and exempting Paris Hilton?
One thing is clear, the new law won't change the current rules regarding what's allowed in the Champagne Room. When that was made clear the 141 legislators who voted for the tax immediately lost the support of the Frat Boys Union.
Thursday, April 2, 2009
The "ER" is closing
In college, the weekend generally started on Thursday. It was fantastic. By the end of the night we'd eventually wind up at our favorite bar, but the good times didn't officially start to roll until after we watched NBC's "Must See TV."
At that time, the Thursday night line-up was at it's peak with the hey day of Friends, the final run of Seinfeld and, later, a clever new show called Will & Grace. All were watched by various clusters of pajama-wearing dorm dwellers gathered around televisions in common rooms across campus. And no show as watched more than the evening's anchor - ER.
ER combined bloody, medical suspense with soap opera-ish storytelling, and played our emotions like a cliched metaphor. Overly empathetic viewers couldn't possible understand the depths to which their guts would be twisted every week.
In an early episode, guest star Bradley Whitford (The West Wing) brought his pregnant wife in for a simple procedure and - 40 minutes later - she died giving premature birth to their child. It wrecked us all for days. To this day, our mom can't even be in the same room when re-runs are on or else she might faint.
Characters came and went through the revolving doors of County General. Some, like George Clooney, left with our blessing - he was always movie star material and never cut out for the small screen. Others were ripped away from us, like Kelly Martin (A.K.A. "Becca Thatcher" from Life Goes On) whose character Lucy was stabbed at the very end of one episode, but didn't actually die until the end of the next.
It introduced us to the kind of romantic drama that only exists inside the walls of televised hospitals, teaching valuable lessons about what happens when coworkers refuse to date outside the office.
We learned a whole new vocabulary that eventually made its way into the current workplace lexicon. Bosses, even those in fields unrelated to medicine, used to settle for receiving something ASAP and now can't settle for anything less than "STAT!"
It even gave us the opportunity to wear scrubs as Halloween get-ups, pretending to be interns - far and away the most comfortable costume attire ever.
We loved everything about the show, and stuck with it for about ten years but, like millions of other viewers, grew tired and moved on.
Maybe it was because medical trauma didn't charm us like it used to, or too many characters we'd grown fond of weren't around any more. Maybe it was because we all experienced our own share of romantic drama and when it came to relational angst - even on TV - less was more.
Maybe it was because the friend we donned scrubs with for Halloween - who looked exactly like Nurse Carol Hathaway - tragically died in a car accident on New Year's Eve 2004, having actually been in the position of the hundreds of extras who didn't survive in the TV show.
We don't party during the week anymore and our friends are spread out all over the country. With one or two exceptions the current NBC Thursday night lineup is kinda lame and things now aren't the same as they were when we first discovered ER.
Even so, when it ends its 15 year run tonight we'll be among the millions who tune in to remember why we used to watch it. It will seem fitting that it take its place in TV history, just as it has in the annals of our memory.
Then, the next morning, we'll head to work and lament the fact that the weekend no longer begins on Thursday night - a notion we'd all like to revisit. Let's revive that tradition STAT!
Wednesday, April 1, 2009
Tax evasion isn't funny
The Chicago Tribune just reported that Gov. Kathleen Sebelius - President Obama's second pick for Health and Human Services Secretary- failed to pay a little over $7,000 in taxes between 2005 and 2007.
You're kidding us right? This is some sort of April Fools Day joke. It has to be.
Because, if it isn't, we'd like to know how it's possible to nominate SIX people to high-ranking positions all who, at one point, decided taxes weren't something they need be concerned with.
Please...TELL US THIS IS A JOKE so we don't quickly lose faith in the people with whom the President's choosing to surround himself.
Just cop to the fact that this is a prank, and we'll all laugh it off. Go ahead...anytime now...we're waiting...
Happy Day Fools April!
According to this article on The Huffington Post it's possible the reason we celebrate April Fools' Day is solely to mock the French.
Back in the day April 1 marked the new year. When the calendar shifted to start the year on January 1, some French people were slow to change, thus they were labeled "fools."
Of course, nobody really knows the origin of April Fools' Day, and this is just one hypothesis. But we mostly like it because - though we love France, French wine, French fries, and French bread - laughing at the expense of the French brings inexplicable joy.
The best April Fools' Joke we ever experienced was played on us in college. Our then-girlfriend told us she was pregnant with her ex-boyfriend's baby, but decided she was going to tell him and everyone else it was mine - he was already going through a rough time and she didn't want to add to his stress.
Looking back we can see some gaping holes in her story - first and foremost was her staunch belief in abstinence - but for some reason we bought it at the time. Fifteen minutes of mental and emotional anguish passed before we realized the date, became flushed and started laughing.
Those who aren't fans of April Fools Day really should investigate sharpening their senses of humor. Whether you're "gotten" or you "get" someone, it's a day that celebrates good fun and should be viewed as such. And really...couldn't we all use a little bit of fun right now?
This article from the website of the Museum of Hoaxes - surprisingly not a hoax - lists the Top 100 April Fools' Day Hoaxes of all time. It's a fun read, so enjoy.
Oh and if you're French, and haven't changed you're calendar yet...enjoy your special day!
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