Cowgirl Melinda Checks Out Congress

Some situations are just not safe for a sheltered, middle-of-the-road Western woman. Now Cowgirl Melinda was used to camping out on the lone prairie, going into tame places such as Buffalo, Ten Sleep, or even Cheyenne, but she went into dangerous territory when she went to Washington to see what all the fuss was about, and charm those good ole boys and gals running the place to see some reason, for a change.

So she goes into this big damned building with a pretty dome, and she is told she had to check her gun. So Melinda goes, "Cool. They sell drinks while you watch the show." But what she sees is mostly long-winded guys and a few women who talk on and on, stand around, scratch their crotches, and pass all kinds of motions. She decided that it's some kind of game for uncoordinated people to get some exercise.

She asked a man next to her, "How do you tell the Democrats from the Republicans?" The dude did not know; only saying that Republicans wear shorter hair than Democrats. Otherwise, they wear dark gray suits, with a bright-colored tie. One or two of them wore ties with nekkid ladies on 'em, so Melinda asked if either represented Wyoming. She was relieved at a negative answer, I guess.

She stayed around a bit; but nothing seemed to happen. So she asks a guard, "How much them fellows get for being here?"

The guard says, "$174,000 a year."

Melinda goes, "Are they also part-time football coaches? They sure don't work very hard for their money. Maybe they oughta get paid by the bill passed and maybe we would get some work out of that shiftless lot." But then she thought that the bills they do pass do some mischief. 

Then she noticed some fat cats talking animatedly to the elected officials, so Melinda asked the guard politely: "Who are those hombres?" "Miss, those are lobbyists." 

"They sure don't look like bell boys, do they?" 

By now she got  the lay of the land, so she didn't ask about the big gals following the lawmakers around. "I see they got a stable of whores, don't they?"

 "Dear lady, those are Congressional Assistants." The man winked while saying that, and Melinda wasn't going to let any East Coast dude make a pass at her, no Ma'am, even if he was a Capitol guard!

Still, she was curious. They all seemed to have spiffy haircuts. The guard told her that the Senators have their own barber shop so that they would look good on C-SPAN if their constituents happen to flip by while looking for some afternoon talk show or ESPN. 

Melinda asked, "Can you get a pedicure there?" 

"No, but they could get manicures until budget constraints caused them to drop that service." The things you learn if you ask the right questions.  Melinda thought that they probably don''t do bikini waxes, either.

But there's more. Congresspersons have their own gym, and they get free parking at Dulles and Reagan airports. They get to lease cars as an expense and help increase traffic on the beltway. And they get to go on fact-finding junkets to swell places as Paris or Stockholm; rarely to places such as Ubzekistan or Sudan. Finally, they have a retirement benefits that are so much better than the real working stiffs. It's like a bribe to make them go away.

Cowgirl Melinda said, "Not bad for a bunch of steers eating at the public trough. At least they're not in Wyoming."

We Need to Go In for Soccer and Other Sports

Let's face it: while professional football and baseball are well-followed in America, we are out of step with what the rest of the world considers big time sport. For some reason, they're caught up in soccer, which they have the temerity to call "football"! But, we set ourselves open for criticism when the our World Series is staged, and only American teams and one little bitty Canadian team are eligible! And . . . . let's be real, folks: the game with Gisele Bündchen's husband and the sinister coaches was upstaged by the Left Shark!

Clearly, we need to ramp up our soccer here. After all, it can be played also by ordinary-sized guys and women! And it provides a convenient venue for spectators and players to wear outrageous or even sexy costumes, and engage in recreational hooliganism while lustily cheering their gladiators...er, players! 

Part of the problem is the creeping expansion of seasons. Consider this: football dominates the sports news from August to February. There's a brief flurry of interest in basketball (longer for the absurd Hollywood Laker fans), and then there's the dull tedium of baseball. I think what the President needs to do is limit those seasons! If that could be blamed on the Republicans, so much the better!

Right now, there only a teeny gap in sports coverage from February to mid-March, if you exclude the Swimsuit Issue season of February. Maybe we can slip soccer in there, and start baseball a little later.

What about hockey? Well, the Canadians are too tough for us; and hockey won't play well for relaxing the natural aggressiveness of Southerners! So that's a no-go, except in benighted places as Boston and New York. (How about them Broons?)

And maybe fit in beach volleyball for late summer. Actually, although this is regionally limited sport, it does have possibility in that it is singularly American, we do it well, and we can routinely kick the rest of the world's collective asses when it comes to beach volleyball. Now all we need is for those Midwest farmers' daughters to make us feel alright by taking up beach volleyball in style!

Ain't America grand? We still have the wherewithal to kick European butts like we did in the old days. We just need a proper focus.

A French soccer cartoon.

Signs of the Impending Apocalypse

According to the Mayans, the world was to come to an end on December 21, 2013.  It didn't.  But will this cataclysm be preceded by distinctive signs?  A random selection of New Orleans people offered some possibilities of these portents.

Al Gautreaux -- The President and the Republicans will manage to work out an effective budget agreement.

Officer O'Shaughnessy -- The streets in my neighborhood will suddenly get repaired.

Missy Chauvin -- CNN or Fox News will hire me to be one of their anchors, and I'll get a boob job.

Bat Guano Tom -- The Saints will win another Super Bowl!

The Prophetess Madeline -- Street corner preaching will be legal again.

Hizzonor, the Mayor -- We'll come under budget one year.

Prospective Tourist -- Hotel prices won't get jacked up for Mardi Gras.

N.O.P.D. Sergeant -- The fad of breast-flashing for Mardi Gras beads will finally come to an end.

Fish Seller at the French Market -- I'll catch a three pound crawfish.

Preacher Bob -- My ministry commission will finally come through.

Clotilde Badeaux -- Models, like nuns and nurses, get to ride the streetcar free.

Crazy Chester -- The Four Horsemen will ride horses from a claiming race; each went off at 20-1 or greater.

Tommy Tulane -- The Tulane Green Wave will finally defeat the L.S.U. Tigers in football.

West Bank Commuter -- The bridge will not have any traffic.

Suzette the Existential Stripper -- I'll headline the show at the Tipsy Tiger Lounge.

The "I Where You Got Your Shoes" Scam Artist -- I'll know the world will end when the I.R.S. starts sending out "thank you" letters to taxpayers for paying their taxes.

Hilda Walspurgis -- There will be a category 5 hurricane, or maybe OSU coming back again.

Apparently, there's some bad weed being sold in New Orleans, with Al and the Scam Artist being the primary suspected users.

The Avenging Angel moons the world.

What About Wingnuts?

 Wingnut is a relatively new slur that recently entered the lexicon of political discourse; basically applied to someone equally of extreme left- or right-oriented views, as seen by the perceiver. Now this is nothing more than the extention of an ad hominem argument in political dialogue; it really generates some possible heat, a warm and squishy feeling of self-superiority on the part of the user, and nothing else. Sorry, folks; that's the way it is.

But one wonders how real wingnuts feel about this usage. Are they offended? And what are their political leanings, anyway?

Fearless, no-nonsense, big city reporter from New York Wilma Hastings did the ultimate preparation for interviewing on the street: she took a few tokes of that heathen killer weed before encountering the Great Unwashed. Hey, if you write for a newspaper catering to the uptown clientele, you have to make some sacrifices. So, after getting a good buzz on, the donned her urban sombrero to pass as an ordinary citizen and sallied forth!

Only there were no wingnuts in evidence. Wilma said, "My bad."

So she went into a hardware store, and found more likely candidates there. Big ones, little ones, wingnuts of color, wingnuts with rounded wings, those with squared wings, and so forth. You might say that she found a random sample of wingnuts; or at least a sample good enough for reporter work. Anyway, she saw no tinfoil hats in evidence. Curious.

Wilma Hastings: "Mr. Wingnut, what do you think of political extremists being referred to as 'wingnuts'?"

Big Wingnut: "I don't approve of that term. First of all, it's disrespectful to Wingnut-Americans. Secondly, very few metallic, hardware wingnuts hold to political extremes." 

Wilma: "Oh, and where do their political loyalties lie?"

Ms. Wingnut: "Well, 2% of wingnuts are Democrats, 1% are Republican, 22% are middle-of-the-road, and 75% are apolitical."

Wilma: "Well, what do you wingnuts do?

Tom Wingnut: "Oh, mostly we screw around and follow the Wichita Wingnuts minor league baseball team."

Wilma Hastings was a little disappointed at this. Her first thought was no story!

However, she re-thought things and came up with a new angle:

[Headline] WINGNUT-AMERICANS NEGLECT CIVIC DUTIES FOR SEX AND BASEBALL

Being a Fake Girlfriend

I don't know if anyone else did this, or had an occasion to have one, but I was a guy's virtual fake girlfriend briefly when I was an undergrad. Here's the story:

While I was a student at L.S.U., I was approached by a friend from U. L. - L. who said she had a problem, and I asked if I could help. She told me how:  I was to pretend to be her brother's girlfriend. Now Warren (not his real name) had just gone to U.L. -- Lafayette and had pledged a fraternity that was pretty broad-minded.  Now Warren was in the closet (so to speak). I kind of guessed it; but he was afraid that some less tolerant frat member might blackball him because of homophobia!  [I make no judgments about his preference nor his desire to make it not evident. Anyway, he is a nice guy and was glad to help out.]

The story line is that I was his g.f. away at L.S.U. while he was being a Ragin' Cajun at U.L.- L. (Lafayette is a party town.) Still we would correspond by email, send letters to each other, and occasionally phone.  I was careful to make the tone of the correspondence by post to be somewhat suggestive of closeness, but without explicitness, to indicate we had an enduring relationship. And, of course, add some day-to-day things for verisimilitude. Boys are just as nosy as girls when it comes to possible dirt. And the idea of someone getting laid! [blush] Frat guys are VERY basic in their interests.

This went on for over a semester. Finally, it came time for the fraternity's Spring Formal. He asked me to come visit, and I got away for a weekend, and crashed with my girl friend.   

Warren and I made the scene, and we played at being inseparable and devoted to each other. This called for the best in our acting performance; but I must say that some guys with a few under their belts were not acting critics! I helped him with his dancing; apparently being gay did not make him a better dancer! However, he got the basics, and I did not mind very much even when he danced close with me while holding me close a little lower than was entirely proper!

And we kissed. Repeatedly. I enjoyed his; and I hope he did mine. Somehow, his ardor must have made an impression on his fellow frat members.

We continued to correspond, but at a lower rate. Apparently, he adjusted well to life in Lafayette. And his frat bros figured out his orientation eventually; but no worries there -- they were open-minded. He was even elected an officer.  I guess the faking was not needed.  Oh well; maybe we all didn't have to be so judgmental. Anyway, he's still a great friend I keep in touch with.

Women are supposed to be good at faking orgasms. But faking a relationship is a whole new dimension. Maybe I'm cut out for diplomacy.   The Department of State is good at that.

Different Drum

A few weeks ago I deconstructed a 1970's song "Peaceful Easy Feeling," giving an interpretation of the lyrics. Now doing that is risky, since the lyrics are, after all, secondary to the beat most of the time. In the interests of fair play, Sometime I'll do "Baby One More Time," one of my favorite songs when I was a girl.

But I recently came across a song from 1967, "Different Drum" by a group called the Stone Poneys (Linda Ronstadt, Bobby Kimmel, and Kenny Edwards).  Actually, in reading about it, the version that made the CD was done by the lead singer Linda Ronstadt alone. Furthermore, she had to do it cold with a different accompaniment: she had a different back-up to her solo, and they used a  complex string arrangement including a harpsichord instead of acoustical guitars.

The Stone Poneys were not the first to do the Mike Nesmith song: the original group was the  Greenbriar Boys, and Carrie Underwood was to do it at the time of Linda Ronstadt's induction into the Rock and Roll Music Hall of Fame. Even the Lennon Sisters did a cover of it.

The song is, briefly about a young woman telling her lover that she's not ready to settle down, but that they both will live a lot longer if they live without each other. Apparently, they discovered that women, like guys, could have commitment issues too.

Seriously, this is a great song!!!

Sir Nils Olav

Edinburgh has a nice zoo; but one of the animals has a distinction that sets him apart from the others: he was knighted. His name is Sir Nils Olav. 

The story begins when the Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen brought back a king penguin for the Edinburgh zoo. He became the nucleus of the penguin exhibit. Back in 1961, near the fiftieth anniversary of the gift, the Norwegian Royal Guards came back for a visit. One of them, Nils, suggested that they adopt one of the penguins at the zoo as a mascot. Accordingly, he was given the rank of lance corporal.

King Olav V of Norway loved the idea, and the penguin was named Nils Olav. He, and successor penguins, rose in the ranks until the present Nils Olav (the third one to bear that name) was given the rank of Colonel-in-Chief of the Royal Guard. And King Harald V knighted him Sir Nils Olav, declaring him in every way qualified for knighthood! Not bad for a resident of Scotland!

Here's Sir Nils reviewing the troops.