Houston's New Mayor.

Annise Parker has been actively involved in Houston politics for as long as I can remember. She has been a city counsel member in both a district and at large and has been city controller. Several years ago, I was fortunate enough to meet Ms. Parker and she struck me as a sincere public servant.

Ms. Parker ran for mayor against a Gene Locke whose political "experience" came as an appointee to several positions. He wasn't a bad man and wouldn't have been a bad mayor, but many felt Ms. Parker to have been more qualified and she won 52% of the vote in Houston's mayoral election. I will say I like Ms. Parker and voted for her.

All is well in Houston...except there are one or two people who take issue with the fact that Ms. Parker is openly gay. My voting for Ms. Parker had nothing to do with her sexuality. She strikes me as a competent public servant who has the best interest of the city at heart and to that end I think she'll make a great mayor. My concern as I cast my ballot as well as now is those who will spend the next two years talking about the fact that my new mayor is a lesbian.
The national media will take both sides of the coin. Conservative media outlets will blast Houston as the new Soddom because we've elected a homosexual as mayor, the "progressive" media outlets will try to treat Houston as a 'city on a hill' in the struggle for gay rights. I wish for us to be seen as neither. There will be religious types who will more than likely not consider us as a choice for their church's conventions.

There will be gun lobbies who will wonder how the biggest city in Texas could have done such a thing and will either avoid us or make it their mission to show us the "error" of our ways. We ARE the 4th largest city in America with an oil and gas industry that keeps a good portion of America afloat.
We're the busiest port on the gulf coast and a city where the cost of living doesn't eat the average person alive. Mayor Parker grew up here and is an intelligent woman with a good head on her shoulders and will have a large, diverse city to run. She needs "The Advocate" in her face as badly as she needs "Fox News." I for one hope both leave us and our mayor alone.

I...Hate Everything about....(list #1)

In the 90's Rock group Ugly Kid Joe did a tune called "Everything About You" in which the singer outlined everything he hated about his girlfriend. I'm not here to bitch about a lady, but rather about little things in every day life that irritate the hell out of me.

Hand Sanitizer: For God's sake. I'm IN a bathroom. I want a big, soapy anti bacterial lather. This crap is just some gooey alcohol that kills germs...but leaves dirt in place. I had axel grease on my hands. The hand sanitizer killed every last germ in it! I can't touch ANYTHING....but if I did the huge black stains I left would be hypoallergenic!

BlueTooth Headsets: Ever see a guy walking down the street talking to himself? If you saw this before 2005 it was some mentally disturbed individual discussing the subtle differences between 18th century British Parlaimentary procedures and the current model used in India or Why Pitt the Elder was a MUCH better Prime Minister than Benjamin Deshrali. NOW if you see the same guy and he has a little piece of blue plastic on his ear...you can rest assured that some bozo OTHER than you is listening to this prattling dufus.


Fox News: I could care less that they used press releases from the Bush Whitehouse as news stories. It doesn't bother me that they trash President Obama. They make the hate list because of the whole "tea bag" fiasco. People, you're entitled to slant to the right. The world would suck if we all agreed, but you can't argue that you're fair and balanced and that you're merely reporting news if you SPONSORED the "tea parties" and set up "tea party" web sites. Ladies and gents despite how un-abashedly pro Obama MSNBC is...durring the presidential campaigns they didn't set up Obama web sites. For the record I don't hate YOU guys. It's the hypocricy I hate.


The BCIS Ratings: So I have to watch USC, UT and Notre Dame in Bowl games every season even if they post sucky records because by VIRTUE of the fact that they are USC, UT and Notre Dame...they're going to AUTOMATICALLY make it to bowl games? There are colleges and universities with winning teams who we'll never see playing in a bowl game, because YOU jackasses don't know of any famous alumni from the schools in question. You guys should change if from the BCIS to the BSCIS. It would be more fitting. Hey guys ever hear of PLAYOFFS? They do it for college basketball...no one's complained yet.

Kid's Breakfast Cereal: Not because they're loaded with sugar. Not because they have no nutritional value, not because they're possibly the worst things any human can possibly consume...but because they don't put PRIZES in the boxes anymore! WTF people. A brotha can't get a decoder ring in a box of Cocoa Pebbles? Captain Crunch out of 3D glasses? You people sicken me!

People who talk on the PHONE or Text while driving: Okay. We as a society live under the DELUSION that there is such a thing as "multi-tasking" Translation a bunch of cheap A-holes who run companies rather than letting individuals be productive by doing one thing at a time give one person the work of three people. This idiocy crept it's way into real life to the point where people will attempt to manuver a couple of thousand pounds of steel and fiberglass through groups of people doing the same while:

a. applying make up
b. eating
c. playing air guitar
d. text messaging
e. receiving "oral pleasure" (as outlined in the film "Pulp Fiction")
f. watching small video screens
g. reading books/ news papers
h. combing their hair
i. TALKING ON THE PHONE!

People try something novel...like...um...I don't know....DRIVING YOUR *FCUK(tm.)ing car!


*FCUK = French Connection United Kingdom a clothing manufacturer...I had no idea they made cars.


The Techno remix of ANYTHING!!!: I liked the song. I liked the first remix...do you have to do 20 remixes of a given song or worse still give it the same sickening euro-trash (in 2/4 time dum-dum-dum-dum-dum-dum...dum-dum-dum-dum-dum) back beat? Just shoot me in the forehead, it would be much more humane than hearing the mega-mix of Elmo singing the alphabet.

The Dallas Cowboys: They didn't do anything in particular this time around, but I've always hated the organization for various reason and I just didn't want to leave them out.

Basketball referees: The officials are the reason I don't watch basketball anymore. No one calls traveling EVER! "Marquis" players don't get called for ANYTHING. Michael Jordan was a gifted athlete...he didn't NEED referees ignoring the FLAGRANT fouls he committed...but they did anyway. If you doubt that refs can control the outcome of a basketball game...ask the Sacremento Kings how four of their starting FIVE fouled out in a playoff game against the Lakers.

Activist with 'mysterious' sources of income: Ever see someone on TV with the caption "community activist" under their name? I'll bet it's someone who has a camera in his/her face whenever there is an issue with some disenfranchised group. After the rally or press conference ends, this person usually hops into a new Mercedes or a Range Rover and drives off to a big house..rather than some kind of job. I'm all for helping out one's community...but if it seems like it's all you do you kinda look like a parasite. Martin Luther King was a minister, Caesar Chavez was a Union Organizer. My point? Both of these cats had jobs. Look into it...


The Hills/Keeping up With the Kadashians/Jon & Kate/ Kathy Griffin/ & Every"SCRIPTED reality show: I only know who Heidi and Spencer are...because TMZ puts a camera in their faces every 8 seconds and TELLS ME their famous, prior to that I neither knew, cared nor gave a vugg. Insofar as I can figure out she's an idiot and he's a douche incapable of growing visible facial hair. Kim Kardashian is pretty enough, but had she not video taped herself getting her freak on with Brandi's barely talented younger brother (who would have had neither a recording/acting career without her) would anyone have any clue who she was? You're a pretty Armenian girl with a big butt...so what. That and $5.00 will get you a coffee at Starbucks. If you don't have any actual talent you shouldn't be famous simply for BEING famous. The exceptions are Kathy Griffin and Maragret Cho. They actually ARE commedians and both can act so I won't dog them out.


Parents who insist on being thier child's "Friend": Being physically and mentally abusive to little Johnny may wreck his self esteem. I agree; however, treating Johnny like he's your younger brother rather than your son and never showing him that his actions have consequences will turn him into a disrespectfull little vinegar and water filled feminine hygeine product with an overwhelming sense of entitlement who as an adult will need a deep-down-home-countryboy-what-you say-about-my-mama-ASSWHIPPIN'. So be Johnny PARENT now. You can be his friend/mentor/big brother when he's in his 30's.


Celebrity "News": I like Angelina Jolie's movies, but I don't need to know that she took her son shopping for a new Playstation 12? or is adopting a small child from the Democratic Federated Socialist Republic of Yusukistan. Let celebs have a private life.

Ryan Seacrest: Sorry you did WHAT to earn a star on the Hollywood walk of fame? Stanley Kubrick directed iconic films...and HE doesn't have one. You're a radio DJ who hosts American Idol and says: "Seacrest Out" as you're leaving a room. Cha...not feelin' ya princess. I want to see a bunch of thugs beat the man down for sport and have one of them say 'Seacrest out.' before knockin' him the vugg out. What a tool.

Movies based on tv shows OR that are remakes of OTHER films: Are there so many idiots running Hollywood that no one has an original idea, or does Hollywood lack the cojones to make films and television shows that take any kind of risks? Hey Hollywood...grow a pair.

Tom Brady: Miss, when you have a 40 point lead in a football game after two quarters of play, if there are 60 seconds on the clock...in the second quarter you kneel on the ball and run down the clock. You don't shove the ball down your opponents throat and try to see if you can score another touchdown. That madame where I come from is what we'd call a bitch move. Wonder why you spent last season out with that leg injury? Because you've been playing like an arrogant little BITCH for most of your career.

Well there you have it. The first installment of the nonsensical ravings of a lunatic mind and if ya don't like it...life's hard....deal with it.

Guys and Fashion

For some reason I was subjected to the film "The Devil Wears Prada." For those unfamiliar with the chick flick in question it revolves around an aspiring journalist who takes a job at a fashion magazine (Obviously modeled on Vogue) and is the 2nd personal assistant to it's editor-in-chief (obviously modeled on Anna Wintour). In the film our protagonist has her resolve slowed eroded by a cruel boss who expects her to get her flights out of hurricanes and to locate manuscripts for unpublished novels among her other tasks. She is constantly ridiculed by very catty men and women for her fashion sense or lack thereof and her respect for the fashion industry as a whole. the women are catty and the men are more so. The female characters strike you as women who will die alone and the male characters strike you as guys who couldn't work in an all male environment for more than a week without being beaten to death.
The film paints the fashion industry as a bunch of tall, skinny, shallow, bitter women and the gay men who wish they were tall, skinny, shallow, bitter women and the remarkably small outfits they design.
I will admit I have no fashion sense whatsoever. I think I could give "Hitchhiker's Guide to The Galaxy's" Zaphod Beetlebrod a run for his money as "worst dressed sentient being in the universe." Here's the funny thing. I don't care. Some say our clothes make a statement about us, but I'm sorry I don't see it. Mind you there are occassions when I will dress to impress, but ultimately I don't really see the point . Clothes to be serve a utilitarian purpose. Pants cover my legs, a shirt covers my torso and a jacket keeps me warm. I'm wearing sneakers for comfort and boots if I'm going to be in the great outdoors. Wearing one color because it's a given season makes no sense to me, and neither does blowing an entire paycheck on shoes.
I imagine "Fashion week" has to be the "fashionistas" equivilent of the superbowl, but it still does nothing for me.
Do there exist men who care about clothes and shoes? Yes. It's been my experience that three types of men care about fashion:

a. The insecure
b. The incredibly shallow
c. Really gay guys.

By saying that I'm not attacking gay men for their taste in clothes, I am however attacking the shallow and insecure guys. In sofar as fashion is concerned the rest of us could care less.

Must be a Commie Plot!

I've always been fascinated by history. The written record of mankind's triumphs and transgressions enthralls me. We can learn from how someone succeeded or failed. In the midst of the great health care debate I've heard lots of angry men and women shouting down anyone siding with the president or the Democratic party in this instance and they all seem to be unified in their cries of "socialized medicine." The bulk of the men and women tend to be largely conservative and white.
Being conservative and white aren't bad things. Consider that conservatives as a group by definition simply aren't big fans of radical change and as change can be daunting concepts I can respect this on some level, but I have to analyze what's going on now and compare it to a few other instances in American history.

When in the 20's organized labor lobbied for a shorter work week, a minimum wage and benefits they were called "Communist." They were opposed by big business and such noteworthy conservative organizations such as the Ku Klux Klan. Ironically the bulk of the Klan's membership were blue collar types who benefitted MOST from labor laws. Big companies who shall remain nameless hired thugs to beat up Union reps and The Klan was KNOWN for beating, lynching and running union reps out of town.
When Franklin Roosevelt suggested the New Deal, conservatives and big business called it socialism to the highest degree.
When the civil rights movement hit it's stride in the mid 50's Conservatives were calling it a "Commie Plot" and went so far as to call Martin Luther King a Communist as a means of discrediting him. Along with the conservatives (Who were the Democrats at the time) were the conservative "Citizen's Councils" (who saw integration as evil) and the rank and file of the Ku Klux Klan.
Flash foward to present day. America has a biracial president who is trying to push healthcare reform. Who opposes him? The Insurance companies who deny men and women coverage, give them ridiculous deductables, and just flat out won't pay some claims and the Pharmaceutical Industry who rakes in huge profits for drugs which they sell for a 1/3 their American price in Canada.
Is President Obama's overhaul of the healthcare system a good idea? I haven't read all 1100 pages of the document which lays out his provisions so I won't agree or disagree. Will his plan cost us a fortune? Again, haven't read the proposal so I won't say. Uninformed opinions make one appear short sighted. What I find odd however, is that there are many people who are running with half truths on this potential legislation and calling it both "Socialism" and "communism." What can I say when threatened, play the commie card. Worked for Joe McCarthy. Didn't it?

Tears for Lola

My 3rd grade teacher Mrs Stokes was a master of child psychology. In the year which I spent in her class she convinced me that I was possibly the dumbest child to have ever drawn breath. She attempted to place in me "special needs" classes and HISD subjecteded me to not one but two IQ tests at her bequest.  I was tested twice, because Mrs Stokes successfully convinced the principal that the person who administered the first test OBVIOUSLY made a mistake. The second test showed precisely what the first had shown. I was far from intellectually challenged.

            While I wasn't the "special needs" case that Mrs Stokes had painted me to be I needed a teacher who could have undone the damage that she had obviously done to my psyche. 

Every school has that one teacher whom the kids (and some of the teachers) both respect and fear. At Alcott Elementary in Houston, Texas that teacher was Mrs. Lola Blackmon. Mrs Blackmon taught 4th grade and was known for not taking any attitude from any student or parent and swinging a mean paddle.  As I and Mrs Stokes' outgoing students stood in the hallway outside her door we watched as the fourth grade teachers walked up to class after class and read the names of their new students off the clip boards they carried.

          I can't speak for my classmates, but I stood there praying the way that only an 8  year old boy could for my name NOT to have been on Mrs Blackmon's list.  She was a short, stout woman with skin the color of a freshly poured cup of black coffee. She walked up to my group without expression and peered though her big bi-focals and read four names:

"Davis, Johnny. Garner Frank, HANDY, JESSE. Spiller Willie. Come with me boys." We were in shock. We were too scared to move, but her reputation with a paddle made us more frightened of staying put. From day one Mrs Blackmon let it be known that she would expect nothing less than our best at all times. We would respect, ourselves, one another and her at all times and if we didn't there were consequences. The first time she was out we gave a substitute teacher hell on earth. On her return, EVERY student (except those who were absent) got a paddling for disrespecting a sub. Needless to say every sub we had after that told her how "Well behaved" we were.

          For reasons I didn't understand she was particularly hard on me personally. She always gave me extra assignments. I didn't complain, I was too afraid of her to have said anything. There were times when my classmates would be at recess and she would give me lengthy vocabulary lists or reading assignments.  At the end of the school year Mrs Blackmon pulled me aside when my classmates were playing dodgeball and said "Jesse you're probably wondering why I gave you so much extra work this year aren't you." I was too afraid of her to answer. "Tell the truth."

"Yes ma'am." I replied sheepishly. She then told me about how Mrs Stokes had initially tried to retain me in the 3rd grade and when that failed how she had attempted to have me placed in special needs classes. After hearing about how Mrs Stokes had convinced the principal to test me a 2nd time Mrs Blackmon told the principal that she would gladly take me into her class and prove that Mrs. Jane Stokes had simply given up on me far too soon. 

        I was fortunate to have had my own personal Henry Higgins in the form of Mrs Lola Blackmon. The following year I and several of Mrs. Blackmon's former students were placed in the gifted and talented program. I didn't realize it at the time, but I actually enjoyed the things she made me read. I enjoyed being able to do vocabulary exercises without a dictionary and I enjoyed writing. 

         In high school and later in college I would occasionally venture by Alcott Elementary to see how my teacher was doing.   Whenever I did, I got Mrs. Blackmon's trademark smile and a huge hug. One day while talking to a concierge in Houston Center I mentioned Mrs Blackmon and the impact she had had on me early on. As luck would have it, the concierge was in her very first class when she taught at Sunnyside Elementary. 

        We laughed and joked about her for a moment then he hit me with a devastating blow. He'd informed me that the greatest teacher I had ever known, had passed away a few months earlier. There were hundreds at the funeral, most in attendance had been former students. I'm not ashamed to admit that I stood there and openly wept for Mrs Lola Blackmon. 

        Today I work for HISD and whenever I can I try to rise to the incredible standard which she set.  There are times when I will ask myself 'How WOULD Mrs Blackmon handle this?' when faced with a perplexing issue. 

       

         We encounter many people in the course of our lives. Some we forget instantaneously, some we find memorable, others make a profound impact.  I'm happy and proud to say that Lola Blackmon made an impact. Who knows, maybe one day years from now, someone may say the same of a kid who sat in the front of Mrs Lola Blackmon's 4th grade class in 1979.

Who do you have to kill to get published?

 

For the better part of my life I've wanted to write fiction. Last summer I wrote an outline and from it wrote a 273 page manuscript about a girl from the midwest who runs away from home and is forced to make an inner journey on the mean streets of a sweltering urban hell as she supports herself in the world's oldest profession and takes stock of her life. 

           I allowed a couple of objective and just plain mean people read it. They loved it and asked when I was getting published. My question is this. WHEN AM I getting published. I learned after completing the project that publishers don't take manuscripts from authors who DON'T have agents. Hence the days of sending your manuscript to Bantam or Simon and Schuster are long gone. 

            If you're famous or infamous literary agents salivate at the thought of you putting your incessant ramblings on paper as they can sell millions of copies of a book that is filled with pics of your dog or you doing laundry.  I mean come on, Paris Hilton's DOG Tinkerbell is a published author for god's sake. Celebs, pseudo celebs and the idiot by products of condomless celebrity sex can get books published while men and women with premises that would make great books fall by the way side and continue to work in factories simply because no one want to listen to an unknown. 

           Literary agents are like ugly girls on an aircraft carrier to unpublished writers. They KNOW they're sought after so they're considerably more selective than they would be under normal circumstances. Let me give you a scenario.  You're a lit agent and a security guard from the University of Mississippi has written a manuscript. Do you give it the once over, or let him get lost in the shuffle of other authors who clamor to be published? Chances are you'll do the later. Congratulations! You passed on "Soldier's Pay" and Mr William Faulkner will simply have to find SOMEONE ELSE to publish his works and his Nobel and Pulitzer prizes will not equal a few million more in sales for YOUR agency. The downside to being TOO selective is that they may very well be missing out on the next William Faulkner, Stephen King or Amy Tan.

         I'm not trying to imply that I and every other unpublished author out there should be mentioned in the same breath with Faulkner, Tan, King, Stienbeck, Sinclair and Capote, but at the same time if literary agents never let us past their receptionist the world will never be able to judge for themselves. I and every other unpublished author out there write for the joy we get from telling our stories. I'm actually 125 pages into my second book about a first year teacher in an inner city school (I work as a substitute teacher in an inner city school by the way) and I write simply because I love doing so.  But who knows, the literati may be too busy waiting for Tinkerbell's latest saga to care about what unknown writers in Houston, Sioux City, Madison Biloxi are doing.

Music Piracy...hardly.

On Thursday June 18th a jury awarded a group composed of music giants Warner Music Group Corp, Vivendi SA's Universal Music Group, EMI Group PLC and Sony Music Entertainment 1.92 million dollars in a copy right suit.  Who were these giants of the music industry suing? A huge musical conglomerate who could crush them individually if they DARED not to sue en mass? A music mogul who attempted to steal the recordings of their artists to become even wealthier? Who frightened the companies that give us the bulk of our distributed music? Would you believe a housewife and mother of two? 

       Yes, Jamie Thomas-Rassett  was found to have willfully violated the copyrights of 24 songs by making them available for free downloads and was charged the sum of $ 80,000 PER SONG! This is Thomas-Rassett's second trail. Music industry fat cats are saying that people like Thomas-Rassett are the reason they keep jacking up the price of downloading music for a fee. 

      Fact the average C.D cost 18 dollars and usually has 11 songs on it, most of which are filler material. The average blank CD cost  a few cents. The music industry seems too stupid to grasp that the REASON for wholesale "Piracy" are their ridiculous prices. I wanted to purchase the soundtrack of "Jesus Christ Superstar" on CD. The price was $40.00. I went out and bought the MOVIE "Jesus Christ Superstar" and it only cost me $10.00.  Does it cost more to record an album than it does to make a film? Of course not.  Record companies are run by men and women so incompetent that they have ceased to ask what people are listening to and now TELL us what we listen to. Most song that make it to radio are chosen by a handful of record company executives and the heads of a few major corporations that control the bulk of Americas radio stations, Cashbox Media, Cox & Clear Channel Communications control most of the major market stations in every format. Recording industry low life tell the media conglomerates what they have, buy lots of air time and we get sucky artist like the Plain White Tee's, L'il Wayne and The Jonas Brothers going platinum. Prior to Disney shoving these warmed over Osmonds down our collective throats...who the hell ever heard of the Jonas Brothers.

          Music industry types have always wanted to squeeze every dime from consumers. In the 60s when cassette players were about to hit the market, record companies sued saying they would lose hundreds of millions from people recording things on cassette. They lost thankfully and an entire generation recorded songs directly from radio and made our own poor quality cassettes. We still bought the albums but some times we merely wanted a single rather than an album. Ironically the recording industry didn't collapse and the earth didn't fall from it's axis.

           When it became possible to buy music online not only did recording industry types complain, but overpaid, spoiled artist did as well. At one point when Napster provided free downloads, Heavy Metal band  Metallica's drummer Lars Ullrich  whined like a little girl who had soiled her favorite Sunday dress at the thought of someone downloading "Master of Puppets" for free. Globally Lars' music has sold hundreds of millions of copies making him and the other members of the band very wealthy men several times over. Not satisfied with his millions Lars whined on behalf of all spoiled musical vaginal cavities. Apparently he could have bought platinum fixtures for the bathroom in his yacht rather than gold ones had one person in Michigan not downloaded one of his songs without paying for it.  

         One can't help but wonder how small someone's genitalia would have to be in order to measure his worth not in the QUALITY of the music he's created, how many concerts, he's sold out or his place in music history, but rather how many poor people he could prevent from listening to his music, becoming fans and possibly BUYING his music.  The music industry needs to take a long hard look at itself. For decades the quality of music has declined to the point where when someone with talent proves how well they can sing we are collectively Amazed because the music industry in addition to over charging us, has brainwashed us to think that only attractive people can sing or should. If that IS true and we can judge someone's beauty based on their personalities then the bulk of record company executives shouldn't be allowed to record out going messages on their own answering machines.