Monthly Archives: September 2017

Sunday Morning, September 17, 2017 – Vietnam and Constitution Day

Sunday Morning, September 17, 2017 – Vietnam and Constitution Day

Tonight PBS stations will air the Ken Burns and Lynn Novik documentary Vietnam. It will be difficult to watch. But We, the People must watch. It will be especially difficult for those of us who lived it one way or another. For those who have no memory of this time period it is imperative that you watch.

We must revisit a time of protests, angst, upheaval and change in order to understand the protests, angst, upheaval and change that We, the People are experiencing today.

It was a time of unpopular leaders in an unpopular conflict in a foreign place exemplified by protests of “Hey, Hey, LBJ, How many kids did you kill today?”

It was a time of water hoses and attack dogs in our streets with “Burn, Baby Burn” slogans against our fellow Americans because of the color of their skin and ignoring the content of their character.

It was time of flag burning and flag waving and multiple crises of The United States Constitution addressing First Amendment Rights.

News about Vietnam came into our homes every evening on the social media of the day – television. Families sat down at the dinner hour to watch Vietnam on the evening news. Today we have 24/7 cable TV and other social media to keep us divided.

The Vietnam Conflict was considered the most consequential, divisive, and controversial events in American history probably until today.

Perhaps it is not ironic that today, September 17 is also Constitution Day

http://www.constitutionday.com/

On this day citizens are asked to read and reflect on The United States Constitution in its entirety. I suspect only history and government geeks like me will read the document from We, the People to the last signer, Gouv Morris.

If you only have three minutes, check out the video and sing along to one of the best learning programs ever – School House Rocks. Remember it is WE, the People of THE UNITED STATES of American Not just the few.

We were divided once. We are divided today. The Constitution worked during the years of turmoil of the years reflected by the Vietnam decades and it will work today.

https://youtu.be/yHp7sMqPL0g

http://https://youtu.be/yHp7sMqPL0g

 

Friday, September 15, 2017 – Dog Gone It! Best Dog in Show!

Friday, September 15, 2017 – Dog Gone It! Best Dog in Show!

Snarky Friday before College Football is short today due to a busy day for The Snark and many lackluster football teams and games scheduled for Saturday. Of course there are exceptions.

At 11:00 on ESPN we find #9 Oklahoma State versus Pitt. Yes, 11:00 o’clock games are the Pitts.

On CBS @ 2:30 in a huge SEC match up, for the bottom of the Top 25 but a seat at # 1 in the SEC, we have #23 Tennessee and # 24 Florida. I suggest to Tennessee not to Volunteer to put your hand in the Gator’s mouth.

However, Gators do not habitat mountainous areas. “Wish that I was on ol’ Rocky Top Down in the Tennessee hills…”

Thank you Algers, for being in Tennessee the day it after Coach Summitt’s announcement and buying me this shirt. Please remember the cause behind it

At 6:00 in another SEC match up it will be raining cats and dogs in Starkville, MS, when # 12 LSU meets Mississippi State. Go Big Solid! But Geaux Tigers. Watch on ESPN.

On FOX at 7:30 THE University of Texas returns to Los Angles to play USC. Didn’t the Horns play that team a long time ago? Probably a very long time ago for Horns Fans. Perhaps the BEVO Trojan Horse will have the Alabama Team inside. Watch Bama play Colorado State at 6:00 on ESPN2. Roll Tide. Watch out for Rocky Mountain Highs in Colorado. I am referring to the altitude of course.

Back to the morning – kicking off to a full stadium in Kyle Field, the Rajun Cajuns from UL Layfayette bring their mascot, Cayenne the Pepper, and the rest of the team to meet the Texas Aggies. Let’s see Aggies if you get the adjective “Fighting” back next week.

BTHO Rajun Cajuns!

Here’s the Big Dogs, the Under Dogs and the Best Dog in Show.  Check out the video for the history of the four runners up and the winner – Lady Reveille. WHOOP!

http://www.ncaa.com/video/football/2017-09-13/high-five-college-football-best-dog-mascots-reveille-uga-jonathan

Thursday, September 14, 2017 – I Kid You Not. Goat Yoga

Thursday, September 14, 2017 – I Kid You Not. Goat Yoga

The other day my friend, RL, sent me a link and said “this may go over better down there” Better meaning in College Station. – Home of Texas A&M University. The A&M formerly stood for Agricultural and Mechanical. It is a myth that those of us who hold degrees from The Harvard on the Brazos are competent in agriculture and mechanical things. I have a tendency to kill even fake plants and I can’t operate a mechanical pencil. Where was I goating with this?

I clicked the link and realized it was doing yoga with a goat and my first thought was “Nope, sounds like more of a Keep Austin Weird” thing to me. I am not fond of goats or yoga. Both are smelly.

It seems that you pay a fee and get to do yoga with a Kazmir Kountry Nigerian Dwarf Goat. I do not know if you get a discount if you bring your own goat.

If one is interested this website offers goat yoga classes as a Hurricane Irma Benefit later this month. You missed the goat yoga benefit for Hurricane Harvey, but there will be another opportunities. https://www.eventbrite.com/o/goga-goat-yoga-austin-15045758190

Subscribers to Goat Monthly received postcards featuring twin goats. Goat Monthly? Should Texas Monthly be worried?

http://www.austin360.com/lifestyles/recreation/goat-yoga-new-workout-trend-has-officially-come-austin/FePXhUq40C4j7AHxxLjvfO/

Here’s what I’m thinking. I just got back from the gym with my wonder trainer. To KB and former trainers, Killer Queen and Snookie, don’t even goat there. I am not goating to do this. No way am I planking with a damn goat sitting on my back. I am not lifting the goat as a free weight. I am not doing squats or lunges with the goat around my shoulders. I am not chasing the goat for a cardio workout. Just say NO to goats.

I saw that there was a Facebook page about the goats, but when I clicked on it, it said the page was not available. I suppose the goat ate it.

https://www.facebook.com/ADOPTfordogs/

I am thinking that my friend, HW, should give some thought to Chicken Yoga. Not just a farm animal spin off yoga, but design yoga mats with numbers and have Chicken Crap Bingo Yoga mats. I would not advise actually doing chicken yoga and chicken crap bingo simultaneously. As the bumper sticker says “Shit happens!”

Never too early to set up the Beat Alabama Shrine.

However, if goat or any other form of yoga is the answer to finding an offensive line, an entire defense and a quarterback, then let’s goat to doing it Aggies. What you think, Coach?

Dixie Chicken Yoga?

Wednesday, September 13, 2017 – Words, Quotes, Twitter and Education

Wednesday, September 13, 2017 – Words, Quotes, Twitter and Education

Eclectic Wednesday. I do not feel inclined to write anything coherent with transitions so I will do what we, the recovering bureaucrats, used to call “the bureaucrat ramble.” Keep reading and hopefully you will find something that moves you.

I was told early on from two fabulous high school English teachers (Wanda Traugh and Marge Burnside) that I could write. Eventually one believes that you can and you overcome the fear of showing your words to the world.

Remember my goal everyday with HWIT is to make at least one person smile and/or think. That does not mean you like what is written or even agree with it. In fact I enjoy those brave enough to say “I don’t like what you wrote today.” This includes family members and friends.

Here are some of my favorite quotes by some of my favorite writers.

“The idea is to write it so that people hear it and it slides through the brain and goes straight to the heart.” Maya Angelou

“Either write something worth reading or do something worth writing.” Benjamin Franklin

Since it is National Peanut Day let us thank those of peanut fame; George Washington Carver, Former US President Jimmy Carter, and Peter Pan. Although we all know that choosy mothers choose JIF.

Speaking of Jimmy Carter, POTUS # 39, offered these words of advice to POTUS # 45 today –

“Keep the peace, support human rights and tell the truth.”

That seems to be good advice for everybody on a daily basis. And it will fit into a Twitter message.

Paraphrasing Dr. Strangelove or How I Stopped Worrying and Love the Bomb, I could say “How I stopped worrying and love Twitter.” Actually I don’t love or even like Twitter, but with one little tweet I went from about 30 followers to 108 in two days with more RT’s, (Retweets) Likes, Hearts and favorable emoji characters than anything I tweeted in over three years.

The tweet? It was a response to Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos – aka known as Betsy DeVoucher.

“Usually when one is in charge of the educational institution he or she has an education and understands the issues. You have neither.”

In a previous lifetime I interacted with the office holder of the position of Secretary of Education and his or her staffs on a weekly basis and annually in person. These individuals regardless of political party affiliation had one thing in common – The improvement of public and parochial schools and institutions of higher education. The letters before my name mean I am qualified to make that statement regarding the current Secretary of Education.

May 1985 – Hooding at Texas A&M Graduation = Three stripes on the sleeve, a baby blue color “hood” and flat hat with strings on the side.

“Writers are not here to conform. We are here to challenge. We’re not here to be comfortable-we’re here, really to shake things up. That’s our job.”     Jeanette Wilson

Tuesday, September 12, 2017 – The First Space Race, Educational Reform and the Second Space Race

Tuesday, September 12, 2017 – The First Space Race, Educational Reform and the Second Space Race

Today I am wearing my doctor hat – the flat one with the string on the side.

To: Dr. A., Dr. B., Dr. C., and MRS. DeVos. Yes, the letters mean nothing if you have them and everything if you don’t.

If I have thought of this, surely someone else has. Evidence continues to point to the Russians hacking the 2016 Presidential election. They (whoever “they” are) have reported “The Russians could not have done it without American help.”

Here’s what I’m thinking. The Russians, formerly known as Soviets, beat us to the Space Race so what makes you think they did not beat the United States in the Cyber Space Race?

I was eight and a half years old on October 4, 1957. CBS was one of only three TV stations at the time. My parents and I watched a talking head on a black and white television. The news person said “The Soviet Union successfully launched Sputnik I. It is a satellite that orbits the earth.”

My mother burst into tears and my father left the room, as was his custom, to go ponder what he had just heard.

The United States was caught off guard. The Soviets might have the capability to launch nuclear weapons from Europe to the U.S. The Soviets were way ahead of us technologically. The Space Race had just begun and the Soviets blasted out of the blocks like rockets. Pun intended.

As a result of Sputnik I and the continued Soviet space successes, the United States launched a reform of the educational institution requiring that science be taught at all grades from Kindergarten through high school. Opportunities for advanced sciences were to be offered at all levels of college from baccalaureate to postdoctoral studies.

It was imperative that public schools, colleges and universities teach sciences of all disciplines to surpass the Soviets. Significant funding for science education was made at all levels. To even catch the Soviets, we needed to grow scientists, math people, engineers, astronauts and all types of technical minds and WE DID! The United States ultimately surpassed the Soviets when Neil Armstrong took the one step for man, one giant leap for mankind in 1969 when he stepped on the surface of the moon.

The Russians caught us again with our rockets down when they hacked the election. It is time for the Cyber Space Race and the educational reforms necessary to create the scientists, mathematicians, engineers, computer specialists, and cybernauts to once again surpass the Russians. It is time to adequately fund programs such as STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) programs at all levels. http://www.stemedcoalition.org/

It is time for MRS. DeVos to create funded mandates to encourage and engage learners at early ages to appreciate, enjoy and learn science of all types from frogs to physics. It is time to create the learning environments, including after school programs in public schools, that foster the necessary people to conduct research, to create new frontiers and to educate others with real data-driven research sciences and not the junk sciences currently in vogue and subscribed to by a backwards looking administration.

It is time, MRS. DeVos, to start planning for their future and quick sticking them with ours. It is time to boldly go and split our infinitives and educate the right people with the right stuff to win this Cyber Race.

Read about Sputnik I – https://history.nasa.gov/sputnik/

Hear the CBS broadcast about the Sputnik I https://youtu.b

http://https://youtu.be/dO33bvFbUCU

e/dO33bvFbUCU

Monday, September 11, 2017 – My Monday After College Football Awards

Monday, September 11, 2017 – My Monday After College Football Awards

With no further typing – My Monday after college football awards.

The Cupcake Game Ball goes to almost every team that played a smaller school. You won by large double digit margins and the smaller school is able to fund their entire athletic program for this year.

In the Uniform Category –The Best Uniform Award goes to the Ducks of Oregon. The Ducks usually win the Ugliest Uniform, but not Saturday. Their uniforms were a chrome helmet, with white jerseys and pants. Green numbers. Bright yellow socks and gloves that read: Win the Day. Win the Fight. Overcome. The uniforms were designed by kids with cancer from the Doernbecher Hospital and Nike.

Best Uniform for the rest of College Football – The Class Act Award goes to every team expressing their support for Texas with Texas Strong shirts and stickers. Florida you are not forgotten.

The Nothing Pisses Off your Opponent More Award goes “OOOOOOOOklahoma where the flag was planted in the O …” as Boomer Sooner echoes throughout the stadium. Let the Baker stick a fork in that Buckeye pie. It is done! See ya in Atlanta with Alabama.

The Unanswered Question Award goes to The Ohio State University Band. Since no one will be able to read cursive in the future, do you plan change Script Ohio to Print Ohio?

THE University of Texas receives The Sparse Kickoff Crowd Trophy. Looks a bit Spartan. Then again, there is Austin traffic to consider.

Photo by Jill

Glad to see Bevo’s horns growing. A good victory. Enjoy the victory because the USC Trojans await you next Saturday. Don’t forget who won the Trojan War. Hook ‘Em Hippies. (Read USC home page story of Jake Olsen- blind long snapper. https://www.usc.edu/)

The Exploding Coach’s Head Award goes to the Offensive Coordinator for UTSA along with The Hot Mike Award. He could be heard screaming not one, but two, multi-syllable, compound word, adjective profanities that would make Uncle Will Muschamp blush.  Heck, it made me and RL blush and that is real hard to do. I am pretty sure you can’t even say damn in Waco or question one’s mother’s fornications.

And now our final category – WORST FOOTBALL GAME EVER! Equally sharing the awards below are Baylor University and Texas A&M University.

Not just a Poopy Undies Award, but Throw Away Your Underwear Award to both teams. Playing down to your opponent is very dangerous. Your opponent has nothing to lose and gets a large portion of the gate receipts. This makes your fan bases want to say things like the USTA coach did and throw the remotes toward the TV. There are no photos because we threw the phones toward the TV or we had to reboot them after drowning them with tears.

Here to receive The My Grandmother Can Run Through that Opening Award goes to the Defensive Units of Baylor and A&M. Hey, Chavis.! This is not what the Aggies are paying you for.

Wearing a grandmother style hair, but can he play quarterback?

First to Baylor – You next opponent is Duke. Well, there is always basketball to look forward to.

To the Aggies – You’re next opponent is UL Lafayette. They do not call them Ragin Cajuns for nothing. Their mascot is a one of those dress up mascots that is a pickled pepper named Cayenne. I do not want to see you pepper sprayed all over Kyle Field.

And last for today, The Weather Report Award goes to Roy Philpot in the broadcast booth at Kyle Field for saying “it is a sweltering night here in College Station.” Native Texans consider an 80 degree temperature at night in September as a “cool spell,” Maybe it was just your reaction to the booth swaying during War Hymn, but I can only conclude that you were referring to something else sweltering in College Station besides the temperature.

12th Man Statue at Kyle Field. Photo by me.

This post brought to you by Moving Your Things Down Highway 6 in Either Direction. Ready ! Aim! FIRE!  R-E-L-O-A-D! A&M! Give us room, is not just a yell.

 

Monday, September 11, 2017 – Remembering

Monday, September 11, 2017 – Remembering September 11, 2001

Friday, September 8, 2017 – Snarky Friday Before College Football Saturday

Friday, September 8, 2017 – Snarky Friday Before College Football Saturday

The Snark of Friday is here and is very angry. To the person who send a letter of racial hatred and bigotry to the Sumlin Family: THIS IS NOT ACCEPTABLE. Your behavior is disgusting and reprehensible.

Football is a game. College football is an opportunity for many young men to succeed on the field and off. To criticize a coach due to perceived coaching abilities and even to express the desire for a replacement are well within the boundaries of the game. Alumni do not pay for mediocrity. To attack a coach’s family with such vitriolic spewed hatred and then to end it with a threat, is wrong for any family.

From the statement issued by Texas A&M AD Scott Woodward, “We unequivocally condemn this disgusting and threating letter. There is no excuse for hatred and as a community; we will not allow the ignorance of some to intimidate any member of our community.”

To the sender of the letter: May a plague of poxes fall upon your house that brings swarming locusts and grasshoppers, mounds of fire ants, moles in your flower beds, bed bugs in your mattresses, roaches in every room and leaks in the roof throughout your house.

Now moving down field.

From last evening congratulations to Sammy Bearkat and the Boys from Sam Houston in the win over Prairie View A&M 44-31. Not quite enough scare for a Poopie Undies Award Sam, but I will give you Skids Award. Well done, PVA&M.

Our football evening begins tonight with Pistol Pete and the Oklahoma State Cowboys. We shall find the Pokes playing South Alabama at 7:00 on ESPN2. If I were any team from Alabama, I would be watching Oklahoma State – even you in Saban land.

Tomorrow begins at 9:00 with ESPN Game. One of my football goals is to get a selfie with Kirk Herbstreit. I think he is cute and when Fowler scared him last Halloween with a spider and he screamed like a girl, I knew I wanted to meet him.

Thank goodness, apparently no one I care about is playing at the ungodly hour of 11:00 AM.

Screen # 3 – So the day begins with TCU and Arkansas entertaining us in old Southwest Conference rematch at 2:30 on CBS. Go FROGS!

Screen # 2 – Opposite the Frogs and Pigs we find THE University of Texas Longhorns trying to see if they can answer the question “Do you know the way to San Jose?” Kick-off is at 2:30 in DKR Memorial Stadium with Texas versus San Jose State on the Long Horn Network.

Screen # 1 -On my main screen aka Living Room (as in there’s an elephant in the room) –

My friend Celeste and a pack of pachyderms.

will be#1  Alabama versus Fresno State at 2:30 on ESPN2 in Tuscaloosa. Hounds Tooth hats for everyone! ROLL TIDE!

On Fox Sports Southwest – At the truly beautiful McLane Stadium in Waco on the Brazos the Road Runners from University of Texas San Antonio meet Baylor @7:00. New Rhule: Do not take the Road Runners lightly and try not to look like Wiley Coyote like you did last week. Sic ‘Em Bears.

Pardon me Mike? Is that the Chattanooga Choo – choos?” Why yes, Mike, The Tiger, LSU plays Chattanooga at 6:30 on the SECN. The Chattanooga mascot is named after legendary football coach A.C. “Scrappy” Moore, Scrappy, the Chattanooga mascot, is a fixture for the Mocs. A re-design in 2008 puts Scrappy in the image of the State Bird of Tennessee, a Mockingbird. Thank goodness, I thought it might be a water moccasin. YUM. Cats like birds.

Not Relief Out shirts, but proceeds from these also go to Harvey relief efforts.

At 6:00 from Kyle Field we have a Relief Out game between Texas A&M v Nicholls State on ESPNU. All Harvey evacuees in the Brazos Valley were given free tickets. Fans will Relief Out the stadium by filling it with fans wearing Hurricane Harvey Relief shirts. All proceeds go to Harvey Relief efforts. Should provide an intimidating stadium for The Colonels. There will be more people in Kyle Field than live in Thibodaux, Louisiana.

Wearing Big Boy Uniforms playing big boy games we have the #13 Auburn Hair Color versus the # 3 Clemson Tigers @ 6:00 ESPN. Oh, both teams are the Tigers? Roll Tide.

On ABC at 6:30 we have the Sooners from “OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOklahoma where the winds come sweeping down the plains” playing Ohio State Buckeyes. I am sorry. I do not know any Ohio State songs. If I get to meet Mr. Herbstreit, may he can me teach one.

Hope your team wins and

BTHO Nicholls State

Thursday, September 7, 2017 – Sitting in for Madam Rose today is The Divine Miss Peach. For all Feliners.

Thursday, September 7, 2017 – Sitting in for Madam Rose today is The Divine Miss Peach. For all Feliners.

Sitting in for Madam Rose today is The Divine Miss Peach.

Meow,

Since I was already sitting in the inbox on the desk, I get to blog.

My pet parent just got all of her headlights examined. Yesterday was a mammogram and car inspection. Today was annual eye exam. She says her eyes are dilated and she cannot see. Her pupils are very big.

Yesterday was my first day of school. I am in Kittygarden. Of course, I am in the gifted and talented section. This is reserved for Jellicle cats. A true Jellicle cat is like Cousin Moo Moo – black and white. Cousin Shelby is pretty Jellicle too. Not only am I a Jellicle, I am a calico cat (three colors and female) with some tabby (stripes) markings. Therefore I am a calaby cat.

Something is bugging me.

But all cats come to the Jellicle Ball.

Indoor Jellicles like to come out at night and run through the house, jump on the furniture, sweep the knickknacks shelf and dance the night away to music only jellicles hear.

The Attack of the Plastic Bags!

Then we like to jump into pet parent’s bed at 5: 00 AM to tell pet parent what a good time we had at the Jellicles Ball. Then we lie down because after such fun there’s a nap for that.

You ask, how did I get my name? Let’s see what the Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats says about the naming of cats.

I am named Miss Peach and “The name that no human research can discover–But THE CAT HIMSELF KNOWS, and will never confess.”

The Naming Of Cats

By T. S. Eliot

The Naming of Cats is a difficult matter,

It isn’t just one of your holiday games;

You may think at first I’m as mad as a hatter

When I tell you, a cat must have THREE DIFFERENT NAMES.

First of all, there’s the name that the family use daily,

Such as Peter, Augustus, Alonzo or James, Such as Victor or Jonathan, George or Bill Bailey– All of them sensible everyday names.

There are fancier names if you think they sound sweeter, Some for the gentlemen, some for the dames:

Such as Plato, Admetus, Electra, Demeter– But all of them sensible everyday names.

But I tell you, a cat needs a name that’s particular, A name that’s peculiar, and more dignified,

Else how can he keep up his tail perpendicular, Or spread out his whiskers, or cherish his pride? Of names of this kind, I can give you a quorum,

Such as Munkustrap, Quaxo, or Coricopat, Such as Bombalurina, or else Jellylorum- Names that never belong to more than one cat.

But above and beyond there’s still one name left over, And that is the name that you never will guess; The name that no human research can discover– But THE CAT HIMSELF KNOWS, and will never confess.

When you notice a cat in profound meditation, The reason, I tell you, is always the same:

His mind is engaged in a rapt contemplation Of the thought, of the thought, of the thought of his name:

His ineffable effable Effanineffable Deep and inscrutable singular Name.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_Possum%27s_Book_of_Practical_Cats

Tuesday, September 5, 2017 – The Tuesday Agenda. POTUS and Mammograms or Boobs Among Us

Tuesday, September 5, 2017 – The Tuesday Agenda. POTUS and Mammograms or Boobs Among Us

What is on the agenda for today?

  • Repeal Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals.
  • Bomb North Korea.
  • Stop trade with China.
  • Continue to tweet 128 characters about topics I know nothing about.
  • Watch on TV as Florida gets blown away like Texas by a natural disaster.
  • Develop a list of groups to blame for Hurricane Irma instead of climate change. Included, but not limited to: gay people, lesbians, transgender people, people of any color, immigrants, all religious group that is not Christian, and any group not fundamentalist Christian, and the media except for Fox News.
  • Continue to court Evangelicals.
  • Check on Vladddie.

I am sorry. That is the POTUS’ agenda for today. Here is mine.

  • Get mammogram today.

Face you make during mammogram.

Yes, today is the annual Squashing of the Boobs. Once a year women across America get to experience the feeling of a garage door descending and flattening all breast tissue, large or small, while special pictures are taken.

Hold your breath now. I have no experience, but I would think the hold your breath phrase equates to men when they hear “Cough.”

I do not really complain. In fact, I feel blessed to have two Girls to put on the platform and benefits that pay for the squashing. Several years ago, at a sorority reunion (AXO/SFA) a photograph was taken of ten sisters. Five of them were breast cancer survivors. Sadly, there was a display of pictures of sisters who were not so fortunate in the fight. That is one tiny segment of women. Magnify that number of boobs times by thousands to get some idea of the women effected.

You guys need to pay attention too. Every body has boobs.

Here is a toast to my two-boob, one-boob, and no boob loved ones, friends and ladies everywhere. Proudly wear your T-shirt that reads: Hell, yes. They’re fake. The real ones were killing me.

I wish every woman could get a mammogram. Do you have yours scheduled?