Here's What I'm Thinking

Monday, February 9, 2015 – Bless Me Father, For I Have Sinned

Bless Me Father, for I have sinned. This weekend I had brunch at Brennen’s in Houston and ate the most decadent eggs benedict.  Of course they were preceded by a bloody Mary.  And of course, I had bananas foster. I went to Brennen’s. One cannot go and not have bananas foster.   No, I am not at the sinning part yet.  Then I went to see the Broadway play Book of Mormon and laughed and marveled at the entire performance.  I have seen and heard worse on cable TV. No, having cable TV is not the sin. I am getting to the sinning part.

I have succumbed to the slings and arrows of outrageous misfortune and capitulated to the social media peer pressure and joined Face Book.  I still feel the same about the technology.  It is a waste of time and energy, not to mention the last shred of any privacy you might have had, is now for anyone with an Internet connection to see, hear and steal.

Within 48 hours of logging on, somebody found me.  Even BFF Luddite sent a text asking if I had joined. And now my mailbox is filling with friend requests.   Thank you.  I appreciate them and I will get to them.   Here’s a bit of the back story.

Last March my Ash Wednesday, Lenten commitment was to write an essay every day for the 40 days of Lent.  Turns out Lent is really longer than 40 days, so I had to continue from Ash Wednesday to Easter.  I began a blog called Here’s What I’m Thinking.  Do you know how hard it is to write and publish over 200 posts?  Of course with the Texas Legislature in town, it has become somewhat easier since there is so much material.

A few people actually read the daily paragraphs.  Thank goodness football season began and in the fall I began posting to Twitter and people actually began to follow and Retweet.  So in order to reach another audience, I connected Here’s What I’m Thinking to Facebook.   In some respects, I am taking a techno step backwards.

So here’s the deal.  You read my daily writings and I will complete your friend requests.   The majority of the writings are done in parody and satire.  You are supposed to laugh.  Sometimes I do put on my doctor hat and write something serious and use multisyllabic words with long pedantic, Faulknerian sentences.

The usual content centers on college athletics – football and basketball, Texas Aggie athletics, politics, the educational institution and living in the state of Texas.  Remember, the goal of a writer is to evoke emotion.  The reader gets to define the emotion.  Oh yeah, at some point I will write about you.  So consider yourself warned.

What? Ash Wednesday is NEXT Wednesday?  It is not this week? You mean I have to do the whole confession thing again next week?   And there is still one more Friday night steak?  Saints Behold!

Good Morning, Class,

Today we will explore our interdisciplinary thoughts by wasting instructional time and conducting our weekly practice for the assessment.   Our assessment today is based on the weekly question posed to the Texas and United States governments “What Have You Done for the Citizens of Texas this Week?”

Ready? Number two pencils up? Begin!

Question One – Ranking or Ordering

Rank the following in order with number one representing the MOST and number seven representing the LEAST embarrassing to Texas this week.

Molly White – Texas House of Representative who said the group organizing Muslim Day at the Capitol had terrorists’ ties.

Ted Cruz –U. S. Senator from Texas for his strategy of blocking a vote on President Barack Obama’s attorney general nominee until the White House relents on immigration. His own GOP colleagues voted against him.

Lance Armstrong – for side swiping a car while under the influence and then blaming it on his girlfriend.

Johnny Manziel – will he trademark Johnny Rehab?

The leader of Open Carry Tarrant County – for indirectly threatening death for those who did not approve a proposed measure allowing Texans to openly carry handguns in public.

The measles outbreak.

Rick Perry and his team of lawyers – still trying to get the charges dismissed.

Question Two – Writing Portion

Write a 250 word essay explaining why the Texas Land Commissioner is leading the education protesters.  For extra credit, write a protest song about it.  We all know that land commissioners in Texas grow more than agricultural crops on the land.  It grows Bushes too.

Thursday, February 5, 2015 – Bruce Jenner

Bruce Jenner can be whoever he wants to be as far as I am concerned.  If I had to deal with the Kardashians I would go into a witness protection program too. But I do have a question.  He won the gold medal in the decathlon at the 1976 Summer Olympics held in Montreal. Will she be eligible to participate in the decathlon at the Senior Games?

Wednesday, February 4, 2015 – National Signing Day

The ink is dry on the fax machine (See archaic method of communication). The recruit is signed.  For the sports’ challenged, today is National Signing Day.  It is where eighteen year old young men make life altering decisions for themselves and their families by signing a letter of intent to play football with a college or university.  So here’s to all the young men who signed a contractual agreement.  Take advantage of the opportunities that await you. Work hard and learn much. And to Kyler Murray and Daylon Mack and all of the others headed to College Station – Here’s a Big Whooping Thank You!  Welcome to Texas A&M.

Monday, February 2, 2015 – Ground Hog Day

Keep the coats the snow plows handy. Punxsutawney Phil says six more weeks of winter.  It seems the rodent emerged from his hole on Gobbler’s Knob in Pennsylvania at 3:00 am this morning.  However, the rodent, Chuck, on Statin Island in New York at 7:30 am says spring is just around the corner.  See the rodents cannot even agree.  Seems last year the mayor of Charlotte, New York dropped the ground hog who later died of her injuries. I wonder where Peta was for this. In 2009, the ground hog bit then mayor, Michael Bloomberg on the hand. This year they choose a hands-off approach and kept the ground hog in a Plexiglas enclosure.  In Alaska, February 2 is observed as Marmot Day rather Groundhog Day because few ground hogs exists in the state.

What if they used the same rodents to determine presidential candidates?  Wouldn’t that be cheaper than a convention and all those minutes of rude, callous, mostly false TV commercials against opponents?  Put some names of candidates on the ground; let the rodent out of his cage or Plexiglas enclosure and whichever name the groundhog chooses gets to be the candidate.  Punxsutawney Phil could be used for all parties.  Until rodents and squirrels have the right to vote, this seems just as good as any other predictor of success.

Oh well, if you think you are having a bad Monday, it could be worse.  You could be the Seattle Seahawks and their fans who are wondering: You have one of the strongest running backs in the NFL. You are on the one yard line.  There is less than 30 seconds left in the game.  And the play called is to throw the football.  Really?  And just like in the 1993 movie Ground Hog Day, you will have to replay that play for the next year over and over and over again.

Wednesday, January 28, 2015 – Gone to Play Golf

Due to the temperature in the BV area today predicted to be in the upper 70’s, I am going to play golf and think of the people freezing their butts off in the northeast instead of writing something profound today.  I will be wearing a short sleeved golf shirt and shorts. My good, red Republican, cloth ones.

Today also marked the 250th blog post to Here’s What I’m Thinking.

Tuesday, January 27, 2015

Here are the today’s important headlines from Here’s What I’m Thinking News

• There is a shortage of brisket in Texas.
• Bob Dylan is on the cover the AARP Magazine.
• The New England Patriot’s balls are still in the news.
• The New England Patriots found somebody to blame for the de-flate gate.
• New York and Boston and rest of the northeast experience blizzard conditions.
• The weather in the BV should be beautiful and sunny with highs in lower 70’s.
• Bikers advocating the open carry of guns were one of yesterday’s protests de jour at the Texas Capitol.
• Abortion rights or no rights depending on your views were also one of yesterday’s protest de jour in Austin.
• College signing day is just days away creating tense anxiety on the part of college football coaches.
• Sarah Palin is talking again.