Category Archives: Texana

Three feet of global warming and plastic bags

Posted on January 24, 2016 | 5 comments

My friends in the Shenandoah Valley have had about all the global warming they can stand this weekend. Richard T., Mr. B’s godfather and my old Vietnam bud, spent his time driving his vineyard’s tractor equipped with snow plow trying to save his neighbor’s prize bull and cows from burial under three feet of drifting snow. Meanwhile, as our Little Barry Hussein prepares his executive orders supposedly involving climate change:

“I also anticipate lots of dumb laws and regulations that will greatly diminish the convenience of everyday living, even more so than that stupid plastic bag ban my municipality enacted a few years ago. Though a soothsayer I am not, I predict such legislation will have a ripple effect across the world’s economies, resulting in increased unemployment, higher prices, and a less enjoyable standard of living overall.”

Oh, yah. As usual, however, Austin’s plastic bag ban wasn’t about the environment, but graft for the ruling party. The Democrats, of course. I was reminded of that the other day when I asked for a plastic bag at HEB, meaning the 25 cent red job they sell now for folks (like me) who refuse to carry European-style shopping bags like good little drones of D.C.

Instead the young clerk handed one of the old-style free plastic bags which now cost, get this, $1 each. Had to specify the 25 center. Astounding? Only because you don’t understand our crooked politics that masquerades as environmentalism.

Via Skanlyn.

5 Comments

Posted in Blogosphere, Obamalot, Rancho Roly Poly, Texana, The Culture, Weather/Climate

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Launch. Land. Repeat.

Posted on January 22, 2016 | 4 comments

“Blue Origin just launched and landed its suborbital rocket New Shepard — the same vehicle the company flew and then landed in November. The booster reached a maximum altitude of 333,582 feet, or 63 miles, above the Earth’s surface, before landing gently back at Blue Origin’s test facility in Texas. That makes it the first commercial vertical rocket to launch into space a second time.”

This is becoming routine. Finally.

Via Geekwire.

4 Comments

Posted in Science/Engineering, Space, Texana

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Adios, Ziggy Street

Posted on January 20, 2016 | 2 comments

The city government played along for a while. Then they got serious.

Yesterday they removed the David Bowie street sign that Ziggy Stardust fans had got up in place of Bowie Street, an apparent reference to slave dealer and Alamo icon James Bowie, though the history on the original sign is unclear.

The change was less about slavery than about the rocker who finally fell to earth the other day, dead at 69 from cancer, the great destroyer.

Nice try, Ziggy fans. Keep pushing the formal petition. You never know, what with the slavery angle in a city as politically correct as Austin, you just might succeed. After all, Ziggy already has a whole constellation to himself.

Via KVUE.

2 Comments

Posted in Blogosphere, Cancer, Music, Science/Engineering, Space, Texana, The Culture

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Mr. B: Three .38 specials in the bull

Posted on January 18, 2016 | 2 comments

The boy is getting downright deadly with our .38 police special revolver. Another good Sunday morning at Red’s indoor range in Pflugerville found both of us often hitting where we wanted the bullets to go.

Including his accuracy with the .38 which bucks so hard it hurts the pocket between my thumb and forefinger if I don’t grip it right. We wrapped up the day checking out one of the shop’s Henry lever-action .22 rifles. As Mr. B. says, we’re almost ready to move up to a long gun (well, he is) and the Henry appeals.

Though, personally, I prefer a hand gun.

2 Comments

Posted in Guns, Mr. Boy, Texana

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Mr. B.’s new desk

Posted on January 17, 2016 | 3 comments

It only took three hours but we finally found a desk for Mr. B.’s room, in the very place he had scorned not two hours before: Office Depot.

First we had to go to Macy’s in the Domain in North Austin, or what I call North Austin, since it’s north of the rancho and still in Austin. With an argument about how to get there as Mr. B.’s Google skills are somewhat lacking. They didn’t carry furniture. “We’re small,” the nice saleslady said.

On to Louis Shanks, an old line Austin furniture store which had one he liked. Only problem was it cost more than a thousand dollars. Even Mr. Argumentative wasn’t going to argue for that. Finally Office Depot and, lo and behold, the very desk he wanted. And a cheap, high-backed executive swivel chair to boot.

Then the hassle of waiting for the desk to be delivered later this week and him putting the chair together but the latter is another story not really worth relating. I left him to do it because he needs the experience, including the cussing he did when it didn’t go as easily as he imagined. I finally provided minimal assistance, such as… well, nevermind. We have the chair and the desk is coming. On to the next problem in my continuing battle with a teenager.

3 Comments

Posted in Mr. Boy, Rancho Roly Poly, Texana

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Facial tissue best bet, at least in January

Posted on January 16, 2016 | 1 comment

A friend insists there’s a financial future in tattoo removal. For whoever can figure out how to get the ink out of the skin of all those Millennials instead of just blurring the death-before-dishonor or the name of that hot bod who is now sleeping with someone else.

In January, hereabouts, however, facial tissue as the groceries call Kleenex and its derivatives, has got to be where’s it’s at. This is cedar fever season in Central Texas, the time for nose-blowing and sneezing. And my annual promise to move to Alpine soonest. When Mr. B. goes off to college, I may do just that—at least every January.

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Posted in Mr. Boy, Rancho Roly Poly, Texana

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It’s getting deadly out there

Posted on January 10, 2016 | 6 comments

I already knew the traffic on Austin streets was intolerable. I suspected more than the usual number of people were dying in crashes or being run down. I didn’t realize how bad it was–102 dead in 93 wrecks last year. Up 62 percent from 2014.

Or that 34 percent of drivers in those 93 crashes either had suspended licenses or never had one to begin with. Gee, I wonder who they could be. Wink, wink.

6 Comments

Posted in Texana, The Culture

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