Opossum Love

I got lots of opossums. Too many. Mom died and we adopted the three surviving offspring. Four actually, but one was killed by my cats when she wouldn't come out from hiding. Sad.

I am happy to report that they are very nice pets. Clean and non-aggressive. I understand that they are very resistent to disease and very rarely carry rabies.

Find out more at www.possumrescue.com

English Now Official Language?

I'm watching a Daniel Autielle film on DVD. Worked the menu and was able to get the subtitles in French too. What a great language tool. If they'd had this when I was a kid, I'd be tri-ignorant by now. Doesn't it make you just want to vote our pin-headed congress the hell out of town? Such shameless pandering to ignorant zenophobes; they ought to be funding language education in every public school in the country. Instead, we get the dumb'em down brainwash with a chief exec who's not even fluent in his native tongue.
Like maybe we should only watch Fox News. (remember Pravda?)
And only read The Washington Times.
(Moonie mouthpiece!)
How exaspimerating!

God's Smoothie

Rev. Robertson is not backing away from his claim to leg-lift 2000 lbs., in fact he is braggin about it: www.cbn.com/communitypublic/shake.asp


"HEALTH
Pat Robertson's Age-Defying Shake

Did you know that Pat Robertson, through rigorous training, leg-pressed 2,000 pounds! How did he do it?

Watch a video of Pat leg-pressing 1,000 pounds.

Where does Pat find the time and energy to host a daily, national TV show, head a world-wide ministry, develop visionary scholars, while traveling the globe as a statesman?

One of Pat's secrets to keeping his energy high and his vitality soaring is his age-defying protein shake. Pat developed a delicious, refreshing shake, filled with energy-producing nutrients."

I tried to find out what is in this super, age-defying elixer, but I had to register to join the 700 Club first. Drat! I am already a member of Rev. Ostein's flock.

I gotta figure it is a mixture of: crack; human adrenalin; sweet babies' blood; monkey spum; caffene; yojimbe bark; dexadrine; garanja root; sugar; coffee, and more crack.

Memorial Day,

and Bush is signing a measure (constitutionally challenged, of course) to prevent protesters from disrupting military funerals . I wonder why we can't go after the real culprit. What is it that makes Fred Phelps of the so called Westboro Baptist Church of Topeka Kansas untouchable? Phelps and his family cult travel the country flogging their old testament gay bashing. Remember them at Matthew Shepard's funeral with their "God Hates Fags" signs. Now they've been haunting military funerals. Reminds me that nobody looked into Vernon Howell untill the UPS driver complained because hand grenades were falling out of his packages.
I read that Phelps has a pack of lawyers, but I think that Washington has plenty of smart guys who would probably to hang Phelp's scalp on their lance if they got the signal; but when our president has to speak in code to turn out his wacko base, his handlers are too chicken to be alienatin' any church folk. Hell, this bunch could be working for Dobson?!

From the Chronicle; Makes You Wanna Buy the Album

Long tradition of Texas outlaws
Regarding the May 26 letters "Dixie Chicks, politics, shame": It appears that the people holding hands over their ears so they won't have to hear the Dixie Chicks are the same ones who don't want to open their eyes to see how our government misled the nation into war.

It is a mistake for anyone to cast the success or failure of this CD as a referendum on patriotism. We should ask ourselves who the real patriots are: the administration that twisted the facts to justify war, or the three brave women who dared to stand up to the new King George? The Dixie Chicks have joined a long tradition of Texas country musical outlaws who have refused to conform to a Nashville stereotype. Taking the Long Way is one of the best CDs of the year, in any genre. Should country radio choose to ignore it based on the objections of a minority of listeners, it will be to its own long-term peril.

RICK MITCHELL Houston

Art Car Antics

Craig says, "don't be frightened children, come closer"

photo courtesy of Ivan Maltz

Buh-Bye!

I wonder if Ken Lay will have fun dying his underwear pink? I wonder if he knows what anal rape feels like, and how it is to have one's front teeth bashed out for easy oral sodomy? I doubt he knows how to make prison wine in a toilet bowl or how to fashion a shiv from a toothbrush. How about getting stomped and kicked? Or waiting in a cold, dark prison cell for the onset of unimagined terror from those he spat on his whole miserable life? Because when I look in his face lately I see hubris, defiance and fear. Not a good mix in prison.

Make some room in there for King George, Kenny Boy.

Sister Nancy Beth Excema

The Reverend Sister Nancy Beth Excema has become the band's ersatz guru and spiritual advisor with her prostilization of the Holy healing powers of Christian Cosmotology. Praise Him!

So I have linked her below.

Sin Frontera!

After much meditation in the zone of contemplation, I have decided upon my immigration plan, which I think is everybody's obligation.

Let me admit that I am as much aggravated by Mexicans as I am the French, but I am equally in love with them for all their endearing qualities. And to the extent that I generalize about people, I am a bigot.

There should be a unified North America as is the case in Europe. Finances and information flow easily accross borders along with goods and commerce. I think people should be able to as well. As long as there are jobs to do and folks to hire them, people will come from Mexico whether there are immigration restrictions or not. I would like to be free to go to San Miguel de Allende or Vera Cruz whenever I want, or work there or go to school if I want. It is possible to maintain national sovereignty, but borders are increasingly anachronistic concepts. This issue is more about race. Wisemen who parse policy issues over restriction this and that are acting from a racist standpoint, even though they are well-meaning and otherwise good people.

Open borders are no threat to trade unions who should join hands accross boundries and borders. Texans and others for decades have gone to Mexico and died stuggling with brave Mexicans organizing for workers. Blood has mingled in war and peace along the Rio Bravo for centuries. The concept of a dividing line is a racist xenophobic idea that is deeply understood by all those who live under its tyranny.

If everyone is paid the same, it won't matter whether a brazero or a bulio are there to take the job. The myth that dark people are the only ones who could labor in the sun has always been the snake oil of the slave master. Others prey on anglos fears of mesegenation.

National boundries that restrict the movement of people is a backwards looking philosophy, and anti-Christian.

Killer Sheep Headed for Pen

Last week the RNC's James Tobin became the third republican to come away from Federal District Court with a jail sentence for his part in a vote-supression scheme in the 2002 New Hampshire Senate election. These clowns spent $15,000 to swamp phone banks set up by the State Democratic Party and the Manchester Firefighters Union. Coincidentally, they received three $5,000 contributions from Jack Abramoff associated groups, the Agua Caliente Cahuilla Tribe, The Mississippi Choctaws, and Tom DeLay's own ARMPAC. In the three days before the election, Tobin made 25 phonecalls to the White House, But according to RNC Chairman Ken Mehlman, the calls did not involve the phone jamming. Mehlman may get his own chance to testify about it in an upcoming civil case. Maybe he can explain why the RNC has paid 2.5 million dollars to the Washington firm Williams and Connoly to defend Tobin against these charges.
Sort of reminds me of that little creep Donald Segretti who got sent up for doing dirty stuff before Richard Nixon had to get out of town. We can only hope to see history repeat itself. Note: I wouldn't presume to call Mr. Segretti a creep except that I see he gave money to Phil Gramm's presidential bid. That does it for me.

Another Obit

Lou Carrol, decorated army vet who fought at the Battle of the Bulge, died in Barrington Ill. He was 83. In the 1950's, Carrol was a toy monger for Milton Bradley who stole Liquiddaddys cocker spaniel pup and gave it to Nixon to kick around. Nixon soon mentioned the dog in his famous "suckers" speech, trying to feign a "human side" and elicit public sympathy after the press revealed the existence of his $18,000 slush fund.

Insulting Everybody Else

The Bottom 50 Ethnic Slurs:

1. Putty-titted lizard-sucking Tanzanian retard!
2. Unctuous dildo-fingered Camaro monkey Goomba!
3. Arrogant vodka-sweating Scandinavian snowman-fucker!
4. Gland-juggling rubber-tickling Australian Playtex-poof!
5. Petty, twat-faced Dominican chupacabra-diddler!
6. Piss-gargling, pig-drilling Nebraska barn queen!
7. Cat-greasing cookie-pounding Lebanese cellulite forest!
8. Bunion-hobbled narcoleptoid Bavarian cabbage snatch!
9. Macaroni-munching Nevada club-foot worshipper!
10. Half-naked face-scratching Faroe-Islander trailer trash!
11. Psoriasis-ravaged google-eyed Syrian cock vortex!
12. Leather-lunged pruney-pudded Azerbaijani ass-pilot!
13. Snooty, chancre juice chugging Ecuadorian priss!
14. Smelly knuckle-dragging sequin-wearing Slovakian sasquatch-fag!
15. Wishy-washy scrotum-cheeked Eskimo fuck!
16. Typical tone-deaf Canadian jizz tampon!
17. Lyre-strumming congenital idiot Panamanian golf hazard!
18. Chicken-stealing psychotic mumbling Hungarian troll-poler!
19. Arrogant pus-gushing Namibian fiddler crab!
20. Morose defeatist carbuncular Latvian anus-gazer!
21. Just your average prolapsed rectum incarnate German!
22. Gap-toothed Philistine Comanche zit licker!
23. Pink-eyed pyramid scheming Danish castrato-fondler!
24. Carcass-rolling maggot-pimpled Kyrgyzstani yak-slammer!
25. Thunder-thighed Belgian manic-depressive twat-chomper!
26. Dumpster-diving gum-rescuing Nicaraguan bung-beggar!
27. Soup-slurping phlegm-coughing jarlsberg-toed Norwegian barge rat!
28. Annoyingly gregarious, crouton-baking Sicilian mole farm!
29. Thieving coked-up Azorian coconut fucker!
30. 900-pound bedsored fold-fucking Costa Rican soap frightener!
31. Spongecake-decorating limpdicked dirty Maltese sheepfaggot!
32. Greedy thimble-dicked harelip Cambodian cripple-lover!
33. Miserable detail-oriented Armenian sweathog!
34. Barnacle-taunting freckle-assed Irish perch-bully!
35. Toejam-snorting Kiwi dick coozie!
36. Incontinent ping-pong nutted Bulgarian taint-breath!
37. Typical vindictive, hairy-eared Guyanese whoremonger!
38. Two-faced llama-fisting Argentinean smegma geyser!
39. Goat-stinking gong-smacking Chinese loaf-launcher!
40. Lazy good-for-nothing shiftless Moldovian sphincter lint!
41. Sour thankless near-sighted Siberian panty-creamer!
42. Feces-fixated penguin-pronging idiot Antarctic fucknut!
43. Elf-masturbating pixie-poking Easter Island dick-dwarf!
44. Officious parvenu-pooper Icelandic procto-scholar!
45. Inveterate mush-mouthed Jamaican strawberry mark humper!
46. Crumb-covered pope-buttering Vatican City syphilis slut!
47. Sullen, gratuitously histrionic Manitoba hermaphrodite apologist!
48. Conniving left-handed girdle-sniffing Djiboutian bungholer!
49. Disgusting bagpipe-fellating Scottish horse-dicked sex maniac!
50. Dump-eating intestine-flossing lazy-eyed illiterate Jersey jello-ass!

Courtesy of Chickenhead.com

Mystery Disease Infects S. Texas

Doctors puzzled over bizarre infection surfacing in South Texas

Web Posted: 05/12/2006 10:51 AM CDT

Deborah Knapp
KENS 5 Eyewitness News

If diseases like AIDS and bird flu scare you, wait until you hear what's next. Doctors are trying to find out what is causing a bizarre and mysterious infection that's surfaced in South Texas.

Morgellons disease is not yet known to kill, but if you were to get it, you might wish you were dead, as the symptoms are horrible.

"These people will have like beads of sweat but it's black, black and tarry," said Ginger Savely, a nurse practioner in Austin who treats a majority of these patients.

Patients get lesions that never heal.

"Sometimes little black specks that come out of the lesions and sometimes little fibers," said Stephanie Bailey, Morgellons patient.

Web extra
• Exclusive interview: Ginger Savely talks more on Morgellons
Web extra
• Morgellons Research Foundation

Patients say that's the worst symptom — strange fibers that pop out of your skin in different colors.

"He'd have attacks and fibers would come out of his hands and fingers, white, black and sometimes red. Very, very painful," said Lisa Wilson, whose son Travis had Morgellon's disease.

While all of this is going on, it feels like bugs are crawling under your skin. So far more than 100 cases of Morgellons disease have been reported in South Texas.

"It really has the makings of a horror movie in every way," Savely said.

While Savely sees this as a legitimate disease, there are many doctors who simply refuse to acknowledge it exists, because of the bizarre symptoms patients are diagnosed as delusional.

"Believe me, if I just randomly saw one of these patients in my office, I would think they were crazy too," Savely said. "But after you've heard the story of over 100 (patients) and they're all — down to the most minute detail — saying the exact same thing, that becomes quite impressive."

Travis Wilson developed Morgellons just over a year ago. He called his mother in to see a fiber coming out of a lesion.

"It looked like a piece of spaghetti was sticking out about a quarter to an eighth of an inch long and it was sticking out of his chest," Lisa Wilson said. "I tried to pull it as hard as I could out and I could not pull it out."

The Wilson's spent $14,000 after insurance last year on doctors and medicine.

"Most of them are antibiotics. He was on Tamadone for pain. Viltricide, this was an anti-parasitic. This was to try and protect his skin because of all the lesions and stuff," Lisa said.

However, nothing worked, and 23-year-old Travis could no longer take it.

"I knew he was going to kill himself, and there was nothing I could do to stop him," Lisa Wilson said.

Just two weeks ago, Travis took his life.

Stephanie Bailey developed the lesions four-and-a-half years ago.

"The lesions come up, and then these fuzzy things like spores come out," she said.

She also has the crawling sensation.

"You just want to get it out of you," Bailey said.

She has no idea what caused the disease, and nothing has worked to clear it up.

"They (doctors) told me I was just doing this to myself, that I was nuts. So basically I stopped going to doctors because I was afraid they were going to lock me up," Bailey said.

Harriett Bishop has battled Morgellons for 12 years. After a year on antibiotics, her hands have nearly cleared up. On the day, we visited her she only had one lesion and she extracted this fiber from it.

"You want to get these things out to relieve the pain, and that's why you pull and then you can see the fibers there, and the tentacles are there, and there are millions of them," Bishop said.

So far, pathologists have failed to find any infection in the fibers pulled from lesions.

"Clearly something is physically happening here," said Dr. Randy Wymore, a researcher at the Morgellons Research Foundation at Oklahoma State University's Center for Health Sciences.

Wymore examines the fibers, scabs and other samples from Morgellon's patients to try and find the disease's cause.

"These fibers don't look like common environmental fibers," he said.

The goal at OSU is to scientifically find out what is going on. Until then, patients and doctors struggle with this mysterious and bizarre infection. Thus far, the only treatment that has showed some success is an antibiotic.

"It sounds a little like a parasite, like a fungal infection, like a bacterial infection, but it never quite fits all the criteria of any known pathogen," Savely said

No one knows how Morgellans is contracted, but it does not appear to be contagious. The states with the highest number of cases are Texas, California and Florida.

The only connection found so far is that more than half of the Morgellons patients are also diagnosed with Lyme disease.

For more information on Morgellons, visit the research foundation's Web site at www.morgellons.org.

Happy Mother's Day to All

Word to your mother!

Houston Art Car Parade May 13th

This is the Venus Hairse. Our float is riding behind this baby. This year's theme is "Magic Carpet Ride." We plan to go way over-board. Check out the art car scene by starting with Venus' art car links at www.venushairhouston.com

Some Thoughts of Mine

Some have asked me why so many obits?

I figured the other fine bloggers here had plenty of interesting commentary, and they do.

But it is worth reminding folks that the genre of "Texas Music" runs from Archie Bell and the Drells to Pantera. It is all in the same stew. Texas Music is merely a representation of the roots from which creativity springs. Texas just seems to have a massive amount of quality and quantity.

It is not my intent to turn this page into a morgue, so all you legends out there I say, "stop dying."

I do enough dying for everybody.

Steve Coffman

A great one has passed:

"Steve Coffman, a long-time radio station executive and on-air host, died Monday at a hospital.

Coffman, 53, died after a lengthy battle with cancer, said KTXN spokesman Bob Nance.

Coffman drew attention in November when an auction for an autographed Fender guitar ended with nearly $9,500 raised to help pay for his care.

The guitar included the signatures of more than 40 country music performers.

Coffman hosted the show "Coffee with Coffman" on KTXN.

The Waco native began his radio career in Dallas in 1975, with stops in San Antonio and Hallettsville, according to a statement from the station.

Coffman had been in Victoria since 1999.

Funeral arrangements are pending, according to Nance.

Coffman is survived by his wife, Vicky; a son, Steve Coffman Jr.; a daughter, Mary Rose; and one brother and two sisters."

He is remembered around here for his work in SA for the "Underground Radio Show," some 30-odd years ago, which help put a lot of what we hear on the map. Back then it was "subversive," which was a phrase he reserved for Driftwood.

They must be hurting badly at Texas Mix. Please drop them a line with your condolences.

On the Wings of a Dove

Now that we're allready doomed, the Bushies are rolling out their response plan for a flu pandemic. Not surprisingly, this entails billions of tax dollars for multinational corporations, and martial law. Isn't that these peoples answer for everything? Remember the anthrax scare a few years ago? Back then, public health officials pointed out that this countrys health care delivery system is in a shambles. I recall that I once found it odd to come across people stalled in the lobby of a medical building because they couldn't remember the name of their doctor. Ten years and five insurance plans later, I no longer find that remarkable. Meanwhile, MegaMedBizz plays monopoly with the hospital systems, building them up in the good markets, and shutting them down where the big money ain't. "The market" is not going to provide quality healthcare to the bottom half of the demographic, even though we pay more for healthcare than people in any other developed country. Short sighted: Doesn't anybody remember The Masque of the Red Death?
We ought to demand that congress passes a riot act for the prescription drug and health insurance industries. If vaccines have to be a loss leader for them, so be it! And twenty percent off the top for profit and overhead is not acceptable when half of the population is left to fend for themselves.
Furthermore, we must require our congress to crawl out of the pockets of agribusiness and the food processing industry. Food so cheap we can fill dumpsters with it is no bargain if it is a pipeline for deadly virus bred in the factory farms. The last meaningful food safety legislation in this country was passed in the Teddy Roosevelt administration. This ain't no fad diet book, it's a matter of national security.

The Flower of San Antonio Dies

The City mourns the loss of Rosita Fernandez, a much beloved entertainer and expert mariachi balladeer, who passed away last night at the age of 88. www.mysa.com

"Rosita Fernández was born in Monterrey, Nuevo Leon, while her father, a captain in the Mexican Army, was riding in pursuit of Pancho Villa in 1916. While Rosita was still a child, her family moved to San Antonio, where her maternal uncles earned their living as the Trio San Miguel. Young Rosita was recruited to sing with her uncles, and in 1932 won a radio singing contest which launched a long career in radio, and from 1949, in television too. Rosita made four motion pictures and many sound recordings, but she was perhaps best known in San Antonio for the 26 seasons she spent as star performer of the summer-long Fiesta Noche del Rio in that city."

She was great lady who could fill up a room. She will be sorely missed.

Big Hawk Killed in Houston

Houston rapper, Big Hawk, friend and associate to the late music-master DJ Screw, was gunned down today by an unknown assailant.

From chron.com:

"He didn't have any enemies," Trae said. "He was a good person. I just hate that it had to be something like this for people to pay attention to what he's doing. I hope people support his family and let him know he was appreciated."

Fans and friends posted messages remembering the slain rapper on the Web site myspace.com and several included snapshots of themselves with Hawk, who had a giant smile in almost all of them.

Hawk, who was planning to release a new album, was respected in the Houston underground rap scene and appeared on numerous mixtapes from artists such as Paul Wall, Lil' Flip, Z-Ro, E.S.G, Lil' Keke and Big Pokey.

DJ Screw, who died in 2000, and the Screwed Up Click popularized Houston's hypnotic, slowed-down style of rap called screw music."

Mix up some syrup and slurpee, you and boo ride low down to Sunny Side; pump up the bass and chill for Big Hawk. RIP