Holier Than TB

Posted on January 11, 2010 by travellinbaen

Quote of the Day:

“An insincere and evil friend is more to be feared than a wild beast; a wild beast may wound your body, but an evil friend will wound your mind.” –Buddha

“Whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and whoever humbles himself will be exalted.” Jesus, quoted by Matthew

It seems Brit Hume stirred up a nice little “controversy” last week with his comments about Tiger Woods and his spiritual well-being. The exact quote was “I don’t think that faith (Buddhism) offers the kind of forgiveness and redemption that is offered by the Christian faith. So my message to Tiger would be, “Tiger, turn to the Christian faith and you can make a total recovery and be a great example to the world.” Buddhists took gentle exception to Hume’s mischaracterization of their religion while politi-christians rushed headlong to his defense, frothing at the mouth over their collective cultural martyrdom.  But as usual, no one featured on either cable or the interwebs represented TB’s point of view. I think it was just another instance of overinflating the import of some random guy’s words just because a camera happened to be pointing in his direction at the time.

Now I doubt Brit Hume knows much about Buddhism. And when he publicly urges Tiger to “turn to the Christian faith” I get the sense he knows little about that either. After all, what is the Christian faith? Roman Catholicism? Southern Baptist? Mormon? Snake handlers? From what I can glean, many among these groups are fair certain they won’t see their compatriots in the culture wars on the business side of the pearly gates. Are they all the same to Brit?

What really bugs me is that Brit’s comments are just another salvo in what I consider the war of religion against God. As someone who considers himself a Christian, I find that it is not Islamic extremists who distance me from God. It is not our culture of excess, corruption and greed. It’s not even Hollywood. The biggest drain on my personal well of faith comes from those who are tasked with leading it and from those who most loudly profess to follow it. The examples that leap to mind include the Vatican whitewash of the molestation scandal, the politicization of the Southern Baptists, and possibly most of all, the self-aggrandizing nature of the holier than TB crowd. I see it in church when a business leader stands up and INSISTS he not be thanked for doing the lord’s work in the list of a dozen projects he just led and spent half an hour describing. I see it on Facebook where I am yet to become a “fan” of prayer and where it is subtly suggested that I must immediately re-post someone else’s words in my status affirming that Jesus was thinking of this very moment and my imminent status decision while suffering upon the cross lest I prove myself an enemy of The Truth. I get chain emails that tell me not to forward if I don’t love Jesus and they are “sorry” they offended me. And now I get Brit Hume proselytizing for publicity to distinguish himself among the hordes of reporters searching for a new angle on the Tiger Woods story.

I don’t discuss religion much. Most people are far too certain, or at least rigid, in their beliefs to have a candid discussion about matters that are to me unknowable. In one way, I think that’s too bad. I’d like to know what people think; I’d like to know even more about what they question. I’d like to test my own thoughts against theirs. Unfortunately, society frowns upon open discussion of the topic in favor of  dueling pseudo-authoritative statements of creed. Brit Hume didn’t start the trend and I don’t want to make him a scapegoat, just the most recent example. But if public religious discourse is to be about judgment, condemnation and hubris, I’d just as soon the subject remain taboo.

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If you are interested, here’s a link to a Billy Graham transcript from a Larry King Live appearance a few years back. While I don’t agree with all his positions, I find this interview to be as good a sermon as any I ever heard. I think I’d enjoy a conversation with him.

Posted in current events, Philosobaen, religion | Tagged , , , , , , , | 49 Comments

Sweet is the Champ; On an Unrelated Note, TB’s Sick

Posted on January 8, 2010 by travellinbaen

Congrats to Sweet for completing his improbable run to the Travellinbaen Thursday Pickin Season II Grand Championship. I’d like to say more about it and I had even planned on having a major award commissioned for the event by now, but my own continuing illness along with my daughter’s have thrown off everything this week. If it isn’t too expensive, I still plan to ship that major award to you Sweet, though it may be a few days or weeks before I get to it.

One other thing I’d like to point out to you good folks in this lackluster post–I have confirmed that you can NOT actually cough up a lung. TB has given it my best effort for five long days and even longer nights now, and the little scamp has been trying too. Trust me when I say we have tried. It can’t be done.

Posted in Uncategorized | 6 Comments

A Bad Day

Posted on January 5, 2010 by travellinbaen

Quote of the Day:

“Sometimes I lie awake at night and I ask, “why me?” Then a voice answers, “nothing personal, your name just happened to come up.” Charlie Brown

Last week TB had a bad day. First I dunked my Iphone in a cup of water sending it into a protracted death spiral. Then I got stuck in a traffic jam on the eleventh of a twelve hour drive. Then my preferred credit card got rejected for a hotel reservation. I had another bad day yesterday. Not only did I find out I would have to pay full price to replace my phone, I also suffered near debilitating flu-like symptoms. Then today I heard about a friend who returned to work from serving his spouse with divorce papers to learn the DUI charge he was confident would be dismissed was instead going to trial next week and he was suddenly being advised to just plead guilty and get it behind him. At first I thought to myself, “now that’s a crummy day. I should be thankful my bad days were so benign  relative to his.” Then I thought, “Screw that! Just because my days weren’t as bad as all that doesn’t mean I shouldn’t be able to wallow in a bit of self pity.” Then I thought, “I should write about this.”

Society tells us we should minimize our misfortunes. Ever get in a fender bender? You were just thankful no one was hurt, right? If you have the flu you have to be mindful that many are suffering much more serious health problems. If you make waffles and only then realize you are out of syrup you have to think of the starving children in Africa who would love to have such a problem.

But I’ve decided to no longer conform on this point of order. A bad day sucks and that’s all there is to it. After all, when you have a good day society doesn’t encourage you to say “yeah, this hundred dollar bonus was great, but there are people on Wall Street who got 2.8 gazillion.” Or “I sure enjoyed my trip to Charleston but let’s not forget there are people out there who went to the Swiss Alps.” Or “pizza for dinner was awesome but you have to think of the children in Italy who are having it with gelato for dessert.” You just walk around all day with a big cheesy grin, reveling in the moment. I think a bad day should be no different, well, other than the complete opposite. A bad day stinks no matter how many people are having a worse one and we ought to be able to gripe and glower through it in peace.

Posted in Humor, Life | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 9 Comments

My Phone is Dead and I Don’t Feel So Great Myself

Posted on January 4, 2010 by travellinbaen

Quote of the Day:

“If you ain’t the lead dog, the scenery never changes.” –Lewis Grizzard

Christmas came and went, you may have heard, so did the turning of the New Year and though I understand there is some debate over it, so did the decade change. TB as you may know is a slave to meaningless milestones. And so for several days I planned my fast start to the twenty-tens (we are calling it that, right?) I laid out a week’s worth of essay topics, made a list of all family business that was overdue and planned my first work week down to the hour. It was time to start fresh, to get ahead, seize the bull by the horns, go for the gusto, head for the mountains, tastes great, less fillin’, etc, etc. And then began the aches, then a bit of fever, then chills, a mild cough–I’ll be damned if I ain’t sick, and not some old-fashioned plain ‘ol cold either, but a real sickness over which I ought to have my ass sitting in some dread physician’s clinic instead of contaminating this poor keyboard with my plague. But I ain’t sick enough for that yet. Maybe tomorrow, after its too late for Tamiflu to do any good. Or maybe it’ll pass.

All of this to say, the TBU must grow or die. And so I post a few randoms that may have made for good essays if I felt like thinking about them for a bit. Instead, I submit them to you to glean from whatever wisdom, beauty and truth you may.

New Year’s Resolutions–For me, a renewed commitment to drastically reducing the intake of Diet Coke. For the family, to cook more and to exercise together. And I always like to have one lofty goal. Mine’s a two-parter–to coalesce these random TBU essays into something of a unified work, possibly fiction, or maybe as a memoir. And to submit some of my work to someone who either crushes or creates dreams, as the case may be. More interestingly, my five-year old niece is committing herself to quit biting her toenails.

Travellin–The gang just returned to Ridgeland last night, in time for a Mississippi Blizzard. The snow is, as I type, sticking to the corners of my roof at the rate of….um….barely but truly visible. Hooray! More White Death in the forecast for Thursday. But as for the travellin, we spent the week after Christmas mainly in Charleston. But we also took a side trip to Savannah, Georgia, for the night and Beaufort, South Carolina for another night. I got a good look at the low country on the way down and I finally “get” why people from thereabouts love it so much. It’s really a beautiful, peaceful swath of mud soaked real estate. Savannah, with its many and ancient city squares surrounded by colonial, federal and antebellum era architecture, majestic churches and imposing banking institutions is now the prettiest town I’ve ever visited. I never really thought about whether Sherman burned the place, but assumed he had. It sure didn’t look like it so I asked and no, he left it intact, much to our collective benefit as Americans. In the same conversation I learned that Charleston was controlled by the Union occupation of Fort Sumpter and was never fought over. It wasn’t even occupied until after the Confederate surrender. Again, I’m thankful for this as the town is full of history and beauty, but I’m also a little hacked. South Carolina started the whole damn thing after all and basically got out of it without a scratch in comparison to the lemmings that followed behind. South Carolina, you’re on notice. If you hadn’t brought Steven Colbert into my life you’d be dead to me. Well Colbert and my toenail-chewin’ niece.

Finally, my freakin phone died, for real. I went to set it down in the car and put it straight into a cup of water. I pulled it out in a millisecond, but that won’t make me feel any better when I shell out two honey buns for a replacement. Might as well have threw it in the ocean. We actually had the thing working for three days, then–kaput. And that awesome list I had to work on this week involved a bunch of phone calls that needed making too, dangit.

Posted in Life, Travel | Tagged , , , , | 7 Comments

The New Year’s Eve Girl

Posted on December 31, 2009 by travellinbaen

Quote of the Day:

And I shall find some girl perhaps,
And a better one than you,
With eyes as wise, but kindlier,
With lips as soft, but true.
And I daresay she will do.

“The Chilterns”–Rupert Brooke

They’d been together four months and he really liked her. But he didn’t LIKE her-like her and he knew better than to approach six months with a girl like that. So he put it out of his mind until Christmas was over. Then it was over and it was time to make plans for New Year’s Eve. He decided an early January break was still well within the six month hard deadline so he could put it out of his mind for just one more night and they could go out and have a great time and have a great memory for when the hard feelings wore off.

With a firm decision in hand he was able to enjoy the evening more than any in the past few weeks. Dinner was nice. They hit triple flaming sevens on a quarter machine and won 250 bucks, and with a flourish of grandiosity he insisted she keep it all. Midnight approached and they stayed about even at the Poker bar, bonding one last time laughing at the drunken cougars across the way. A girl came around handing out complimentary champagne and a funny hat with a noisemaker attached. Midnight arrived and they sang and danced, then it passed and they decided to go to the diner for a late snack before calling it a night.

It had all gone perfectly and he hadn’t thought once about the invevitable hardship to come.  Cheese sticks for her and a patty melt for him and they shared a few more laughs as his eyes began to tire and out of nowhere, as if she realized they were together at a pivot point but misjudged the direction altogether she looked up at him and smiled and said “I love you.” He faltered. She waited. He stared blankly, caught completely off guard and then she ran. He hesitated a second or two and then went after her. She had no other way home after all.

Unable to catch her before she descended the stairs, missing her as they weaved among the reveling throng, he finally caught her just outside the parking garage. They didn’t speak. She cried and he guided her to the car and they drove back to her place in silence. They went inside and she started the conversation he’d hoped to have the next week and, all things considered it went well to his mind. He was still a kid, you see, an idiot for the most part. He’d told her how much fun he’d had, how much he liked her, that she was beautiful. She seemed to understand, she even smiled. Then, two hours after they’d started, he gave her a friendly pat on the shoulder and said he was glad they could end it this way and as he got up to leave she said “End it? I thought you were making up?!” And so two more hours in which he said damned little–an idiot he may have been but one capable of learning from his mistakes. Before the sun came up they were both poised at last to start the year on fresh and different paths.

Six months later the girl called and said “Can you come over today?” He smiled to himself. “They always come around,” he thought. As he drove over he resolved to lay down strict guidelines from the start. After all, he liked this girl and he would never mislead her.  She greeted him and smiled without a trace of discomfort or lingering rancor. “Come in the house,” she said, leading him by the hand. He felt good. As they crossed the threshold she implored him that he must “help my fiancé with some legal problems he has with his ex.” For an almost imperceptible moment he was once again caught off-guard. Then he rallied, smiling at her, seeing the knowing twinkle in her eye and yet at the same time the genuine friendship and happy recollection of good times he’d once hoped she’d take from the four months last year. He gave good advice and shook the strange man’s hand, hugged the girl from the side on his way out and drove away without looking back, but chalking one up for the New Year’s Eve girl. He smiled once more and silently wished her well as he disappeared around the bend.

Posted in Blank Stares, Life, Writing | Tagged , , , , , , , | 15 Comments

Bowl Pickin TBCS, Season II (featuring Sweet and RSR) Part Deux

Posted on December 30, 2009 by travellinbaen

Ok, here are the playlists:

Sweet:

Alabama – “Mountain Music”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u_5sPHnIalw

Leadbelly – “Alabama Bound”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7aRU5QAc7ng

Bob Wills and his Texas Playboys
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X37xnM3VYH0

Willie and Waylon
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jDh6COblb4c

The King in the Steel City (New years eve 1976)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kycbRcDJawE

RockStar Rambler:

Alabama:

Moosehead – Will and the Bushman – mainly because I love this song and have always wanted to put it on a list. Will Kimbrough lived in Alabama (also rumored to have lived in a van in Oxford near the Gin for a while).

Alabama – Cross Canadian Ragweed (saw this Oklahoma band play this song about Alabama in Texas)

Texas:

Texarkana – REM

That’s Right (You’re Not From Texas) – Lyle Lovett

Golden Years – David Bowie

Voting open until midnight January 1.

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TB’s slackin a bit lately. I’m in South Carolina with family continuing the chaos of the Christmas holidays. We drove all day from Oxford, MS, to Charleston, SC, the 26th, left the 27th to visit Savannah (a really beautiful place), then a day in Beaufort and finally back to Charleston for some recovery time before New Year’s Eve. Hopefully I can get something on the blog while we’re gone and hope all those toys from Santa are still keeping everybody happy.

Posted in Uncategorized | 9 Comments

Bowl Pickin Season II, The TBCS Featurin’ Sweet and RockStarRambler

Posted on December 27, 2009 by travellinbaen

Quote of the Day:

Cledus Snow: Hey Bandit. Me an’ Fred got a question.
Bandit: What you an’ Fred want?
Cledus Snow: How come we’s doin’ this?

By now you all know the Regular Season title in Thursday Pickin was won by Sweet, and by now you are undoubtedly weary of the unceasing hype in advance of the overall TBU Pickin Championship Series. But finally it is time for Sweet to try and take home the only crown that matters and TB has devised a formula specifically to make this task as difficult for him as possible. He must now defeat RockStar Rambler in a head to head battle in the First Annual TBCS. They head into this battle even–everything that has happened prior to now is not germane to the situation. “What do the GD Germans have to do with it?,” you are probably asking yourself. To that I say, “get yourself a diablo sandwich and a Dr. Pepper, and make it snappy,” and figure it out for yourself. No Smily, we ain’t got time for any hush puppies. But I digress.

Our competitors are faced with the following task–pick 10 games (five preliminaries, four majors and the national championship) and a playlist consisting of two tunes each inspired by the states of Alabama and Texas and one tune with which to ring in the New Year. Any connection will do. The prelim games are worth 6 points each for a win and 6 for a loss, the majors are 12 points and the BCS is for 24. Best overall tunes list, taking in to account any factors you want to consider, including (but not limited to) personal tastes, enlightenment or spite, are worth 12 points to the winner and subject to your votes through midnight December 31. Everybody else needs to submit their picks as always both. “Why?”, you may be asking yourself? To that I’d say, “For the money, for the glory, and for the fun…..mostly for the money.” The fact that there is no money involved here is not germane to the situation. You might be asking yourself now, “What do the GD–“….but I digress. Here’s the TBCS picks and my own along with a little more about the competitors:

Sweet harbors a secret. You might be asking yourself “what kind of secret?”, but you know what, you’d do better to ask Sweet. Or just tune in if he wins and find out. One thing we do know about Sweet is that he considers TB a demigod of the TBU. I kind of like that designation, however, Sweet is under the impression if he wins I will lose the title. Though he is a faithful citizen of the TBU and a devoted Pickin man, he’d rather be partying with President Obama in Hawaii or reliving the 1987 Motley Crue Girls Girls Girls Tour stop in Biloxi. Even more than war, more than sickness, more than losing in a coin toss to TB, he hates the Big Bama Spellout. Sweet’s Preliminary Round Picks are:

  • Texas A&M  +7′
  • Virginia Tech -4′
  • Ole Miss -3′
  • East Carolina +7′
  • Auburn  -7′

Major Bowls:

  • LSU  +2′
  • Florida  -10′
  • TCU  -7′
  • Ga Tech  -3′

BCS Pick

  • Alabama -6′  (31-20 final score)

RockStar’s Preliminary Picks

  • Arkansas  -7′
  • other 4 are same as Sweet’s–A&M, Va Tech, Ole Miss, Auburn

RockStar’s Major Bowls

  • Penn State  -2′
  • She’s with Sweet on Florida, Ga Tech and TCU

BCS Pick–Alabama -6′ (28-21)

Even more than world financial chaos, worse than global warming, more heinous than a crummy, cliche-filled playlist, RockStarRambler hates Bama fans, especially the kind that send you texts to “cheer you up” when you lose, as if they themselves had a role in the outcome of “their” team’s football contest. RockStar loves Thursday Pickin and can’t wait to see how the games come out on New Year’s, skiing would still take precedence. And re-living Austin City Limits Music Fest in 2004 would top even that (see “the concerts list”). Or staring blankly at drying paint would do in a pinch. But RSR keeps pluggin away at Pickin because of the certainty that overall victory “will make all my wildest dreams come true.”

Oh, and if either competitor picks the exact score of the BCS game they win the game irrespective of all the other games, tunes, votes, smokies, etc.

Dang, its late. I’ve still gotta post their tunes and a couple other items of import. It’ll have to wait a day or two.

My Picks, in case you have made it this far (sorry S&M) are:

  • Texas A&M  +7′
  • Tennessee  +4′
  • Oklahoma St  +3′
  • Arkansas  -7′
  • Northwestern  +7′
  • LSU  +2′
  • Florida  -10′
  • Boise State  +7′
  • Iowa  +3′
  • Texas  +6′  (Texas 31 Bama 27)

Hey, how’d y’all like the Christmas snow? Not counting Zeek of course. TB’s finished for tonight. Over and out.

Burt Reynolds Laugh sound bite

Posted in Music, Sports | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , | 12 Comments

Ghosts of Christmas Past

Posted on December 24, 2009 by travellinbaen

Quote of the Day:

“Happy, happy Christmas, that can win us back to the delusions of our childish days; that can recall to the old man the pleasures of his youth; that can transport the sailor and the traveller, thousands of miles away, back to his own fire-side and his quiet home! ” ~Charles Dickens, The Pickwick Papers, 1836

TB’s enjoying a moment of holiday solitude and reflection before the fire and thinking about the 38 Christmases I’ve known. The best gifts ever, as judged by how readily they leap to mind, were the train set around 1979 and the Atari 2600 in 1982. The train was something I’d never considered. I probably had seen pictures of them in the Sears Catalogue we used each year to mark our wish lists and discounted one as a present. After all, something that large would definitely cost too much by my logic of the era. A lot of fun was had with that train even though my left-handed Dad and I (with no excuse but ineptitude) outright butchered most of the model buildings we built. The 2600 though was the biggest surprise. My Mom insisted time and again through the late fall that the 2600 was both a budget buster and that video games were an inadvisable use of time. One late December day as our by now familiar debate heated up once again my Dad finally weighed in with his “no and that’s final” edict. In tone and expression, I knew he meant it and surrendered unconditionally all hopes of Space Invader Yuletide bliss. Never before or since has he employed said tactic and failed to enforce it. To this day I do not know whether he was overruled by Moma or was going nuclear on the deception. If I had to bet I’d say it was the former.

As much as I treasure the memory of the unearned annual bounty that typified my childhood Christmas morns, my recollections immediately fly to the loot hauled in by my asshole runnin buddies.  It was the same way back in the old days. No sooner had I finished my last sweep under the tree to find one last passed over hidden gem, I’d get on the phone and call BR. We’d conspire to rid ourselves of family obligations as soon as possible and bring our best portable pieces to a central location to show off and share. I recall his bikes and his Broncos gear, but mostly I think we’d dump within minutes whatever we got that morning in favor of a tried and true basketball or football, and we’d get right back to the classic sporting confrontations we always waged. But he wearing his new bright Bronco orange and me with the equally new, but eminently more tasteful orange of the Dolphins.

For Smily I didn’t have to call. He and his brother were the kings of Christmas on our street. First automated preschool motorcycles, later go-carts and three wheelers, those boys would zoom back and forth on their cutting edge gifts for hours while BR and I silently wondered at our sad plight. Our parents would never measure up to such a level of cool. An even more vivid memory regarding Smily is one of our earliest and typically inane arguments. Smily, you see, lived in a home without benefit of a chimney. He insisted Santa simply came in the back door to leave his gifts, but the logic of this assertion completely mystified me. If he could do this, why bother with chimneys at other houses? Some fact was missing. Either Smily was lying or misinformed or…..well, the alternative was unthinkable.

It is cliché, but to see through the eyes of a child is to truly appreciate Christmas to its fullest. I guess the best way to do that is to bring back all those old memories. Here’s to your own treasure trove within.

———————————

For those of you new to the TBU and from some place other than South Mississippi or Louisiana, I give you “The Cajun Night Before Christmas”. I hope somebody posts a better version to You Tube before next year, but for now this will have to do.

Posted in Christmas, Life | Tagged , , , , , , , | 10 Comments

TB’s Christmas Awards (the Elfies)

Posted on December 22, 2009 by travellinbaen

Quote of the Day:

“Look Charlie Brown, let’s face it. We all know that Christmas is a big commercial racket. It’s run by a big eastern syndicate, you know.”     —Lucy

TB has been immersed in Christmas now for a couple of weeks, save one day for the pagan in me to revel in the Winter Solstice. I have participated and observed, made a list and checked it twice. Below are my awards for excellence in Christmas Achievement, 2009….the Elfies.

  • The Elfie for Greatest Christmas Movie goes to “It’s a Wonderful Life”, the climax of which once again coincided with an unexplained allergic reaction of watery eyes. Plus, that Donna Reed was a real beauty.
  • Best animated or claymation feature goes to the “Peanuts” gang. When Schroeder starts banging on those keys and the freestyle dancin commences you can’t help but feel good about the world. Makes me wanna dance with my hands held down at my waist, head up and eyes shut just thinkin about it. I dig that kid doin the zombie too.
  • Worst Christmas Movie that they better never take off the air goes to “Rudolf the Red-Nosed Reindeer.” Really, his Dad is ashamed, his friends ostracize him and even Santa for Pete’s sake tells Donner he better do “something” about Rudolf’s nose if he ever expects him to fly on Christmas. Only when they need him do Santa and the prima donna reindeer crowd come around. This movie should get re-done by Spike Lee and Rudolf should say……well, let’s just say he ought to bust out the “Queen Mother” of all curse words on ’em, which brings me to….
  • Best Dialogue in a Christmas Movie goes to “A Christmas Story.” The “dare” sequence, “you’ll shoot your eye out”, the Chinese dinner…these and countless other scenes are eternally quotable but my favorite one of all is the poetry that is “In the heat of battle my father wove a tapestry of obscenities that as far as we know is still hanging in space above Lake Michigan.”
  • Best Christmas Treat is my Mom’s coconut pie. Special lifetime achievement awards go to her divinity and every mother’s iced Christmas cookies.
  • Best Christmas Song–this one was hard to narrow down, but I finally decided the simplicity and joy of “Jingle Bells” puts it at the top.
  • Best New Christmas Song–There hasn’t been a new Christmas song of note in quite a while and for all I know this one is really some old Polish folk song. But I’d never heard it until I saw it on TV a week ago. Then I saw where you could download it free on Itunes, so I did, and I can’t get enough of it now. Bob Dylan’s “Must Be Santa Claus”, and by the way, this looks like one helluva party. Enjoy.
  • Best way to restore TB’s faith in humanity–going shopping in the most crowded stores possible. I’m pretty down on “people” sometimes, but I’m always amazed, contrary to what I usually hear about from media sources, at the patience and consideration of people this time of year, especially in the hectic last shopping days I’m prone to.
  • Best War Ever–The “War on Christmas”. I don’t know who’s fighting Christmas but I hear a war’s been raging for years. I DO know that Christmas must be beatin’ the hell out of whoever is fighting it. Happy Holidays, y’all.
  • Bonus War on Christmas Video–Robert Earl Keen
  • Double Bonus Peanuts Dancin video
Posted in Entertainment, Lists, Music | Tagged , , , , , , , | 7 Comments

TB Ain’t Predictin It or Nuthin, But What If the Saints Go to the Super Bowl?

Posted on December 16, 2009 by travellinbaen

Joke of the Day:

After he was dead, Boudreaux discovered himself in Hell. He looked around awhile, then went right to work shoveling brimstone. The devil came up to him and said, “How you like it here, my friend? It’s hard work and it’s hot, yeah?”

Boudreaux just smiled and answered, “It ain’t so bad. The work is steady. I got no problem with steady work. And it ain’t so hot. You think dis is hot? Man, I’m from south Lousiana — It hot there, my fren! Dis here ain’t nothin.” He just laughed and went back to work singing and having a high old time.

Satan, being a former Texan, did not like Cajuns. He said to himself, “I’ll get him. So he don’t mind the hot, huh?” Satan waved a hand and the whole place was suddenly ice and snow, solid. And he said, “That’ll fix dat fool!”

When he went back to check on Boudreaux, he found him jumping up and yelling and laughing and clapping and dancing. So Satan said, “Man, what’s wrong with you?!”

Boudreaux smiled big and replied, “Dem Saints done won da Super Bowl!

Super Bowl XLIV will be played in Miami, Florida, on February 7, 2010. The New Orleans Saints have a pretty good chance of playing in it, good enough at least to start planning a (fully refundable) trip. It is with such thoughts in mind that I recalled a day back around 1983 or 1984 and the famed living room on Del Norte Circle which served as the center of the sporting and culinary universe for my old asshole runnin buddies. Back in the day Zeek’s folks, Mary B and Buddha used to have a running wager with Sweet’s parents, Waldo and Mamoo. Whoever lost the Ole Miss-Tulane football game always hosted a day of gridiron and gumbo, beer and (once the ladies left) bourbon.

It so happened that year that Waldo was hosting and a young, impressionable TB was in attendance, learning quietly from Sweet the ins and outs of point spreads, the juice and teaser odds. Perhaps it is because these were the early days of my semi-residence at Del Norte that Waldo has never acknowledged my presence or perhaps it was the beer or more likely still the bourbon that has distorted his recollection. Whatever the case, the fact of my presence has become more important than ever in this year of 13-0 Saints because of what Waldo has no choice but to acknowledge: a solemn oath was made, inscribed upon a roux-stained cocktail napkin, that if and when the New Orleans Saints ever played in the Super Bowl, he would take everybody present at that moment to the game. And so I was curious about where we might travel come February. I hear Miami is nice that time of year.

The cost for Waldo? Well there’s Sweet, Zeek and Greeg which he doesn’t dispute and me, who I feel sure he will no longer deny. Maybe Rusty? A few others probably. All told we can get in the game for about $3500 apiece according to one travel site I consulted. We get three nights in a nice hotel, a ticket, a program and a ride to and from the stadium. Hmmm. I don’t think Waldo’s gonna be able to keep that vow. And I’m a reasonable man–when the oath was given tickets were probably around $75 bucks a pop. Inflation he could’ve reasonably expected but this is ridiculous. So I’ll tell you what Waldo–actually I guess Sweet will relay this to you since you aren’t hip to the web–let’s make a deal. Get with Greeg and put together a prime batch of home brew, fuel up your car–better yet let’s rent a camper–grab a random stack of your old scorecards for settling arguments and let’s all go for the weekend. We can even bring the rest of the ARB’s old and young alike. Screw the game, we’ll watch on TV and we’ll roam the streets and tan our guts and tell old lies and if we see Morten Anderson we’ll whip his ass like we should have back in ’86, and when its almost over we’ll break out the bourbon to keep it going a little bit longer.

On second thought, let’s skip the bourbon. People do stupid things when they get on the dark stuff.

And if the Saints don’t make it this year the deal’s off. I take great pleasure in hoarding that future ticket in my hip pocket.

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