Thursday, October 06, 2005
Who's A-Runnin' This Here Place, Anyhow?
Man, you just gotta love Texas. There's no place like it anywhere else. It's where my roots are; both my mother's and father's sides of the family are Texans going back several generations. Now, I know what you're thinking:
That explains a lot, Crime Dog.
And you're probably right.
There's a certain backed-up-old-fart quality to Texas that just annoys the piss out of me, but is still somehow oddly endearing. That sort of dichotomy has a tendency to make one's head goofy. Which explains George Bush the younger, who started out slamming drinks and raising hell with his frat brothers, only to end up thumping his bible with Billy Graham and Pat Robertson and a preachin' on the evils of homosexuality and abortion. Of course, I could be misunderestimating the strategery of his way of a-thinkin'.
Then there's Dallas. It's all those things you might expect from a major American city: beautiful, cosmopolitan, and fast-paced. But just try buying a bottle of tequila. You'll think you were drugged, kidnapped by Mormons, and woke up in Salt Lake City. It turns out that large portions of the Dallas area are either partially or completely dry. You can drive for miles in some parts of Dallas and never see a bar or liquor store, then suddenly cross an imaginary line on the ground and be inundated with them. Now, that just makes all the sense in the world, doesn't it? The backed-up-old-farts evidently prefer their drunks in cars hurtling down the freeway, rather than quietly getting shit hammered in their own neighborhoods. In some areas, you can't buy beer unless you also buy a food product. (The idiots who make this shit up obviously don't realize that beer is food.) The per capita consumption of peanuts, pretzels, and juicy fruit must be off the chart in those areas.
That's not the only weird law they have in The Lone Star State. Did you know that all male citizens over the age of 13 are required to own at least one camouflaged ball cap? Those ugly-ass things are like a uniform item to those people. While driving through South Texas on Saturday, we stopped at a convenience store advertising "BBQ, Bacon and Eggs, Beer, and Fishing Tackle." All sorts of dead critters hung from the humidity-stained walls, and they had a world-class jerky selection. It was there that I bumped into a guy wearing the legally required camo hat, along with a camo shirt, combat boots, and get this: a pair of those silky, bright blue, baggy U.N.C. basketball shorts. I still can't drink that image out of my head.
And "BBQ" is another statutory requirement in Texas. First off, it must be at least a misdemeanor to actually spell out the word "barbecue." Everywhere you look, it's just "BBQ." And there must be at least one BBQ joint per 25 registered voters. Now, a joint doesn't necessarily have to sell only BBQ to qualify under the law. We went to a seafood place Sunday night, and BBQ was on the menu. Dat Nguyen's family owns a Vietnamese restaurant in Rockport. I'm sure BBQ brisket is somewhere on their menu. Right after fish heads and rice.
Just don't necessarily expect that you'll be allowed to wash down your BBQ with a cold beer. You'll have to wait till you get back in the car for that. Sheesh.
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That explains a lot, Crime Dog.
And you're probably right.
There's a certain backed-up-old-fart quality to Texas that just annoys the piss out of me, but is still somehow oddly endearing. That sort of dichotomy has a tendency to make one's head goofy. Which explains George Bush the younger, who started out slamming drinks and raising hell with his frat brothers, only to end up thumping his bible with Billy Graham and Pat Robertson and a preachin' on the evils of homosexuality and abortion. Of course, I could be misunderestimating the strategery of his way of a-thinkin'.
Then there's Dallas. It's all those things you might expect from a major American city: beautiful, cosmopolitan, and fast-paced. But just try buying a bottle of tequila. You'll think you were drugged, kidnapped by Mormons, and woke up in Salt Lake City. It turns out that large portions of the Dallas area are either partially or completely dry. You can drive for miles in some parts of Dallas and never see a bar or liquor store, then suddenly cross an imaginary line on the ground and be inundated with them. Now, that just makes all the sense in the world, doesn't it? The backed-up-old-farts evidently prefer their drunks in cars hurtling down the freeway, rather than quietly getting shit hammered in their own neighborhoods. In some areas, you can't buy beer unless you also buy a food product. (The idiots who make this shit up obviously don't realize that beer is food.) The per capita consumption of peanuts, pretzels, and juicy fruit must be off the chart in those areas.
That's not the only weird law they have in The Lone Star State. Did you know that all male citizens over the age of 13 are required to own at least one camouflaged ball cap? Those ugly-ass things are like a uniform item to those people. While driving through South Texas on Saturday, we stopped at a convenience store advertising "BBQ, Bacon and Eggs, Beer, and Fishing Tackle." All sorts of dead critters hung from the humidity-stained walls, and they had a world-class jerky selection. It was there that I bumped into a guy wearing the legally required camo hat, along with a camo shirt, combat boots, and get this: a pair of those silky, bright blue, baggy U.N.C. basketball shorts. I still can't drink that image out of my head.
And "BBQ" is another statutory requirement in Texas. First off, it must be at least a misdemeanor to actually spell out the word "barbecue." Everywhere you look, it's just "BBQ." And there must be at least one BBQ joint per 25 registered voters. Now, a joint doesn't necessarily have to sell only BBQ to qualify under the law. We went to a seafood place Sunday night, and BBQ was on the menu. Dat Nguyen's family owns a Vietnamese restaurant in Rockport. I'm sure BBQ brisket is somewhere on their menu. Right after fish heads and rice.
Just don't necessarily expect that you'll be allowed to wash down your BBQ with a cold beer. You'll have to wait till you get back in the car for that. Sheesh.
