Author Archives: Red from Texas

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About Red from Texas

I'm proud to be Red. I have lived most of my life in Texas and I love this place. Here are a few things you should know about me. 1. I am happily married and intend to stay so. 2. I live in a house that is older than you, unless you are really old. 3. I own 2 rifles and a shotgun. I think handguns are just trouble. 4. I have never killed a man, but have taken out some deer and hogs. 5. I was a good student, but never close to being valedictorian. 6. In no particular order I like the Houston Texans, San Antonio Spurs, Houston Astros, FC Barcelona, Tottenham Hotspur, Texas Longhorns and Houston Dynamo. 7. I hate Dallas but always have a good time when I go there. 8. I was a Dallas Cowboys fan for 26 years but declared that I was no longer a fan during the 1987 strike. 9. I don't own any pets. I like cats, and a good dog and I have met at least 3 of them in my lifetime. 10. I think the best part of Texas is west of I-35. 11. I own two pairs of cowboy boots, but don't wear them very often. 12. I don't have a pronounced Texas accent, but can affect one when needed. 13. My last meal would be fried shrimp with tartar sauce, a baked potato with all the fixins', a dinner salad with 1000 Island dressing, yeast rolls and chocolate fudge pie for dessert. 14. I'm an old Dad, but my children are none of your business. 15. I have two degrees from UT-Austin and somehow managed to fall in love with and marry an Aggie. 16. Most of my family are right-wing nut jobs but I love them anyway. 17. When I get to play golf on a regular basis, I shoot in the low 80's. 18. I don't get to play golf on a regular basis. 19. I think Fort Worth is the best town in Texas by a long shot. 20. I have a mean herb garden. Regards, Red P.S. Remember it's not a color, it's a state of mind.

200 Days Done – 1261 To Go – How Low Can He Go (cont.)?

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Two hundred days into the Reality TV Show that is the Trump Presidency and the news could hardly be worse for the adulation-seeking President.  It turns out that people just don’t like him.  That would be bad enough, but Americans are also questioning Trump’s honesty, leadership and skills.

Red just can’t understand why people don’t understand what Trump is up to.  He has a job that he never really wanted.  He has to actually work at shit he knows very little about.  And he is continually criticized from all sides.  When Charles Krauthammer thinks a Republican President is a complete tool – well, chances are good that he is a complete tool.  One thing Trump does understand is marketing himself.  He wasn’t so good at football, casinos, wine, ties, steaks, airlines, “universities” and the list goes on,  but he does know how to package, promote and sell himself.  It’s really the only product any politician has.  And what does America like?  A come from behind last-minute unexpected win.  Well if Trump wins re-election, it certainly looks like it will fulfill all those criteria and a good segment of the population will have a rooting interest in that narrative.  Red won’t bet against Trump for re-election until the final vote has been counted.

Meanwhile, as Trump looks for his Pro-V1 in the rough (and uses the leather wedge to improve his lie), the pollsters have been hard at work.  The Week has the latest on Trump’s dismal poll numbers.

Only 30 percent of respondents said they admire Trump, 34 percent said they are proud to have him as president, and 55 percent said he has lowered the stature of the presidency. Regarding Trump’s Twitter use, 71 percent agreed it’s an effective way for him to reach his supporters, but 70 percent said Trump tweets too often in response to TV news, 71 percent said it was a risky way to communicate, and 63 percent said his tweets turn out to be misleading too often. Overall, only 36 percent of respondents found Trump honest and trustworthy, versus 60 percent who say he isn’t, and 24 percent said they trust most or all of what they hear in official communications from the Trump White House, versus 30 percent who say they believe none of it.

TV’s Big Bang Comes to Texas – Sort of

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Image result for young sheldon show

Young Sheldon the spin-off of the megahit sitcom The Big Bang Theory will, of course, be set in Texas.  In TBBT, Jim Parsons, a Houston native, plays social misfit genius Sheldon Cooper who was fictionally raised in east Texas in a  bible-thumping, sports and gun loving family.  The show has played off of that aspect of his character rather brilliantly – especially with crackerjack actress Laurie Metcalf in a recurring role as Sheldon’s  mother Mary.  Every episode with Metcalf is a real joy to watch as she totally invades the stage with her understated performance as Sheldon’s doting but often cynical mother.  Young Sheldon will start with seven-year old Sheldon already in high school and feature interaction with his family who do not know quite what to make of the young prodigy.

MySA reports that Metcalf’s daughter Zoe Perry will play the same role as her mother in the new show and one can only hope that she carries on like mom.  In any event, Red is always pleased to see another TV show set in Texas (with the notable exception of Walker – Texas Moron) even if filming takes place in Burbank. Hopefully, there will be some notable Texas exteriors if the show takes off.  Red is skeptical, but then he also thought Frazier would probably bomb.

Young Sheldon is set for a special Monday night premiere at 7:30 p.m. on Sept. 25, after the season opener of The Big Bang Theory.   The regular time slot will be at 7:30 p.m. on Thursdays beginning in November with the TBBT as a lead-in.

Counterfeit Money – Mexican Style

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Red had not seen a real counterfeit bill in many long years.  Red once worked in a bank and bogus bucks would turn up not infrequently.  But with the advances in technology and hated colorization of the greenbacks, counterfeiters have had an increasingly difficult time of it.

Some of the illegal printing operations may have moved south of the border.  While in Mexico, someone passed Red an ersatz 200 Peso note. A cab driver discovered it and handed it back to Red – “Is no good.”  Fortunately, 200 pesos is only about $12 USD, so the hit was not bad – just annoying.

Mexico employs similar technology  as the U.S. Treasury to imbed strips and other counters  in its bills and most establishments will waive a pen over 200 and 500 peso notes to check for fakes. After getting the trashy 200, Red started paying more attention to what the shopkeepers were doing and their diligence indicated that counterfeiting may be something of a problem south of the border.  Even Red started holding up every bill to the light to see if someone was attempting to pawn off phony pesos on an unsuspecting gringo.  It did not happen again.

Image of 200 Peso note featuring Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz, or Juana de Asbaje.  Sor Juana(1648-1695) was a writer, poet and nun.

Quote for the Day

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“That White House is a real dump.”

President Donald Trump (said to members of Trump National Bedminster Golf Club where the President chooses to spend his summer weekends at great expense to the taxpayers).

Red can see how Trump thinks the WH is a dump and not up to his standards.  Trump has made a few other more detailed observations about our Nation’s Number One Dump.  Red shares a few with you:

Where are the silk-embroidered toilet seat covers with my face and MAGA?

We really  need some solid gold faucets and spigots to class this place up a bit.

Not to mention Perrier spouting bidets like we have at Trump Tower?

There is absolutely no room for the stuffed and mounted wild animal trophies of endangered species offed by DJ and Eric.

You expect Melania to make do with a 1500 sq. ft closet.  I take a dump in bathroom bigger than that at Mar-a-Lago.

You call this a kitchen – when it can only crank out 400-500 dinners at one time?

The oval office – not really all that oval! Fake news.

Didn’t Lincoln die in the Lincoln bedroom anyway? Sad!

Not surprisingly, it still reeks of Negro!

On the bright side, the lingering odor of Rancid Penis is quickly fading!

How Low Can he Go – in Texas?

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As readers know, Red has tried to guess the bottom for Trump on a national scale.  Red has figured that 29% approval is about as low as Trump can hit because there are at least that many dead-enders who will convince themselves they are satisfied with this Reality TV Show Joke of a Presidency no matter what happens.   What Red never figured on happening was attempting to guess how low Trump would go in Dark Red Texas.   But even DRT is souring on the bombastic and ill-prepared Trump as leader of the land.   Turns out that Texans may not be quite as willing to follow Trump to the bottom as previously suspected.  Red doubts this will have any impact on state-wide elections in 2018 with the possible exception of Sen. Ted Cruz (TP-Texas) whose presidential campaign and subsequent toadying towards Trump (who directly defamed his wife and father) and current refusal to meet with constituents have revealed Ted as a craven coward interested in nothing but the greater glorification of all things Ted Cruz.  The remainder of Texas Repubs are waiting around for a Democrat to show up and get pummeled.

Texas Monthly reports that Trump is now under water in the last bastion.

According to a new Gallup poll measuring the average job approval rating over his first six months in office, only 42 percent of Texans approve of his performance. Texas is among 31 states across the country where the majority of poll respondents disapprove of the job Trump has done since the election, according to CNN. And the Lone Star State is one of ten other states where Trump’s approval rating has flipped after voting for him in November, joined by Indiana, Ohio, Iowa, Georgia, Florida, Arizona, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan, and North Carolina. The only states with a larger net loss than Texas are Michigan and North Carolina, and Texas is tied with Indiana for the biggest gap between Trump’s margin of victory in November and his net job approval—a difference of eighteen points.

Arrive Alive – Drive 75 or 95 in the Left Lane

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Red has been on the highway to hell (aka I-35 to Dallas) and other major and minor Texas roads quite a bit this summer.  Red has driven all over this  great country of ours, and Texans take a back seat to no one when it comes to overly aggressive highway maneuvering.  If you aint doing 95 in the left lane partner, you’d best get out of the way unless you like having some angry cowboy drinking a Bud Light in an F-250 pulling a trailer loaded with 2 horses, 6 goats, 5 bales of hay and his mother-in-law right on your ass.  And if you’re just doing 75 in the right lane, you’re going to be the last one back to Abilene.  Red just can’t remember the last time he saw someone pulled over by a DPS officer.  Red has seen a few on the road, but they just don’t seem interested in pulling over Billy Joe anymore unless he has reached triple digits.  Perhaps they are all policed out from chasing illegals down on the borderlands.

Apparently, someone is still getting ticketed however.  The Fort Worth Star-Telegram has posted a list of the counties where you are most likely to get bagged for speeding.  So speed read on brother because as they say – Hell aint half full yet.

 

Red is Back

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Just in case you were wondering, Red has been visiting our former imperial masters to the South now know as Los Estados Unidos Mexicanos or Mexico.  He was down south for a week with Mrs. Red enjoying some mescal, sopa de tortilla and chiles in nogado.  And although the trip was bigly fun, when Red gets back to Texas the first thing he wants is an ice-cold glass of good ol’ American water.  After drinking cool to luke warm agua mineral (con gas) for a week, there’s nothing like the refreshing taste of your local water – unless you live in Odessa.  In that case, go get an Ozarka or a cold Lone Star if you are so inclined (and you better be half inclined to guzzle down some Lone Star).

All the Mexico ignoramuses were amazed that Red came back with all body parts intact and that they didn’t receive any ransom demands last week.  The average American’s view of Mexico is remarkably uninformed.  Years ago when talking with one of Red’s friends about driving down to Zacatecas, Red’s buddy seemed amazed that you could actually drive in Mexico.  “Do they have cars?”, he asked.  “Only about 35,000,000 of ’em”, Red replied. And at one point on this trip, Red was convinced that every last one of them was out on the streets of Mexico City, DF.

Red will be blogging about the trip over the next few days, so stay tuned.  Until then, Adios Amigos.

Quote for the Day

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“When I go back to Texas, nobody asks about Russia. You know, I held town halls all over the state of Texas. You know how many questions I got on Russia? Zero.”

Sen. Ted Cruz (TP-Texas).   Red wonders exactly what town hall meetings Cruz is talking about.  Looking at his official website, there is a bizarre out-of-focus picture of the Loop 360 bridge over Lake Austin, but nary a mention of any town hall meetings since Trump took office and shows that none are scheduled.  Red acknowledges Cruz held some kind of under the radar meeting to discuss Veterans’ issues in recent weeks, but Cruz has been notably unwilling to face the citizens he supposedly represents in recent months.  So hold a real town hall Ted, and Red will be there to ask you plenty of questions about Russians and why you now support the “utterly amoral”, “pathological liar”, serial philanderer”, and  “sniveling coward” of a President who slandered your wife and father.