Dallas Cowboys Attacking Homes Again

Jerry Jones decided he needed more Arlington homes destroyed for added parking space for his new Dallas Cowboy stadium. So, Jerry Jones sent out someone to make offers to a number of homeowners. About a dozen, so far, have agreed to sell. Once the deals were made the deeds were transferred to a company run by Jerry Jones.

The city of Arlington, stung by their notorious new reputation for being co-conspirators in the worst abuse of the concept of eminent domain in American history, refused to use eminent domain this time.

Jerry Jones minions have been very aggressive, harassing the holdouts relentlessly. Jerry Jones has now acquired enough new parking lot space that the holdouts will end up being an island surrounded by concrete. And football fans.

Holdouts have had their homes invaded and have had to chase surveyors off their property.

Meanwhile, there are many cases still being litigated from the original land grab. Apparently there is some principle along the lines of you can't start bulldozing until due process has been followed. Or whatever the right legalese is. But Jerry Jones unleashed his Army of Bulldozers in a Hitlerian Blitzkrieg while homeowners were still trying to fight their destruction by using the American court system, well, the American court system as practiced in Texas.

If the cases can get to a court outside of Texas jurisdiction it would seem there'd be a good chance that justice might finally be found and maybe ultimate justice might be attained and someone finds himself charged, arraigned, tried, convicted and behind bars. And the NFL changes its mind about playing a Super Bowl in a stadium so shamefully built on what amounts to being a graveyard of people's unfairly altered lives.

I wonder how actively those holdout's home invasions have been investigated?

Six Flags Over Texas Roller Coasting

I've been to Six Flags Over Texas twice. Both times due to being given free passes. When I moved to Texas I thought it'd be fun living near what I assumed would be something like Disneyland. Sadly I was not out of the Six Flags parking lot before I realized Six Flags was no Disneyland.

Six Flags Over Texas is known for its roller coasters. I had not been on a roller coaster since I took my nephews to Vegas a couple months before I moved. In Vegas I rode the New York New York roller coaster. It is a bumpy ride but not bone jarring. In the photo that is me and my nephew Joey in the front seats on the NYNY coaster.

By the time I made my first visit to Six Flags I knew their Texas Giant wooden roller coaster was one of the world's tallest and that it had been named by some group of professional roller coaster riders as the Best Wooden Roller Coaster in the world.

I'd been on a wooden roller coaster before, at the PNE in Vancouver, Canada. The Canadian wooden roller coaster did not prepare me for the Texas Giant. It may be my age-related frailness, but by the time I got off the Texas Giant my bones were aching, my back felt like I'd been in a Nazi torture chamber, my neck was twisted. And my hair was a total mess.

And so I vowed to never get on another roller coaster. And I haven't.

You can ride the Texas Giant via the YouTube video below. And go to my Eyes on Texas website for more Six Flags coaster rides.

Scarlett Dumped Me For Ryan Reynolds

I'm shocked. After our long secret romance, Scarlett Johannson is suddenly marrying someone named Ryan Reynolds. How did this happen? Who is Ryan Reynolds? I don't even feel like I know Scarlett anymore. I don't feel like I ever really did.

Not having a clue as to who this was who stole Scarlett away from me I had to look it up. He's a Canadian. From Vancouver. How can she marry a Canadian? They say "eh" after almost every sentence, like they question every thing that comes out of their mouths. It is very very annoying after you hear dozens of "eh's".

That's Ryan Reynolds on the right. Eh? With the beard. Eh? Scarlett looks like she's lost weight. Eh?

Canadians also don't know how to properly pronounce other words. Like they can not say "about." It comes out as "aboot." Eh?

And Canadians leave off the word "the" when they speak of going to a hospital. They don't say, "They took him to the hospital." Canadians say, "They took him to hospital." Eh?

I worked for a short time for an ex-priest in Tacoma who married an ex-nun and who runs a rundown trinket store in Tacoma. He would say, "I will have to talk that over with staff." Not, "I will talk that over with the staff." Or, "my staff." That'd work too. I don't know why I find this annoying. Maybe, in the ex-priest's case, it's because his staff consisted of his ne-er-do-well son, the son's high school dropout wife, a dissipated elderly alcoholic, a blonde floozy and a yes girl who acted like Honey in the Doonesbury strip. It just seemed sort of pretentious to refer to that group as staff.

One time the ex-priest told me he considered me part of staff. Even though I'm in Texas. I was offput. I did not want to be part of staff. I no longer am part of staff. It was probably my bad attitude that got me removed from staff. Eh?

I also worked for the ex-priest's hugely obese sister. She sold chocolate and ate considerable volumes of the stuff. While being perpetually on the Atkin's Diet. She had all sorts of digestive and hygiene issues. Due to her size she fell down every once in awhile. I only saw one fall. It was like watching a large tree slowly crash to the ground. She never got hurt from the falls due to all that heft acting like a giant pillow. Or at least that's what I assumed. When I saw her fall I tried to help her get back up, but I can only lift 300 pounds tops.

Eventually I had enough and had to fire the ex-priest's hugely obese sister. She'd lied to and cheated one of my best friends one time too many. She was caught shorting her workers on pay. And then she made the mistake of shorting me. I never did learn the exact size of the fine that she had to pay to Labor & Industries. Except that I heard through the grapevine that it was substantial. The IRS caught up to her too. For not filing for 10 years.

I wonder who turned her in?

Turkmenistan Texas

I was reminded of Fort Worth's Bass family when I saw this photo of what I believe is the Saparmurat Atayevich Niyazov Performance Hall in Ashgabat, Turkmenistan. Fort Worth's Bass Family, as I've noted previously, has an odd habit of naming Fort Worth buildings after themselves, like the Nancy Lee and Perry R. Bass Performance Hall in beautiful downtown Fort Worth.

Saparmurat Atayevich Niyazov was Turkmenistan's president for life til he died a couple years ago. He became quite famous during his reign for his megalomaniacal ways, one of which was a penchant for naming all sorts of things after himself on a level that leaves the Bass Family puny pikers.

Niyazov decided the old names for months and days would be much better if named after various people, such as himself and his mother and other Turkmenistan historical figures.

He even renamed bread after his mother. Both the month of April and bread became Gurbansoltan. April seems a much prettier name for both bread and a month. And a mother. Maybe Gurbansoltan sounds better in its native tongue than it reads in English. When I try to say Gurbansoltan it sounds like Gur Buns So Tan.

Niyazov banned car radios, lip-synching and all recorded music.

Because Niyazov thought dogs smelled bad they were banned from capital city Ashgabat.

Niyazov spent untold millions of dollars to build a lake. Which is yet one more thing Ashgabat and Fort Worth have in common, as in Fort Worth has a boondoggly plan to spend untold millions of dollars to build a lake, and just like in Turkmenistan, the good citizens of Fort Worth do not get to vote on the lake that may flood part of their town. Fort Worth's ruling junta makes those type decisions and then orders property owners off their property using the unique Texas variant of the concept of using eminent domain to acquire private property for the public good. Like building a lake.

President-for-Life Niyazoz liked seeing himself in sculpted form, so he ordered statues of himself erected all over Turkmenistan, including a 40 foot high gold statue that stood on top of a 20 story tower and rotated throughout the day to face the sun.

I used the past tense to describe the location of the above statue because it has gone bye-bye. The new Turkmenistan President-for-Life, Gurbanguli Berdymukhamedov, ordered the gold statue moved to another part of Ashgabat. I don't know if it still rotates.

The new President-for-Life is not seen as a powerful leader like his predecessor. Because he looks so much like the previous President-for-Like it is rumored throughout Turkmenistan that Berdymukhamedov is Niyazoz's illegitimate son.

Berdymukhamedov is sort of acting like his possible dad in that he is sort of making moves to start his own personality cult. He recently ordered that his likeness be put on newly minted coins. Can statues and a new calendar be far behind? Maybe he'll rename the country Absurdistan.

I bet there are members of the Bass Family who would love to have a statue or two in their honor, along with their likeness on a coin or two.

Hillary Clinton Physically Assaults Barack Obama

Yesterday I checked in on Fort Worth's best blogger and found myself amused by a YouTube video in which Hillary battles Barack with a light saber in a futile effort to get him to come over to the Dark Side. The Force continues to be with Barack, though, with a lot of support, including Abraham Lincoln.

Rattlesnake Phobia

When I began my exile in Texas back in 1999 I think the #1 thing that concerned me about Texas (at that point in time) was I knew rattlesnakes, copperheads and water moccasins lived in Texas. Along with tarantulas.

On the west side of the mountains, in Washington, there are no poisonous snakes. Eastern Washington does have rattlesnakes, but I never saw one. I do remember a ranger at Sun Lakes State Park once warning my brother and me of a bunch of rattlers ahead in the canyon we were climbing around in.

When I was first in Texas, at my first abode, I had to walk out a long driveway to get my morning paper. It took me along time to quit worrying I'd encounter a snake.

I was swimming in Lake Grapevine in July of 2002. I knew there were water moccasins in the lake. Suddenly a reptilian head popped up in my face. I did not know I was able to swim as fast as I did. The temps were well over 100. Forgetting that, I ran out on the metal floating dock to see if I could see the snake. I was jumping up and down cuz the deck was so hot. After a minute or so of hot footing it a big turtle popped up instead of a snake. They can bite you too, it just isn't poisonous. I've not been back in Lake Grapevine.

And then in 2003 I went to the Sweetwater Rattlesnake Roundup. Sweetwater is a town out in west Texas, about 200 miles from my current location. At the Sweetwater Rattlesnake Roundup I saw hundreds of snakes. I heard many rattling. At first I was unsettled by all the up close and personal contact I was seeing with the snakes, but I got used to it.

I'd bought my first video camcorder the week before I went to Sweetwater. The YouTube video below is the first video I made. Hence the goofy bad titles at the start. But, even though this was my first video, and with it only being on YouTube for a few months, it is by far my most viewed video with almost 2000 viewings.

The rattlesnakes at Sweetwater were the first I'd seen in Texas. My snake fear had had some reinforcement via copperhead and water moccasin encounters at a Indian Village Park in Arlington. And I've had many non-poisonous snake encounters at River Legacy Park. You can go here and see a photo of a huge snake blocking my way at River Legacy.

So, one week after hearing all those rattles rattling at Sweetwater I was biking the Extreme Trail at Cedar Hills State Park's mountain bike trail in Dallas. I was nearing the top of Expletive Ridge when I let out an expletive, not due to the steep, punishing hill, but due to the no mistaking what it was loud sound of a rattlesnake rattle. I looked to my right and there it was, bigger than any I'd seen in Sweetwater, its rattle in fully erect position and shaking hard as the snake slithered away. I suspect it'd been napping on the sun warmed trail when the sound of me coming up the hill woke it up.

The rattlesnake encounter sent my adrenaline into overdrive. The section of trail after Expletive Ridge went through a marshy, tall grass area. Prime snake territory it seemed to me. I pedalled as fast as I could to get through it and was real happy when I reached a much broader section of trail.

I have not been back to Expletive Ridge since, because of the rattler encounter, plus the fact that the trail was destroyed by a 13 inch rain and has only recently re-opened with newly built trails.

It amazes me how my snake phobia has so greatly diminished over the years. It doesn't even cross my mind anymore, even when hiking in a real wild place like Tandy Hills Park. Of course, all it would take is one close snake encounter and my phobia will be back.

JFK Assassination Anniversary

Yes. I know it isn't November 22. But I'm busy doing something that requires me to concentrate my limited brainpower, so I've got not enough mental bandwidth to think of anything to blog about. But, my YouTube videos now seem to work just fine in this Blog.

Back in 2003 I went to Dealey Plaza in Dallas for the 40th Anniversary of the JFK Assassination. This event drew a huge crowd, as you will see in the video. Many very moving and very odd things occurred during this event, the most macabre being police arriving in riot gear just as the moment marking the firing of the sniper's gun arrived, diverting everyone's attention. I did not catch the police on video, I had my digital camera out when they arrived. You can see the police and more photos from that day by going to my Eyes on Texas website. And below you can watch the video I took that day.

Paula Abdul is a Precious Gift

Paula Abdul had one of her better moments of ditsy weirdness on Tuesday's American Idol. The 5 remaining singers were to warble 2 songs each. The judges did not do their usual critiquing after each singer sang.

Instead, after all 5 had sung their first song they stood as a group in front of the judges to hear what they had to say.

Well, Paula started with the dreadlocked, perpetually stoned-acting one, named Jason Castro, believed to be Fidel's 4th cousin twice removed. Paula pretty much told Jason she did not like his performance of his first song, that being the only song he'd sung. And then she went to tell Jason she also did not like his second song. Which he had not yet sung.

Paula was, in a very confused way, reading off notes. When the other judges, Randy Jackson and Simon Cowell tried to get out of this mess, Paula just got more confused, crying "this is so hard."

The show's host, Ryan Seacrest, tried to get out of the awkward moment with an attempt at humor, saying "Paula is finally revealing her secret power, that she can see the future." Or something like that.

Last year Paula had her own reality show on Bravo, called "Hey Paula." It was extremely painful to watch, but in a good bad train wreck sort of way. We got to see the backstage look at those embarrassing interviews she gave last year that caused a big brouhaha because she appeared to be drugged, drunk or both.

I thought the "Hey Paula" show would be the end of her career, that American Idol would replace her. It was that embarrassing.

My favorite moment of the "Hey Paula" train wreck was a part where Paula was in full whining, crying mode, verbalizing her odd sense of entitlement and her displeasure at being ill-served by her minions. She uttered what I thought would become an infamous quote that Simon Cowell would use at least once, but hasn't, as far as I know. Paula said, "Why don't they appreciate me for the precious gift that I am?"

Below you can watch YouTube video of Paula being very precious this past Tuesday.

This Farmer Wants a Wife

Before I get to this wanting a wife thing I've got to mention that there is this brilliantly insightful website devoted to all that is good about Fort Worth that has the extremely highly evolved good taste to include me among all that is good about Fort Worth.

The website is called West & Clear and they had this to say about me....

"The Durango Texas blog has writeup and YouTube-ry from last Saturday’s PrairieFest. You’ll see our booth at about 3:16 on the video! We are famous in the internet! Durango Texas looks like a pretty interesting read (especially the frequent Star-Telegram bashing) and I am looking forward to spending some time on the site. "

So, what I got out of that is yet one more person who sees the need to bash the Fort Worth Star-Telegram Pravda-esque Purveyor of Propaganda and Disseminator of Misinformation tool of the good old boy network that runs the company town of Fort Worth.

Well, let's do some bashing. In today's paper we had yet one more article that revolved around the exciting news that yet one more person from Texas is on yet one more reality show. It makes us so very very proud. My 2 readers may remember me complaining about this odd trait before, with me getting a clarifying message from the Star-Telegram's lead TV writer explaining that, unlike that evil paper in that evil city 30 miles to the east, the Star-Telegram tries to make their paper localized, connecting their few readers to anything remotely local about any given story.

Tonight a new show starts on the CW Network. I've no idea what that is, the network I mean, not the show. The show is of the reality show genre and is called "The Farmer Wants a Wife." Some farmer in Missouri apparently is having such a tough time finding a mate that he contacted the CW Network and asked for help. So, they brought in a bunch of city girls for the farmer to choose from.

And one is from Texas. Which the Star-Telegram made the focus of in their article about this show. The headline being "Farmer girl on new CW dating show has local ties." Wow. Now that really makes me want to watch this now that I know the show has a Texas connection.

The article goes on to report the totally important and pertinent info that "Brooke Ward is identified as being from Dallas. But the Texas Christian University grad grew up in the East Texas town of Atlanta, about 25 miles south of Texarkana. So among the 10 'city girls' that Missouri farmer Matt Neustadt has to choose from on this Bachelor with hay, the 23 year-old marketing representative would seem to have an edge."

Because she's from Texas? That's her edge? I don't think I am able to follow the train wreck of logic.

The article goes on to interview the Texas connection in a fine example of making a story local for the readers of the Star-Telegram. A paper with a mission. Unlike the Dallas paper that does not connect its readers to anything remotely local.

And on a totally different note on the same subject. I looked at the Farmer Wants a Wife website. It opens with a video. The video is amusing. At one point the voice over is saying something like "when the girls get to the farm they see the biggest (we cut to a rooster strutting about) they've ever seen." Then one of the girls says, "I didn't realize roosters were real things." Obviously the producers selected for high intellects when casting this show.

No wonder they ended up with at least one Texas girl.

I am Woman Hear me Bore

Have I already talked about my first Texas driver's license? I recollect mentioning it to Gar the Texan in reference to something I also don't remember.

Rather than blog about my driver's license I'd prefer to blog about a new goofy Star-Telegram, Fort Worth thing. But I've been banned for a week from boring people with my pathetic making fun of Fort Worth and its sad excuse for a newspaper.

So, back to my first Texas driver's license. It arrived the day before I was set to drive up to Washington for Christmas. I didn't notice anything wrong with it til I looked at it more closely the next day. Texas had turned me into a woman. I didn't mind too much.

I made it out of Texas and all the way to Washington without having to show my license to anyone. Not til I was at my sister's house in the Seattle suburb of Kent did I have to show my license. She was having an all-girl Christmas party and I was allowed to stay if I acted as the greeter and if I showed my license to all the incoming girls to prove my bonafides as one of them. It really wasn't all that hard to be a good girl. I was actually one of the better looking girls at the party, if I do say so myself.

I made it all the way back to Texas without having to show my license to anyone with a badge. When I got back here I went to the Department of Motor Vehicles, that's not what they call it here, that's the Washington name, I never can remember the Texas name for the place you get a driver's license. The DMV, or whatever it's called here, is a total zoo. Long lines, antique computers, noisy. But the help is nice.

When my turn finally came I showed the nice lady my license and asked if she can spot an error. She saw it and said "I assume you are not female."

"I'm fairly certain I'm not," said I.

She then entered something into her computer to get my records from Austin. When she had that info she looked surprised and had me lean in close because she had a delicate question to ask me.

She whispered, "It says you're African-American. You aren't are you?"

"I'm fairly certain I'm not," said I.

She snipped the corner off my license so I could keep it as a souvenir of my day's as a female. I wonder what would have happened to me if I'd been stopped for speeding and the cop looked up my record to learn I was African-American in addition to being a woman? I suspect if this had happened in Texas this would not have gone well for me.