I get the news I need from the weather report
Cafe And Mercury Colony Park. U. S. Highway 90, Dryden, TX 78851
For my carnivorous friends in Dallas
It’s been a while since I posted a review by my favorite food critic, Alice Laussade. So here you go.
Go Mavs!
American Elegy: An Interview with Phil Bebbington
Phil Bebbington (aka Terrorkitten to many on the web and Flickr) is an Englishman with a keen sense for photographing the US. On his photographic journeys to America, he has captured an amazing array of “disappearing America” shots. Upon starting American Elegy, Phil was one of the first photographers that popped into my mind as an artist that needed to be featured here. Though based in Bath, England, I consider Phil Bebbington to be one of the best American Elegy-type photographers working today. I want to thank Phil for working with me for this interview and letting us use some of his wonderful images.
A terrific interview with one of our own. Recommended reading and viewing.
headline of the day
Texas governor asks lawmakers to pass airport “groping” bill
Lee Otis Johnson, 1939-2002
“Why are those people hollering about beans?”
“Free Lee Otis! Free Lee Otis!”
I still think that’s funny even, or maybe especially, if you don’t know any Spanish, but there’s a Texas Monthly article about Lee Otis Johnson that’s not funny. You need to “register” to read it, but I think that’s all.
Lee Otis Johnson was a symbol of many things, and that can be a killing burden. All his life he had been reduced to shorthand labels: radical student agitator, black power advocate, casualty of Texas’ draconian drug laws, victim of racism, petty criminal. But labels are beside the point in death, and Lee Otis Johnson died alone, in Houston, on June 12 of complications from circulatory problems. He was 62 years old.
He was best known for the thirty-year prison sentence he got in 1968 for passing a marijuana cigarette to an undercover police officer in Houston. Those who thought the punishment didn’t fit the crime distilled their outrage into a chant–”Free Lee Otis!”–that was heard on campuses around the state, including Texas Southern University, where he had been a leader of the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee in the mid-sixties.
Frijoles
It was the photo of a friend’s pot of weekend frijoles that called this to mind, and now I want to tell a story.
It’s a Texas gubernatorial anecdote. Could well be spurious, but even if so, it’s true. In the early 1970s, a white man named Preston Smith was governor of Texas. And there was this Texas member of the Black Panthers named Lee Otis Johnson, who got 30 years for possession of one joint. And then there was this one day (probably one of many) when people were demonstrating outside the Governor’s Mansion or the Capitol. And Preston Smith is said to have asked, “Why are those people hollering for beans?”
They were chanting, “Free Lee Otis! Free Lee Otis!”
Dallas
Carrollton man crashes, undresses, dies in second of two accidents in Far North Dallas
Man found dead in South Dallas pond after using drugs, talking about walking on water
(thanks, Patrick)
May 23, 1934
This day in 1934 Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow was shot dead by Texas officer Frank Hamer and his posse on a back country road in Bienville Parish, Louisiana.
It probably weren’t much like in the movie.
Cooper’s and my friend Allen was just writing to tell about the 1936 Texas Centennial, staged in Dallas.
“One of the attractions which impressed my father, who at that time was 13, was the bullet-riddled death car of Bonnie & Clyde.”
Texas Talk
Austin-based PUBLIC SCHOOL made a deck of alphabet cards to help out those of us who don’t talk Texan.
Motel. U.S. Route 54, Texhoma, OK 73949
I thought I was in Texas, part of the town is and I wanted to be so I have given it the Texas tag as well. I hope y’all forgive me.
Farm to Market Road 356, Trinity, TX 75862
U.S. Route 90, Marathon, TX 79842
A Grotto. U.S. Route 54, Dalhart, TX 79022
The cfsiii Fight Card
in conjunction with
SMITH AND SMITH PUGILISTIC ENTERTAINMENT
are proud to present the
BIGGEST SUPERCARD SINCE SLICED BREAD!
(which is a very long time)
Come one come all to
CLUSTERSTOCK
heavyweights |
|
East Anaheim Junior High Spelling Bee Finalist Telephone, TX |
Frank Sinatra Look-Alike of the Year ’82 Hoboken, NJ |
bantamweights |
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FBI’s 23rd most wanted El Paso, TX |
Eunuch Singer Ypsilanti, MI |
super welterweights |
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Poops at will Kingston, RI |
Colo. Brazillian Jiu Jitsu champion Fort Collins, CO |
featherweights |
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Little Miss Panhandle ’92 Tallahassee, FL |
Presidential Physical Fitness Award Winner Fort Wayne, IN |
cruiserweights |
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Bareback rodeo clown Schenectady, NY |
Canadian Canada |
from the comments
Here in Texas, gas is free and comes out of our dicks.
From the comments
I just sat there watching people eat fried frogs.
Where to Live to Avoid a Natural Disaster
Feet on the ground
The less we say about it the better
Make it up as we go along
Feet on the ground
Head in the sky
It’s okay
I know nothing’s wrong
Windom, Texas. April 30, 2011.
Thanks, all, both for granting me time and space to myself last weekend and for welcoming me on my returns to the fold.
Also, for confirming my conviction that there is no significant “generation gap” amongst folks who are simpatico.
Let’s do it again.
Texas State Highway 17, N. Dean Street, Marfa, TX 79843
Clusterflockstock 3: Outside the Feed Sack
Bright Lights. Big City.
Windom, Texas. April 30, 2011.
Farm to Market Road 170, Terlingua, Big Bend, TX 79852
Mercury Colony Park. U. S. Highway 90, Dryden, TX 78851
Thinking of you all at the farm.
