News & notes...

It was bound to happen ... The New York Times called to ask about the recent hubbub surrounding this weblog ... The writer, a self-described "tech freelancer," said his story would appear a week from this Monday ... He asked the usual questions, seemed like a nice fellow, and chuckled at the appropriate times ... What inquiring journalists want to know, which we can't answer, is why a so-called "newsmaker" whose anonymity remains shielded by the local Clute-based daily would go to the trouble of digging up a 10-month old obituary and comparing it to a weblog three months later ...


Randall's is putting in a Wells Fargo bank branch in the place where other Randall's grocery stores put in a trendy Starbucks...It's over where the videos used to be ... What gives, we asked the nearest employee ... "Hey, this is Lake Jackson," said the sacker kid, which was his way of saying, we live in a one-horse town ... Speaking of one-horse towns, We received a missive from a former employee of the late A Curious Place coffee joint, which has closed down, which is no longer news ... The former employee was talking about what a special place it was, so we sort of felt bad about our choice of words (ie., "coffee snobs") that we once used to describe the clientele ... "I grew up in the Brazosport area and for me, Lake Jackson was like the movie, Stepford (sic) Wives. But, when I stepped out of Stepford ,(sic) & into A Curious Place, (it) is was an awakening of my spirit," writes Mary, the former asst. mgr... Now we're not entirely sure they were drinking just coffee in that place ....

We had been waiting for some wiseacre columnist to address the David Carr-God angle, and Houston Press media critic Richard "News Hostage" Connelly finally came through this week... Take that, Leon Hale! ... We simply couldn't bring ourselves to poke fun at the Houston Texans QB and his Dudley Do-rightness ... Still, it would kinda be nice this year if Carr would take the time to point skyward when SOMETHING BAD HAPPENS instead of saving those special spiritual gestures for the good plays ... And Lord knows, all the plays this season won't be winning ones ... Ya know, it's late in the game, the Texans have a chance to win, it's 4th and short at midfield, Carr takes the snap from center, he's fading back to pass, he has a man open, oh no, HE TRIPS!! Flat on his butt!!! But look at this folks, he's pointing to the sky, praising the Lord just for giving him this chance to fail....Hey, football fans, just kidding! GO TEXANS!! YEA GOD!!!

Code Red (faced)

This summer I have accidentally-on-purpose smuggled a pocket knife on to four different airlines.

The knife is no Jim Bowie-sized blade. Just a pearl-handled antique job, a keepsake from my late father, who seemed to always have it with him. So I carry it around. Even, unwittingly, to the airport.

This inadvertant test of the nation's high-alert, beefed-up, airport security machine began with a 7 a.m. flight out of Bush to Baltimore via Atlanta.

The airport was deserted and we were sleepy, as were, apparently the guardians of our nation's airliners.

Approaching the first x-ray checkpoint, I reached into my pocket and pulled out a handful of coinage, a tin of Altoids, a pack of chewing gum and -- Oh My God -- the knife.

The car was miles away. The plane awaited. Confess? And have the beloved keepsake consigned to the Department of Transportation's Confiscated Weapons Smelter?

So I stuck the knife into the little plastic tray, along with the rest of my pockets' contents, and held my breathe as it traveled on the conveyor belt under the all-seeing eye of the x-ray machine.

Nobody said a word.

Minutes later, waiting at the gate, I confided to Scooter, my wife and assistant, of the illegal contraband.

Here, I said, put it in YOUR bag. It's got more stuff in it than mine. They'll be less likely to find it in yours.

Thanks a lot, she said.

At the gate, security picked all three of us out, me, Scooter and daughter Scout, for a more thorough once-over.

We took off our shoes. We opened our bags. We lifted our arms for the hand-held metal detector. We answered who won the World Series in 1989. (Just kidding).

Nothing was found to be amiss.

No problem in Atlanta, either.

Weeks later, again we're flying, this time out of Hobby, on the way to South Florida.

In a rush, per usual.

At the airport, I peek into the side pocket of my carry-on.

THE KNIFE!

It has been sitting in the side pocket of my bag since the last trip!

Again, the car was too far away.

And I couldn't pull the give-it-to-the-wife gambit again. She'd never let me forget it.

In my bag it stayed.

And it sailed through x-ray, then survived a cursory look-see into the bag by a female security guard.

But hold everything.

Scooter's been detained. They've taken an intense interest in her carry-on.

The security lady is really pawing through it, like a dog who smells varmint.

Then she finds it.

Out of the bag she pulls ... nail nippers!

She pulls them out of the bag and holds them up with thumb and forefinger, as if to announce, "A-HA!"

"You can't have these."

"Anything for the cause," Scooter says, raising her eyebrows.

Scooter collects her bag and walks through security.

"Do you feel safer?" she asks.

Hell, yeah, I say to myself. I have a freakin' knife!

Returning from Fort Lauderdale, we decide to check our bags this time. No way I'm going to risk the family heirloom by carrying a prohibited lethal weapon in my carry-on luggage.

If they got the nail nippers in Houston, surely the knife wouldn't survive another run through the heightened airport security apparatus of the nation's most powerful country.

But we got a little lost on the way to the airport.

No time to stand in line to check bags.

No choice but to carry our stuff on, knife included.

The initial pass through the x-ray machine occurs without incident. The knife remains nestled in a side pocket of the carry-on, amid a mound of coins, a telephone cord, an electric razor, a cell phone charger, and a half dozen packages of unopened Southwest Airlines peanuts, expiration dates unknown.

Not so fast.

They pull me out of line.

We can't tell what some of these items are, sir. We have to check the bag.

He begins pulling stuff out. A cell phone charger, a telephone wire, some socks...

My heartrate quickens.

I'm gonna lose the knife. The knife my Old Man carried in his pocket for years and years.

What a dope I am.

Jeeezuu...

"OK, sir, have a good trip."

"OK?"

"Yes, sir."

"Well, OK then."

"Have a good flight, sir."

"Well, O-Kay."

The flight went well, which is to say we didn't crash or get hijacked.

The illegally smuggled knife was ready to be wielded at any moment should someone, anyone, try to storm the cockpit.

No one did, but you never know what some bad guy may have smuggled on board.

The Lost Archives

The old postings on the first incarnation of The Brazosport News were zapped when the site was taken down. That doesn't mean they're necessarily gone. They've been saved on a disk. Maybe we'll post them again on the site, or maybe we'll just say fuhgetaboutit. It's all so complicated.

Scooter and I are writing a romance novel. So far, our characters are a big city newspaper editor, who has that lean and hungry look in his eye, a small-town newspaper managing editor afflicted with a Napoleon complex, a local back-slapping legislator who plays both ends against the middle and a couple who decides to start a Website under fictitious names. Send in any plot ideas you feel worthy of consideration.

The Way We Was

A reporter in the United Kingdom called today to opine that Banjo Jones is “the first weblog martyr.”

What’s going on down there in Texas?

“It’s a long story,” sighed Banjo, already punchy from an afternoon chat with KNRC radio talk show host Alan Pell in Denver, who tells listeners his show teeters on “the cusp of mediocrity.”

Be careful.

One morning you might wake up and say out loud, as I did to Scooter, my wife and assistant, “It’s a lot more fun being Banjo than (name withheld by request).”

Then, a few months go by, and you really are Banjo Jones. Suddenly, people in positions of responsibility would like an explanation.

It all began with a bad dining experience at Denny’s. The pancakes were cold and the service was bad. It was comical, really. People were walking out...

Type, type, type.

Post and Publish.

Then, in the course of daily events, other observations of life’s rich pageant are offered.

A link is posted by a weekly paper’s Web site.

Words of mouth are passed.

Emails fly.

The gals in the courthouse typing pool are chattering, logging on every day.

Banjo this, Banjo that.

Hey, this ain’t such a boring burgh after all!

Didja read...?

Twang, twang, strum, strum.

The reaction on the street, by and large, to news reports about the Brazosport News and its creators is, “Hey, what about freedom of speech?”

What about freedom of the press?

This leads to a discussion. Yes, there are those freedoms, and then there is the right not to employ those who part their hair on the left.

Twang, twang, strum, strum.

“I’m proud of you, son. You’ve made my day,” telephones a reader in Alvin. “You’ve got balls, big balls.”

Balls for brains, suggests the Denver talk show host perched on the cusp of mediocrity.

“We enjoyed what you had to say!” writes a Lake Jackson businesswoman, using the quaint approach of pen and paper. “Good luck in the future. We’ll continue to search for the ‘newsmaker’ that turned you in. We’ll miss you!”

Like O.J.’s search for the real killer? OK, get back to us on that.

“The dunderhead running the Hearst seed catalogue should hire that Banjo Jones dude to replace poor (name withheld by request). After all, Banjo seemed a lot smarter than (name withheld by request),” writes manifique@hotmail.com.


“I see from Dave Winer's site that you've lost your job due to your weblog,” writes a sales manager from out of state. “ Well, keep it up. America needs more webloggers and fewer people who don't
appreciate the first amendment. Getting fired in this economic time is not conducive to a low-stress
lifestyle, I understand. I wish you all the luck in your future endeavors!”

“Say it ain't so jo-nes!” emails another fellow. “ Tell me the presses will roll again.”

Like the Warren Oates character said in The Wild Bunch, “Why not?”


Andrew Orlowski article in The Register, a UK site

Houston Press News Hostage column

Wash. Post Media Columnist Piles On (Last item)

Hawes Racking Up Kudos

By Hooterville Newswire Services
CLUTE (Tx) -- A petition campaign to honor Kelly Hawes, the Clute-based newspaper executive, has been launched to honor his recent campaign to promote higher ethical standards in the news media industry.
Velma Oleander, recording secretary of the River's End chapter of the Daughters of the Revolution Concerned About the First Amendment, said she hopes to gather enough signatures to convince Gov. Rick Perry to name the new highway overpass being constructed in Lake Jackson after the newsman.
When completed, the overpass over Farm-to-Market Road 2004 apparently will be the second highest man-made structure in Lake Jackson, the commercial hub of Southern Brazoria County.
Naming the civic improvement after Hawes is appropriate because of his recent championing of media decorum, Crane said.
"He stands for seriousness and decency," she said, moments before being escorted out of the food court at Brazos Mall, where she was soliciting signatures.
Hawes, a popular figure since he began penning newspaper columns on fatherhood, also has been nominated for this year's "Charles Colson Newsmaker of the Year" award given annually by Daddy Mag, a quarterly publication that examines the lighter side of parenthood.
Awarding of the coveted plaque will be announced at the National Rodeo Finals.
J. Patrick Buchanan received last year's award.
Announcement of the newsmaker award historically has led to lucrative product endorsements.
Dippity Do For Men Inc. LLP, the maker of men's hair care products, is a sponsor of this year's Daddy Mag awards ceremony.
Hawes was unavailable for comment this afternoon, according to a spokesman who said he "already knocked off for the day."

Strum, strum, strum

The news of our demise has been greatly exaggerated.

...strum, strum ...

The power of the press is awesome, especially if you own one, which we do, sort of.

...strum, strum ...

Have a nice day.