The Idle American

November 1st, 2012

Bob Lewis aka Tumbleweed Smith

By Dr. DON NEWBURY

World-class sportswriter Blackie Sherrod described columnist George Dolan thusly: “Before God made George, He broke the mold.” In those few words, Sherrod pegged the late columnist whose 30 years of daily columns in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram are legendary.

Bob Lewis is Tumbleweed Smith

Maybe the broken …

¡ask a mexican!

October 25th, 2012

Like water, not chocolate?

By GUSTAVO ARELLANO

Dear Mexican: Why is it that every Mexican I know refuses to eat chocolate? My in-laws drink things I wouldn’t clean my carburetor in. They fill their piñatas with every kind of hard candy – but no chocolate! I bring out a bag of M&Ms and everyone backs away …

¡ask a mexican!

October 25th, 2012

Chicken clucking at CNN en español

By GUSTAVO ARELLANO

Dear Mexican: My fiancé is trying to learn Spanish so he can speak to my grandmother when we get married next month. Lately, he’s been listening to CNN en Español to get an ear for the language. A couple of days ago, he told me that, after several …

High Desert Sketches

October 25th, 2012

Hispanic-flavored Halloween

By GEORGE A. COVINGTON

There are many advantages to living in a remote and beautiful section of the High Chihuahuan Desert. Like most of the country, Halloween allows us to celebrate vampires, ghouls, goblins, ghosts, witches, zombies and the usual run of the socially unacceptable creatures of the night. However, with our heavy infusion of …

High Desert Sketches

October 25th, 2012

Career debut of first world-renowned (blind) art critic

By GEORGE C. COVINGTON

In my long and sometimes productive life I have stumbled through the fields of law, journalism, education and government. Now as I reach my golden dotage I have taken on art criticism. I take on this new mantle of responsibility only because my friend J.R. …

Steve’s column

October 25th, 2012

Early electric current also gets the worm

By STEVE LANG

Finding a quote about nightcrawlers proved far more difficult than unearthing a poem about refrigerator repair.

On the Samurai Appliance Repairman’s website, under  “Haikus You Can Use,” I found:

“Beer is getting warm.

Compressor hums then clicks off.
Replace start relay.”

I found no Haiku concerning nightcrawlers, which are large earthworms also …

Steve’s column

October 25th, 2012

Boring speeches and how to survive them

By STEVE LANG

“Be sincere. Be brief. Be seated.” – Franklin D. Roosevelt

If a public speakers’ heaven exists, may it be filled with wit, brevity and long stretches of nap-inducing silence.

I say this because we endure pontificating hell on a daily basis, not only during election season. Worse, technology fuels …

The Idle American

October 25th, 2012

Upward, ever upward

By Dr. DON NEWBURY

The need for “togetherness” helps us understand the herd mentality; yearning to rise above the pack is not so easily understood.

World record-keeping attests to humankind’s stretch to reach highest rungs in life’s ladder.

One of the greatest stretches is the “need for speed.”  It perhaps began with chariot-racing, an event resulting …

Here’s to your health

October 25th, 2012

Rescuing healthcare, escaping pain

By KEITH WOMMACK

While reading reviews for the new film Escape Fire: The Fight to Rescue American Healthcare, I thought of my own recent release from pain.

Two weeks ago, as I stood outside and reluctantly prepared to mow my yard, my neighbor’s yardman pulled up with his trailer full of yard equipment. I …

¡ask a mexican!

October 4th, 2012

Why Do Chicanos love the Aztecs?

By GUSTAVO ARELLANO

Dear Mexican: Why do so many Chicanos claim to be Aztec?

Chicano stuck in leavenworth

Dear Gabacho: You’re right. The beaner love for everything Aztec mostly stems from the Chicano Movement, which appropriated various Mexica iconography (the stylized United Farm Workers black eagle, the concept of Aztlán, the airbrushed …