News Round-Up (11/12/2024)

 Promising to be an "election free" zone....

Texas, pay-for-play, Michelin Guide is being revealed. Although you probably did not get an invitation to the roll-out.  My reaction is a huge "meh".  Although I was surprised to see tiny BBQ joint Brisket and Rice included in the mentions.  Have to go by there some time.

There was a time when nutritional science did discourage consumption of seed oils.  That was obviously before the "wrong" people started speaking out against them. It's amazing how politics infects seemingly everything. (And the depths to which "science" has devolved)

Just a quick reminder that we're not yet out of Hurricane Season.

For some reason I'm having a hard time getting fired up about the DC Reboot. Maybe it's because James Gunn is running things? I'm not sure.

That said. I'm not that enthusiastic about the upcoming Marvel stuff either. Disney just doesn't know what to do with it now.

I liked the Big Bang Theory, except for the horrid ending.  Yes, I would like to see a follow-up special that fixes that, but I don't think it's going to happen given the career arc of the actors. Sometimes you just have to let things be.

I am, actually, looking forward to Landman. Almost enough to get a subscription to Paramount+

I'm starting to think the Houston Texans are not all that good.  I'm also starting to think that some teams might have dodged a bullet in Bobby Slowik. They are also seemingly trying to get CJ Stroud killed.

This just in. Willie Fritz is a good coach.

It's not that he's lacking in results (he's not, HISD is actually improving) but Mike Miles might be in the running for most unlikable political leader in Houston.

If you own a home in Harris County your property taxes are going to go up, a LOT. You don't need this calculator. Rodney and Lina are going to tax you until your eyes bleed.

Sigh.

And now back to our regularly scheduled programming. (SPORTS!!!!)

Now that we have the election nonsense behind us we can return our focus to sports, and sports gambling, which is the focus of this little corner of blogging and what I enjoy writing about the most.  I'm just going to touch on a few things today that have happened while I was out in Las Vegas and relatedly, while I was sick with the travel crud afterwards.

1. The CFP early ranking remain crap. Nothing against them really, but they don't mean shit at this point. The only thing that we really learned from them are two things. First, the CFP committee understands their marketing obligations to the B1G and the SEC. They are in love with brands, not teams. I don't think this will change any in the future. Second, I'm not as upset about Boise State being close to BYU as most people are. While I feel for Indiana, they have it all in front of them. But if Boise State and BYU played on a neutral field I feel the former would be favored.  Who I feel for is Army, who might be the best of the Group of 5 teams but who might not get a chance to show it.  The CFP committee says that they "watch all of the games" but that is certainly not true. Otherwise the rankings would look far different than what they do.

2. The NFL is top-heavy this year. Kansas City, Baltimore, Detroit, Buffalo. Those are the 4 teams right now that seem like they are Super Bowl Contenders. Teams that we thought might be good (Houston, San Francisco, Tampa Bay) don't seem to be all that good. There are other teams out there with winning records but they don't seem to really have a shot. The fact is the NFL is not very entertaining this year. Most games are poor, the officiating is borderline awful, and the fact that you only get three games per day without paying for a package that's not available unless you subscribe to a certain service makes Sundays must-miss TV.  And no, NBC, we are not waiting all day for Sunday Night, we're using that time to get ready for work on Monday.

3. College basketball is BACK. There have already been upsets, the return of Calipari and a handful of teams that looked REALLY good so far. This is going to be a REALLY good season, and Big XII Men's Basketball is going to be fire.

4. The NBA is back.  Zzzzzzzzzz.  Call me when the playoffs start.

5. The NHL is starting off hot. Scoring is up, there are some amazing things happening on the ice, there's a new(ish) hockey team in Utah. Oh yeah.

We're currently in the best time of the year, a time where football is on TV 7 nights per week. There's not day without a football game until almost Thanksgiving. Yes, some of it is bad, really bad, but it's a needed reprieve from the noise that surrounds the world right now. And, if you don't like the football games, there's basketball and hockey on if you're looking for something to do.

Since I was in Las Vegas and then down with the travel crud there will be no discussion of sports gaming this week. I honestly have not had the energy or time to re-run my numbers but I'm going to get them updated Sunday morning so I should be ready to go next week.

Good luck this week however you choose to play. 

This is no longer a political blog. (Election Day 2024) [Updated, the morning after]

But I will leave you with one, rather important, political reminder as you go out and cast your ballot today.

It matters not they who vote. What matters is they who are counting the votes. 

Remember that as events unfold over the next few days/weeks/months.

In my attempts to be pithy I undersold some pretty important things:

1. The meltdown of the Democratic Party last night and this morning has been a sight to behold. It's almost as if their attempts to hide Biden's declining mental capacity, thwarting the will of their primary voters during the run-up to Harris' "nomination" (coronation) and their terrible campaign strategy had nothing to do with the loss blindsided them.

2. Make no mistake about it, Harris was a terribly flawed candidate. I imagine that, after the emotion is finally spent, Democrats will (in their quiet places) admit to this. That said I doubt they have the self-awareness to really understand the voter's message here.

3. Speaking of self-reflection: Will the pollsters, especially in Texas, take a good, hard look at how they got everything so, so terribly wrong?  Doubtful.

4. More importantly, will the media have the ability to take an honest looked at where they effed all of this up?  Again, doubtful.

5. In an election where one party ran on "we don't like him" it's no surprise that the voters sent mixed-messages. Apparently being told you're awful is a powerful reason to vote against, even IF you agree with many of the proposals.

What a world.

College Football look back Week 7 (And a look ahead to Week 8)

 My apologies for the radio silence last week, life got in the way.

After last week's game of the Century (of the week, again) we get ready for what ESPN is breathlessly calling "Possibly the BEST weekend in College Football HISTORY!!!!")

Meh.

I mean, Georgia v. Texas is probably going to be pretty good, and Alabama v. Tennessee is very promising, in the early window Indiana v. Nebraska has much potential but, after that, there are some good games but not many that I look at as right out bangers.

You do have to understand ESPN's position here however. They're trying their damndest to sell a still skeptical public on the joys of a 12 team playoff. Convincing us at every turn that the expansion of the playoff has not deemphasized the regular season.

Except that it has.

UGA lost to Alabama and yet their still right in it. Even IF they lose to Texas this weekend they're probably not right out of it because (rightly or wrongly) they'll still be viewed as one of the top teams in the Country because of the committee's SEC bias. A two-loss Georgia team is certainly still in the mix,

Who shouldn't be? Probably Alabama. Who, since beating Georgia, has looked bad. LSU who is definitely not great, and Ole Miss, who are overrated and continue to be despite their offense looking terrible over the past few weeks.

My thought was always that the SEC was overrated this year, and the non-conference results proved it. Outside of UGA destroying a not-too-good Clemson team, the SEC's OOC results were sub-par. I'm not saying the teams suck (they don't) but having them dominate the top 10 is a little ridiculous at this point. It's reputational rankings, not results-based rankings and I've a feeling this is exactly how the committee is going to view things when they finally have a say.

Perhaps the best story of the college football season are Army and Navy both sitting undefeated at 6-0. Both have good teams and are not there by means of a fluke. Army has been one of the most watchable teams of the season so-far and Navy looks strong. Notre Dame may want to rethink some of those "traditional rivalry" games that they used to feat on to pad their record.

As I said though, there's a LOT of watchable shit on TV this Saturday. There are some lines I believe are still vulnerable as well.

Utah (-4.5) over TCU - The Horned Frogs have NOT been good this year and, despite Cam Rising being out for the year (Sorry Cam, you deserved better) the Utes play strong defense and I cannot see TCU scoring any at all here.

Iowa (-5) over Michigan State - Michigan State is rebuilding, Iowa suddenly can play offense. I think the Hawkeyes win big here, but I also think that it's time for Kirk Ferentz to go.

South Florida (-13.5) over UAB - The hiring of Trent Dilfer might have been the worst head coaching hire of the off-season. The Blazers deserve better than this mess of a team.

Northern Illinois (-3) over Toledo - Yes, I realize that Northern Illinois has been inconsistent since beating Notre Dame and becoming the G5 Belle of the Ball, but Toledo has looked even worse since their 41-17 shellacking of a pretty putrid Mississippi State team. I liked this much better at -2.5 when I took it, but it still seems OK at -3.

South Carolina (+1.5) over OU - The Gamecocks being underdogs to OU is amazing to me here. I got this line at +3 which seems like a steal right now. The Sooners are reeling, they have almost all of their offensive production on the sideline, and the Gamecocks can play defense. I'm tempted to double down on the ML here to be perfectly honest.

Unlike two weeks ago, which I neglected to write about, I think there will be some upsets this week but it's not going to be the Top 15 blood bath that it was then. I think Michigan is very vulnerable to the Illini and I think Indiana might be in for tougher than they think against Nebraska.  That said, unlike in previous weeks there seem to be competitive games that could warrant watching in every window. It should be a fun game of College Football.

PSA: We're getting very close to the CFB Playoff Committee issuing their first rankings of the season. As a reminder, these rankings are crap, they do nothing but serve to fuel TV talk fodder and are about as useless as PAC-12 officials. Ignore them, and focus on the season, not the fake rankings designed to give First Take some content.

Enjoy the weekend and good luck however you decide to play these games.

College Football Look-Back Week 5 (And a look-ahead to week 6)

Do you remember, way back (OK, around 5-6 weeks ago) at the beginning of the season when I said that all of these early season Top 25 polls are pretty much useless?

Today we give you the 3rd Number 1 team in all the land in three weeks.  Welcome to the Party Alabama. Long may you reign (until the next game of the season, of the month, of the week that is). That said, at this point, I would argue that Alabama does have the best win of the season to date and has been adjusted to number one in my power rankings, but that doesn't mean that any of that matters at this point. What IS going to matter are the CFP Committee rankings, and even then those are worthless until the last poll, which, really, is the only one that matters.

That doesn't mean that the polls are not good for something.

That something being sports talk show fodder and milestones for teams like UNLV which has found itself ranked for the first time in school history. Regardless of my feelings on in-season polling, that's somewhat of a big deal for them. Congratulations Rebels.

I had also stated earlier that I thought Missouri and Ole Miss were two of the most overrated teams in the Country.  I was proven correct on Ole Miss, Missouri is likely to continue to be overrated and will win this week against equally (albeit lower in the rankings) UCF which will drive them even higher.

I'm starting to buy-in to Tennessee, begrudgingly, they still haven't played a top team, but I'm not a believer in Michigan, as that USC win is looking more and more like "meh".

Another area where I think people are getting it wrong is in the Heisman race. To my mind, there are only three players who really should deserve serious discussion right now.  Boise State's Jeanty, Colorado's Hunter & Alabama's Milroe.  I get that the flavor of the year has been Cam Ward so far, but he's not even the best player on his own team, that honor probably goes to Reuben Bain.

We're not going to go a long way towards unwinding this mess this week either. The most telling game might be Mizzou at aTm, Kyle Field is a rough place to play but the Aggies are unranked and have issues trying to rebuild from the Jimbo Fisher error. BYU will get a huge test at home versus Arizona. The Wildcats can be dangerous, although inconsistent on offense with QB Fifita but they have been inconsistent this year on both sides of the ball. Ohio State seems to have a speed advantage over Iowa but the Hawkeyes have actually been.....decent? on offense this year.  I kind of lean over in that one.

From a betting angle I'm really liking UNLv (-6.5) over Syracuse. What the Rebels looked like last week against a solid Fresno State team was impressive.

I'm also a fan of some undogs this week. Some to cover, some to win outright.

Michigan State +24 vs. Oregon. Look, they held in there for a bit at Ohio State and Oregon is NO Ohio State.

Missouri (ML) @ aTm. I've said above, Kyle Field is a tough place to play. I think Mizzou is that much better than Aggie.

North Carolina (ML) @ Pitt  The Tarheels have been one of the most snake-bitten teams in college football this season, and it feels like this on is the one that Mack Brown should hang it up. That said, my numbers have a pretty good lean toward North Carolina and I just feel like the old guy has one more upset left in him.

Army (-11.5) vs. Tulsa. This one is pretty simple. My numbers have Army by 17 here. Army is good, Tulsa is not. Sometimes you just have to trust your numbers and don't overthink it.

West Virginia vs Oklahoma State (u65.5). Neither offense has been even all that good this season and my numbers have this at around 56.5. I just can't see an offensive explosion here.

Florida (ML) vs. UCF.  The Gator faithful are just about to run Billy Napier out of town. UCF came into the season with a lot of buzz but the "quality" wins they have had (Houston, TCU) are feeling less and less quality as the weeks drag on. The Knights loss to Colorado was ugly as they got boat-raced out of the Bounce House (and even let Colorado run the ball successfully, which is almost unpossible if you're a good defensive team. I think Florida's young QB looks better This line opened at -1.5 Gators at home, which I thought was about right. when it switched to UCF -2.5 I jumped on Gators ML.

And finally....

Michigan (ML) vs. Washington. I know, I know, I know. I have a rule against betting on teams I root for.  This one is a pure analytics play. I have Michigan as being much better than Washington. That Michigan is an underdog makes zero sense based on what I'm seeing.  The Wolverines with Orji in at QB have been much better than when he's on the bench.  I had to take a little shot. Since I have broken my unwritten rule though you should probably fade this bet since I'm almost guaranteeing they are going to lose.

The Country the Missus has chosen for our College Football Cooking Spectacular is Germany.  I'm planning on Beer Broiled Brats, a Gluten free Schnitzel and all the gluten free beer and Schnapps she can drink.

Have fund this weekend.  Two, pretty good, small school games tonight and a full 5 games on  Friday.

Thursday:

Texas State @ Troy - 6:00PM CDT (ESPNU)

Sam Houston @ UTEP - 8:00PM CDT (CBS Sports Network)

Friday:

Jacksonville State @ Kennesaw State - 6:00PM CDT (CBS Sports Network)

New Hampshire @ Harvard - 6:00PM CDT (ESPN+ ONLY)

Houston @ TCU - 6:30PM CDT (ESPN)

Michigan State @ Oregon*** 8:00PM CDT (Fox)

Syracuse @ UNLV*** - 8:00PM CDT (FS1)

*** I have action on these games.

News Round-up(10/2/2024)

 Wars and rumors of wars.......

Saying the quiet part out loud. - It's never been about stopping climate change. It's always been about a redistribution of income from wealthy nations to NGOs and other quasi-governmental firms who will then tell the poor what to do.

That's quite the increase. When you  have elected leaders who truly believe that property ownership is theft from the government then you get results such as these.  If you don't already have a plan for an exit strategy out of Harris County you should start planning one.

As a matter of fact, a Texas exit strategy might not be a bad idea. The problem, and their are many, with Texas Democrats right now is that they have been out of power for so long that they are angry, and are going to overreach and are going to make life miserable.  The best thing for Texas right now would be some balance. I do not think we're going to get that, and I think the reversal is going to be stunning. Mostly because of a lack of adults in any room in government.

The biggest news story people are not paying enough attention to. This could be a big deal. In large part because the head of the union appears to be a low-functioning idiot who cannot even remember his 3 main talking points without having people remind him of what they are. I don't begrudge them their pay requests, but fighting against technological upgrades is akin to an old man hollering at the clouds. For this to get resolved the union is going to have to appoint a leader who can speak into a microphone without spitting on the first three rows.

Did you watch the VP debate last night? I did not. Nor did I watch either of the two Presidential debates. Kamala is a tool, Trump is a narcissist. No matter who wins, America loses.

BadScience People can say whatever they want to say when there are no repercussions. 

Will the last business to leave California please turn off the lights? The problem with government by boogeyman is that you, eventually, will run out of boogeymen to blame all of your problems on.  Eventually the people will look to you as the culprit.  Of course, by then they're probably too poor and there are no jobs left to matter anyway.

I really hope that this is the last we hear of Anna Delvey

RIP Dikembe Mutombo One of the great Basketall big men and ambassador's of all time.  And one helluva commercial star.

RIP Pete Rose. One of the most controversial baseball figures of all time. Both one of the greatest hitters and, apparently, one of the worst betters to ever grace the game.  In an age where games are sponsored by FanDuel and DraftKings it's time to relent and put the man in the Hall of Fame. at this point the hypocrisy is through the roof.

And finally...

One of the reason's we continue argue about climate change is that the arguments of the climate warriors are based on lies and logical fallacies. No one involved in carbon capture is suggesting that it is a silver bullet that will 100% solve the problem, yet that is what the climate warriors are attesting. 

In fact, the world HAS made some progress on carbon reduction and, China, India and some other nations notwithstanding, the Western World has taken steps to reduce their carbon omissions. But the climate warriors want stupid goals like "zero carbon now" and "just stop oil" which would plunge the world into economic chaos, kill Billions, and knock us directly back to the dark ages. Perhaps they do want a return to the days with the Catholic Church was the font of all knowledge and truth?  Of course, this time around it would not be the Church, it would be the United Nations.

Think about how scary that thought is.

College Football Week 4 (And a look ahead to Week 5)

Over the last week College Football was less defined by what happened on the field, outside of Michigan's upset of USC it was a fairly benign week, than it was what happened OFF the field.

Realignment: News that 4 schools would be defecting from the Mountain West Conference to head for the PAC was a head-scratcher to some. For one, there's little evidence to suggest that membership in a shrunken, G6 version of the PAC will be any more than even with the MWC. For another, what we're left with now are smaller conferences battling to get to 8. Both the PAC and the MWC now are in desperate need of teams. Both are looking at Texas State, among others. I don't see 8 team conferences being viable for the small schools.  But egos get in the way which is preventing a merger and expansion.  a 16-team Mountain Pacific Conference seems much more viable long-term to me than do two 8-team conferences hoping for table scraps.

NIL: The first issues with the current NIL system reared their ugly heads when UNLV QB Paul Sluka became the first athlete to shut it down for the season, declare his intent to red-shirt and transfer due to not making the type of money he states he was promised. Of course, there are two sides to this story with Sluka claiming he was promised $100,000 while only receiving $3,000 while the University states that after wins over Illinois and Kansas Sluka came to the coaches and demanded more cash.  Since all of this was supposedly a "verbal agreement" it's nothing more than a he said/he said issue now and we'll probably never know the truth. Also, there is a USC Defensive End that's decided to redshirt and transfer as well as the 4th string RB for UNLV. Both of those appear to be related to playing time rather than money however.  Still, until a workable framework is decided upon we might start viewing Week 4 as "shut it down" week as players are only allowed to play in 4 games before losing their opportunity to redshirt.

It's a mess and I'm not sure the NCAA can fix it. My feeling is still that the P4 programs, or the BIG and the SEC are ultimately going to form their own league that closely resembles NFL Lite. This will effectively destroy college football as we know it, but I also predict it will be immensely profitable, and popular.

Looking ahead to week 5 the biggest story might be Hurricane Helene. She's currently barreling toward Florida and could impact the Southeast and Midwest greatly. For everyone in their path, hunker down and good luck.

As for the betting, I've got some plays that I really like but none of those lines are still available, and I don't like where they sit currently so I'm just going to say good luck wherever you are sitting.

College Football Week 3 (And a look-ahead to Week 4)

Well, well, well.

Coach Sark and the Longhorns are the new number one team in all the land while Georgia, who struggled mightily against a live Kentucky underdog, slips to number 2. Tennessee is being overhyped as a strong contender despite not playing much of anyone and Florida State is still struggling and desperately looking for their first win.

Meanwhile, UNLV continues it's improbable winning streak now boasting a win over 2 Big XII teams, with a beatable Syracuse of the ACC still on the horizon and Colorado actually looked competent against the Rams of Colorado State.

On the betting front, I had something happen last week that has not happened in a while. I went 5-0 for the week raising my season bet tally to 12-3. Of course this happens when I abandon the weekly five. Whatever, I'm winning and I'm up 10.4 units so I'm happy.

About the Longhorns. I've said before that top 25 rankings at this point in the season are brunch for the debate shows. That's it, that's all they are.  Sure, some schools can make them into some milestones (for example, UNLV being ranked 25 in the Coaches Poll is the first time the school has been ranked in it's history) but for the most part they're just to allow the screaming heads an opportunity to scream at each other. Is Texas the number 1 team in all the land? Well, we probably still don't know. They have looked the most impressive on a week to week  basis so far, but outside of Michigan (who I still don't think is any good this year) they haven't exactly played a murderer's row of opponents.  Let's let some more games play out before we say that "Texas is back baby". They might be, but we've seen this happen early in the season before only to realize that they're not. I still am keeping the Bulldogs number 1 in my power rankings but Texas is gaining ground.

Looking ahead. If you're going to be partially distracted on Saturday this week seems to be a prime time to do so. There are not any games that I look at which make my teeth sweat with anticipation. That being said sometimes weeks that don't look too strong on paper tend to provide some of the better games of the season. In the early window I think Houston @ Cincinnati has potential, as does Kansas @ West Virginia. The 2nd window feels a little sparse but Utah @ Oklahoma State has some serious potential as a defensive gem and TCU @ SMU could be a rivalry sizzler (see what I did there?)

From a betting perspective I have another five teams that my numbers REALLY like. 

Kansas (+111) to pull the mild ML upset over West Virginia.

Central Michigan (-6.5) to win big over Ball State.

California (+106) to win over poor Florida State

Utah @ Oklahoma State (u51.5) to be a defensive battle (even IF Cam Rising plays)

NC State (+20.5) @ Clemson to keep it close against a Clemson offense that is not good.

As the usual caveat, I took most of these bets on either Sunday or Monday when the lines opened, so you might not be able to get the numbers above if you tried.  But I'm happy with what I have.

Finally, for those of you who don't know, probably because you're not following me on X, Mrs. TPM and I are doing the Great College Football Country Cooking Challenge this year.  The rules are simple: Mrs. TPM picks a country off of the big-assed map that we have on our living room wall.  My job is to create a (gluten-free, because Mrs. TPM is Celiac) menu based on dishes from that country, or inspired by their cuisine. So far, we've done the following:

1. Italy - Italian sausage/pesto flatbreads, charcuterie plate and pasta with marinara sauce.

2. Texas (because it's a country y'all) - Jalapeno poppers, smoked Spare Ribs and BBQ sides.

3. Mexico - Queso Blanco and Chorizo tacos with Mexican rice and beans.

This week she's chosen Cuba.

My menu is going to be gluten-free Cuban sandwiches and Ropa Viejas with rice for dinner. My struggle is, obviously, the Cuban sandwiches because there's really no gluten-free Cuban roll.  So I'm going to have to figure that one out.

Good luck to you this weekend no matter who you root for.

Quick Thoughts (Wednesday, September 18th)

Items that I found interesting, not worthy of a full blog post, but needing more comment then a quick quip on a news round-up.

1. Texas Media is dead. All they're doing now is whistling past the grave yard.

The myth of the media has been well crafted over the years but has never really been what they've puffed themselves up to be. The media has NEVER been honest, objective reporters of the truth as they have romanticized themselves to be. Instead, they've always had an agenda and they've pushed that agenda relentlessly. This is NOT about "Liberal bias". Instead it's about a POV that every media outlet prescribes to and promotes, both progressive and MAGA. American journalism has a long history of making up facts to meet the narrative. From the trumped up "mafia crime wave" back in the 50's to global cooling to the AIDS crisis (Not that AIDS wasn't a crisis for those who had it, but unless you engaged in some specific activities you were relatively safe See Also: MPox or MonkeyPox.) The difference now is that certain media outlets just come out and admit that they have a POV and are actively working to skew their reporting toward it. The Houston Chronicle famously did this with their infamous "pro-rail memo" back in the aughts, while Texas Tribune has been an advocacy group since their inception.  Now Houston Landing has come out and just admitted that they are going to ramp up their advocacy for things they like, rather than just reporting the news as-is.  Sad times indeed.  But it's time to stop buying the "unbiased, crusading media line and view them for what they are: advocacy groups with an agenda to push.  Then, when you consume their product, view it through the proper lens.

2. Harris County is devolving into a festering pit.

From tax increases to increased crime to declining quality of life to sketchy neighborhood safety things are getting pretty shoddy in the Bayou City and surrounding areas. Corruption at all levels of government run rampant, will the last person to be indicted for fraud or corruption please turn out the lights once you leave the office? Now, in an effort to shunt more money to their preferred patrons, local politicians are moving to raise taxes on residents until their eyes bleed.  This money will NOT go to help the public, it will predominantly be redirected to their friends who either donated to their campaigns or to whom they owe various other political favors. The media (see above) will not report on this because, in addition to being pretty much worthless these days, they are also the largest collective of courtiers that you will ever find. What they want, more than doing their jobs, is retaining access to those in power. It all leads to reporting that overlooks the obvious that you see every day. It's going to get way worse before it gets better.

3. Ragweed begone!

I'm not sure about you, but my allergies are severe right now.  Like many, I'm allergic to ragweed and it's really bad in Houston right now.  While we have to thank Mother Nature for Saharan Dust, which has really reduced our tropical activity this year, we can curse her a little for the heat domes that seem to be settling in on us. The old saying was "Houston, it's worth it."  Sadly, increasingly, it's not.

4. Dancing with the Crooks.

It's been around 5-6 years since I last watched an episode of the increasingly inaccurately named television series Dancing with the Stars.  Given the presence of Anna Delvay (the Fake heiress who scammed several people out of Millions of Dollars and who is now on some weird form of "house" arrest after overstaying her Visa) on the show I think it's time that people tune out and let the show out of its misery.  This feels oh so much like a desperate last-gasp of a show that's been running on an Iron Lung for years now. Related: has there ever been a company that's fallen so far, so fast as Disney? From the creators of beloved children's animated movies to the purveyors of some of the worst received content out there, clearly a course correction is desperately needed.  They ruined Marvel, they've all but gutted Star Wars, and pretty much every thing they touch now is doomed to failure.

5. Our long, National nightmare is almost over.

In case you missed it, I'm referring to election season. If, like me, you're tired of having your football games interrupted by Harris/Trump or (more often in Texas) Allred/Cruz ads just keep the faith that the end is nigh. They're awful, there are too many of them, and none of them say anything that is likely to change the minds of one voter. If, at this point in the election cycle, someone presents themselves to your or the media as 'an undecided voter' what they're really saying is either "I'm an idiot" or "I'm in desperate need of attention." Just make it stop already.

News Round-Up (09/17/2024)

Don't mess with Israel Wow.

Their problem seems to be more with them than Texas. The media loves to hold up these situations as there being something wrong with Texas.  No, clearly there is something wrong with Californians.

Nope. This artificial food trend needs to stop.

And when the plume of fire arose before them they all knew it was time to abandon LaPorte to travel to the Holy Land.

Given the growing number of people who believe property is theft. This can only end badly.

Ragweed sucks. If you're not afflicted by it, good on you. I, for one, am miserable.

I'm old enough to remember when the Chron itself gushed about Annise Parker conquering homelessness in Houston. Apparently, not so much. Of course, it was never really eradicated, just moved out of the areas where wealthy, white, liberals lived to live and play.  Our of sight, out of mind one guesses.

The story of PlazAmericas, the former Sharpstown Mall, is a rare, good story in Houston right now. In a city desperately needing something good to point to as everything is turning to shit.

In a city that cannot fund waste collection, is this really a prudent expenditure? And yes, before you say anything, I realize this is TIRZ spending, and not coming from the City Coffers. However, it should also serve as a call to re-examine TIRZ altogether.

The public battle between Hidalgo, Ellis and Garcia is about to get nasty thanks to Barbie Robinson. Rodney Ellis and Lina Hidalgo want Adrian Garcia gone so, so badly.

I had no plans to watch this show. Seems my instincts were right.

Once at the trough, always at the trough.

Could it be....Satan? Or just the horrid people that have a certain lack of moral compass that it takes to survive in American politics today?

The politicization of Science is not a good thing. In fact, it might represent the end of actual science as we know it. It will soon become weaponized.

College Football Week 2 (And a look-ahead to Week 3)

Michigan is in big, big trouble. Texas is most assuredly not. Notre Dame did Notre Dame things, and Georgia still looks like the top team in the Country.

As a matter of fact, ALL of the top teams in the Country owe the Irish one. Already I've heard that Coach Sark and a host of other coaches are holding up the Irish loss, at home, to Northern Illinois, as an example of what could happen to them if they slack off, or take an opponent for granted.

Of the Top 10, the SEC holds six spots, the B1G holds 3 and the ACC holds down one spot. Nothing for the Big XII. 

Given the results of SOME of the inter-conference games, the SEC is probably overrated at this point, but they now have the full power of the ESPN College Football hype-machine behind them so I imagine they stay that way all year long.

I feel some more upset potential this weekend. I like Pitt to pull an upset over West Virginia in the Backyard Brawl, UNLV to take the measure of Kansas. I also like Washington State over Washington, but not enough to pull the ML trigger. I'll take +4.5 and be happy with it.

Arizona State was a -2.5 favorite over Texas State/ I liked that line and took it.  The line has moved to PK and AZ State is -110.  However, you can get them on the ML for better odds than that. I've watched AZ State play in both week 1 & 2. I really like the odds for them so I doubled up.  Last play is Cincinnati at -2.5.  You cannot get that line any longer, it's jumped to -3.5. I do not like the line as it currently stands.

As a quick aside: NFL markets are tough. Last week the both the favorites covering and the O/U came in at 9-7. The NFL is a terribly efficient market and harder than heck to bet into with much of an edge. There's a reason I limit my play to College Football.  Even then it's getting tougher and tougher to find games. Doubly tough when betting into the Top 25.  But there are nuggets to be found. It just takes some deeper diving.

At this point I still think Boise State is the odds-on favorite to finish at the top of the heap for the G5 automatic playoff spot. Yes, UNI has the best win at this point but the Mountain West is a MUCH better conference than the MAC and I still think Boise is the favorite to win that. That said, right now UNI is a deserving top seed.

Week 3 actually promises to be fun. The Apple Cup is being played, as is the Backyard Brawl and the Bayou Bucket. Some fun, regional rivals have fit themselves into the schedule. It's nice to see these schools try and keep the rivalries going. They make College Football better and seem to be the one thing we're in danger of losing with the realignment mess the way it is.

Good luck this week.

News Round-up (09/04/2024)

 The "Football is BACK" edition.......

Do you even BET bro? Some in the media want to paint legalized sports betting as the scourge of the modern age.  The data doesn't reflect that reality (although it does show that there are some groups that probably need to be targeted for help and some better regulation is needed) but that doesn't seem to be stopping them.

Get well soon Mack.

What's bad for the Oil and Gas industry, is awful for Houston. Unfortunately it doesn't seem that the business reporter for Houston's Regional newspaper understands that. 

Of course, it COULD be that he wants to see Houston fall into disrepair.

Harris County Government has become quite the mess. Amazing how far it's fallen in just a few short years.

Maybe they need to raise taxes to pay for their legal bills? In reality, Ellis and Hidalgo (and to a lesser extent Garcia, although he's on the outs now) have been pushing for large tax increases for a while. Hurricane Beryl just gave them an excuse to do so.  If you haven't started planning your exit from Harris County, you might want to start giving it serious consideration.

On September 10th at 8PM I would advise, for your sanity, that you find something else to do besides watch these two low-functioning idiots take the debate stand. You'll thank me for this.

Here's hoping Breaking is a one and done Olympic event.

It's official, everyone has a podcast now. The biggest issue with them, as it became with blogs years ago, is that very, very few of them have anything very interesting to say.

Dancing with the Stars continues to push the boundaries of Celebrity.

A disaster in slow motion. This is insane. Here's hoping they can find a solution, or provide some help, to these poor folks.

The Tesla CyberTruck is a disaster. It's not a truck, it's ugly as sin, and it's clearly unsound. Since only around 3000 have been purchased if you see someone in your city driving one you have just identified your village idiot.

Here's hoping for some semblance of recovery for Rebecca Cheptegei

And finally....

You should really pay no attention to College Football Top 25 polls right now. At best they are guesses, at worst, click-bait and fodder for bad TV & radio sports talk shows. (of which there are many).

Some thoughts after Zero Week and Week One in College Football.

Congratulations y'all.  We made it. College Football is BACK and, despite some old-timers protestations  to the contrary (self-included) it looks like it's all going to be fine.

And, yes, it was hard to find some true gems in what was a weekend full of relative blow-outs, there were some take-aways that I noticed and I'm going to summarize them here:

1. Florida State.

Let's just go ahead and get this one out of the way. There's a lot to unpack with this team. And while most of it centers on the offense, and the poor performances of DJ Uiagalelei, their defense, especially defending the run, is not good. Florida State has holes throughout their roster, most noticeably at QB, where I think we MIGHT just have witnessed the last Collegiate game for DJU, IF this Brock kid is ready that is. My guess would be the Mike Norvell keeps his job even IF the Seminoles continue to flame out.  After all, who could they possibly hire at this point that would be any better?

2. The 12-team playoff

If, by this time, you do not understand how the playoff works then you obviously did not watch College Football at all over the weekend. Seemingly every broadcast (ESPN/FOX/CBS) had an explainer on how a bracket works. It was infuriating, boring and after a while very repetitious. Hopefully that was just a one week thing. 

3. Ranking the Teams.

I'm not a fan of Top 25 rankings this early in the season. In fact, I wish they would just up and do away with them until say, mid-October.  That said, I do think there is some benefit in discussing where teams are in the pecking order, where they could be and possibly putting them in unranked tiers.  Here's my go at it.

Looking Playoff Ready Right Now: Georgia, Alabama, Penn State, Ohio State, Utah, Miami, Texas.

Not looking ready for the playoffs but could get there by the end of the season: Boston College, Michigan, Ole Miss, Oregon, USC, Notre Dame.

Stick a fork in them: Florida State (see above), Texas A&M, West Virginia, LSU, Florida, Clemson

For all of the other teams it's just too early to tell. Certainly there were some good performances but, and especially for the teams above in the "might get there" column many had great performances but it was against inferior competition. Many of those teams did not play their best, but they could improve by the end of the season.

One of those teams, I think, is Michigan.  And yes, I know I'm a fan but I saw enough on defense that I think this team will be OK by the end of the year, once the offense has a chance to gel. Unfortunately, I don't think they're going to be able to fix their issues prior to Texas rolling into the Big House.  As such, I have a large supply of whiskey on-hand for this upcoming Saturday.

4. Betting recap. 

Normally I'm not one to bet the opening weekend. I prefer to see the games, and get some actual, usable data.  I did well fading Colorado, Houston and Florida State. I did not do as well taking some shots at some big underdogs. All in all the opening weekend was a push. I've already loaded up my plays for this upcoming weekend which I'll share later, probably on Friday morning if all goes to plan.

As always, if you DO choose to place wagers on the game do so responsibly. Don't hire a tout service and bet within your means. If it's not fun, stop. If you find yourself chasing losses, stop. Betting is entertainment, treat it as such.  Also please remember that sports betting is illegal in many jurisdictions still. Know your local laws and know your outs for placing legal bets during the season. In many cases that might involve driving across State lines.

5. Final Thoughts.

After Week One it's easy to get irrational. "UNLV to the Playoffs" is one I've seen.  While UNLV looked REALLY good against what many thought would be an improved UH team, I still believe that NEXT year is the one to watch for the Cougars. Willie Fritz seems to have a knack for turning it around then, not in year one.  But UNLV's performance does show that the Odom miracle in the desert is probably more than a one-year fluke flash in the plan. This is a talented team with some depth across the roster. I still think Boise State is the team to beat in the Mountain West, but UNLV is #2 with a bullet.

As for the rest?

Again, Top 25 lists are worthless this time of year. There's a LOT of football still to be played in front of us. Top teams will play top teams and it will all work itself out in the end.  Enjoy the ride.

The Olympics we don't want to see.

Last night, after I finally got home from work after being stuck for an hour behind a wreck on 290 (thanks Houston drivers) I was watching the Olympics when diving came on.

Full disclosure: I'm not much of a fan of diving. It's a judged athletic competition that makes no sense to me how they score it, and it's pretty much a snooze-fest unless a dive goes horribly wrong.  And even then I'm not happy because I don't want to see any athlete hurt.

But I was struck by something one of the announcers said during the lead-up to a dive by eventual gold medalist Quan Hongchan  If you've never seen Quan dive, she is amazing. She's only 17 (she's been competing at the top level since age 13) and she rarely misses. As a matter of fact, the Chinese are so good at diving their only true competition any more are themselves.

But, this comment, by former American Diver Laura Wilkinson I believe (and if I'm wrong I'm sorry, I tuned in with the event already in progress) got me to thinking. Here's what she said:

"Quan was drafted into the Chinese diving academy at a young age. One of the benefits of that is that the State agreed to provide her mother, who was very ill, medical care for life"

The two announcers then went on to gush about how great that was, how nice it must be for her. In fact, her Wikipedia page, clearly written by the Chinese government by the way, talks about how much she "loves diving".

Uh-huh.

Read into this and it becomes a little bit clearer why China is so far ahead of everyone else in diving. 

They're conducting military-style drafts of athletes in certain events and training them up, for life, to do one thing. I'm guessing, at a very young age, means that they are "drafting" these kids into the academies at somewhere between 4-6 years old?

One imagines that life in the academy means LIFE in the academy. You don't see your family, you live on the compound and you train and train and train.  Remember in the Acolyte (Disney's recently released, and fairly awful, Star Wars series) where the Jedi were slammed as monsters for doing that to younglings?

But we glorify it during the Olympics. The Chinese government basically forced a child to dedicate her entire early life to a sport, or face the prospect of her very ill Mom not receiving the medical care that she needs.

In many pools in America, kids under the age of 12 aren't even allowed on the 10m platform for safety concerns. How many young Chinese kids are getting injured (or worse) by being forced up onto those platforms at an early age?  Sadly, we won't know this because China would never let that information out.

Look, it could be none. The Chinese diving academy could be the safest environment possible. I'm not suggesting that it's not. What I am suggesting is that we don't know. Nor do we know much about the Chinese Olympic sports program at all.

We know the Chinese swimmers dope and we know that they are also very good at Table Tennis and Badminton. They seem to be pretty good at shooting BB guns. (what else would you call air pistol and air rifle?) Outside of that however we know very little about how they prep and train their athletes.

I know what you're going to say here. "Those who live in glass houses should not cast stones" and you are right. America has not been a shining example of sport in the past. We have our horrific ladies gymnastics scandal, several Track & Field athletes who have doped, and athletes who have copped, usually after the Olympics, to horrific tales of physical and mental abuse.

The difference is none of this was State sponsored. And in almost every case the bad actors have been caught, and either shamed, stripped of medals or (in some cases) criminally prosecuted. Also, we learned lessons. In ladies gymnastics we certainly learned that importing coaches using training techniques and methods that originated behind the Iron Curtain is not the way to go.

Look, the Chinese government and people seem to be OK with this system. As Americans we probably need to deal with this and let them run their own shop. That doesn't mean that we should not condemn the doping, and it's very fair to ask questions when any Chinese athlete does something that seems too good to be true at this point, but we cannot lecture them on how they run their shop.

What we can do is to ensure that we don't try to run our shop that way, even if it means that in sports such as diving we're just always going to be a few steps behind. The Chinese divers are amazing. And, by all accounts, China is breaking no rules in making them that way. But America needs to look at what we know is happening to make them that way, and decide whether or not we want to play that game.

My thought is a hard no.

I'm already bored (and done) with this election season.

If you spend any time watching the Olympics then you undoubtedly know what America Democratic Presidential candidate Kamala Harris has been told to believe in by her handlers. (read: Barak Obama's people)

Yes, we get it. An America where the working class are suddenly given things that two decades of Democratic rule have taken away from them. a fair shake for the "working man" and....abortion.

It's Hope! It's Love! It's Fairness!  It's leading to endless dreck like this and this.

Please make it stop. At this point, between the hokey media coverage of Harris/Walz and Trump's continuous droning on and on and on and on about well....himself, the campaign has already grown tiresome.

If you've read this blog for any period of time now, you know that I gave up on politics a long time ago. I don't vote, I just don't care. After 23 years of working with governments at all levels at my place of employment I've learned that it doesn't really matter who is in charge, which party gets to claim victory. The graft and political favors just go to different people, but they still go regardless of who is in power.

Whether it's a Democrat or Republican government they're still going to make sure your taxpayer dollars go to their political patrons. The people who supported them and got them into office are going to get PAID, it's just that the names on the checks are different.

And the politicians themselves are going to engorge themselves on the public largesse. Yes, even bastions of the little guy like Bernie Sanders and "The Squad" are getting rich off the public teat. The only good place to be in an authoritarian government is in the Politburo after all.  You (and I) are not there, they are.

While there might be some window dressing around the edges that looks a little different the window of politics for both parties is the same. For Democrats, they want to make sure that the people who have been with them since the days of Al Gore making a movie that contained multiple factual errors get theirs. For the GOP it's their friends in the petrochemical industry.

That energy security probably means a mix of oil, solar, geothermal and nuclear is not the point. You government doesn't give a shit if you freeze in the dark, as long as their political patrons get paid. And the greatest crime against humanity is that our politicians have wasted Trillions of dollars trying to prevent climate change instead of investing Trillions on how to DEAL with it. Leadership?  You wish.

So now we're facing a long, bleak election season with the top of the ticket race being a match-up between Barack Obama's Avatar and.....The Orange One.

The honest truth here is that, no matter who wins, we all lose.

News Round-up (08/06/2024)

 The "Yay!!! I have A/C back" edition.....

I'm still not entirely convinced that AI is going to revolutionize the way we do business, but our politicians are stupid enough that it might impact how we live (or don't live) our lives.

At this point does it really even matter?

*snicker* He's such an angry little man at this point. Here then is a more reasoned take. Probably better to take the latter over the unhinged ranting of the former eh?

Hello Houston. Yes, it's hot Damn hot.  Remember to drink a ton of fluids and stay hydrated.

At what point do we just feel really sorry for Houston's incoming Police Chief? On another note, is there any City Department that did not almost totally implode during the Turner Administration?

Speaking of useless and the Houston Chronicle At what point do we all admit that this Editorial Board has long outlived it's usefulness and should just be shuttered with the headcount and resources redeployed to the newsroom?

RIP to the Bayou Bucket  Sad.  But, this is going to be the norm as College Football continues it's inevitable march to NFL Lite.

The problem when you get partisan political sports writers is ugly, partisan columns such as this This is just a poorly written screed whose main target are the great unwashed. Some nuance is much needed on this topic. Sadly, modern media lacks either the intelligence or the desire to address it in an adult manner.

Probably a case of "Too little, too late" for Centerpoint from a PR perspective (and make no mistake about it, this is a PR move) but at least it's something in terms of grid resiliency. 

Ever seen a self-fulfilling prophecy? It seems no one in America really wants a civil war, except for Hollywood and the media.

I mean, you distribute thousands of contraceptives, then you kick people out for dressing inappropriately?

And finally.....

This is either a big thing, or a tempest in a teapot. Time will tell us which. (And I'll admit to being unsure at this point)

Not a Sport

Well, it's time for the Olympics or, as they like to be called, the Games of the Modern Olympiad (or some fluffed up BS) which means it's time to see medals awarded for Basketball, Rugby, Swimming, Track & Field and a host of other, actual, sports.

It also means that diving, gymnastics and other non-sports get lumped into this mess and get medals.

Wait, what????

But OF COURSE gymnastics is a sport you say.

"No, it's most certainly not." is my reply.

While the athleticism and sheer incredible that we see on TV each night during the diving, gymnastics and other judged events is impressive. (I could not walk down a balance beam without wobbling much less do what those ladies do, and if I tried to perform a vault I would turn my spine to sawdust) that doesn't mean that we're talking about "sports" here.

The fact is, if your primary form of scoring is subjective judging, and not an objective target (a basket, a run, a touchdown, a try, etc.) then you're not a sport. I'm sorry, but it's true. Judged-scoring events are not true sport, because there is no objective form of winning. 

All that being said, we HAVE to call them something right?  With that in mind here is my humble suggestion for categorizing these events in order to lead to a more peaceful, perfect sports universe.

Sport (n). An athletic contest whose primary form of points scoring is an objective target. Examples: American Football, Football, Basketball, Archery, Table Tennis, Badminton, golf, track & field, swimming. etc.

Athletic Competition (n) An athletic contest whose primary form of points scoring is subjective. Examples: Gymnastics, Diving, Ice Skating, Figure Skating, Competitive Dancing. etc.

Competition (n) A non-athletic contest whose primary form of scoring is objective. Examples: Poker, Chess, etc.

Pageant (n) A non-athletic contest whose primary form of scoring is subjective. Examples: Miss America, Dog Shows, etc.

I had to include dog shows and Miss America style pageants because I have actually heard their announcers say "in our sport" without a hint of irony.  There is no "sport" of beauty pageants. I'm sorry folks, there is just not.

All of the above said, I do realize that these categories are imperfect and likely to cause some debate. Look at tennis this morning. Certainly a sport, but it is still judged. And quite often, as was the case with Coco Gauff, those judges frequently get it wrong. Whether out of bias or incompetence or just simple human error, they can eff it up with the best of us. However, their input is usually not enough to turn the tide. The goal in Tennis is to make more shots and win more points, sets etc. than your opponent. if you do this, you win.  Period, end of story. Even in football there is the occasional bad call, and while instant replay has gone a long way to fixing this issue, it's still not perfect.  But in any sport you need rules, and those rules have to be officiated.

In all the main difference between "Sport" and "Athletic Competition" is how points are awarded. Objective is sport, subjective is not.

Last night I was watching the Olympics and I heard in both gymnastics and diving "well, the general public is not going to understand how these scores were awarded". I'm sorry, if you have to say that you're not a sport. EVERYONE knows when a basket is made, when a home run is hit, or when a touchdown, try etc. is scored.

It's no wonder then that subjective judging is among the worst judging in the world. If no one knows how it's calculated, then how can you argue if the judges are right or wrong? In objective sports you pretty much can know what the rules are that the officials are judging on. That's why bad NFL/College football calls are so glaring, it's why people think Gauff got the shaft today. In subjective judging, there's really no way to tell. Much of the judging is based on reputation, what the judges think the athletes can do, not what they actually accomplish.

So, for our sports sanity we need to break these things down into categories. Otherwise we're living in the sports equivalent of anarchy, and no-one, except for the Chinese athletes, wants that.

Throwing The Acolyte into the bin.

In the final scene of The Acolyte the camera focuses on Osha and Qimir/The Stranger standing on a rocky out-cropping looking at a setting Sun. Then, inexplicably, the camera goes close-up on their hands and we witness Qimir gently grab Osha's lightsaber wielding hand in a gentle embrace. Earlier in the series Qimir states that he is "What the Jedi would call a Sith" and that he "Just wants to be free to practice the Force in his manner."

Both scenes are not only wrong, they fly in the face of  almost 50 years of established Sith lore.

This is why I cannot stand The Acolyte, while I think it should be relegated to the dust-bin of Star Wars history never to be mentioned again.

There are other reasons I think the series was bad, the casting of the Jedi as an evil, selfish organization. (Instead of a flawed entity), Ham-fisted cameos that seemed only as vehicles to try and appease fans after shitting on them for eight episodes, clunky dialogue, a horribly paced story, and the creation of no characters that we have any reason to give the smallest of shits about.

In short, the Acolyte was story-telling of the worst kind. Not only was it heavy-handed and flew in the face of the source material, but it really gave you no reason to care. The stakes were non-existent, and it did a disservice to the Star Wars universe as a whole.

Show runner Leslye Headland should not ba allowed to be anywhere near a Star Wars project ever again. She's in the same realm as Rian Johnson.

Heck, even Johnson was somewhat better, at least he was willing to explore the Jedi as a flawed entity, instead of just a force of evil, which is how Headland chose to view them. This incessant desire to blur the line between heroes and villains is a weakness, and it's destroying the Star Wars universe.

That's not to say that heroes have to be flawless, in fact, I think heroes with issues are much better. And I think there is fertile ground to be plowed regarding the mistakes that the Jedi made leading to the rise of the Sith in the Lucas Prequals. I don't, however, think that this means you throw the baby out with the bathwater. Writing heroes in this style takes a maturity and nuance that I don't think Headland and team had. I think this type of story was beyond them.

In the end they gave us a nebulous slog of a story that left us with no players to truly care about, they turned the Star Wars world around where, suddenly, the Sith didn't want to rule the Galaxy, lacked the cruelty that they have had in almost every other Star Wars story, ever, and they reduced the Jedi to a blatant political entity where all of them were jerks, idiots, evil, or just unlikable people. There was not one Jedi in the entire series that was a decent soul.

In the end, I walked away from the series not caring what happened to any of the characters going forward. If they come out with a second series I won't watch.  I simply do not care.

I've never said that about Star Wars before.

And that might be their greatest sin of all.

NERDS!!!!!

 Not exactly the Shot heard 'round the World.

Revisiting the Houston Political Dictionary.

Houston Politicians (n): 

1. People you knew in High School who had no friends.

2. The last people in the world you want to invite to a Dinner party.

So, Lina Hidalgo is marrying a nerd. Whether or not this is the case, and I don't know her Fiancé from Adam so I have no idea, it should not have been something posted by Houston's highest elected official, even in jest. Especially given the frosty relations between Hidalgo and Whitmire to kick things off.

Quips like that are things that bad politicians live for. For Hidalgo, it allows her to, once again, play the victim card and continue her ridiculous narrative running that the system is somehow rigged against her. You know, rigged in that she was able to be elected to Harris County's highest office despite being a political neophyte and a total unknown. Rigged against her in a way that allows her to marry a wealthy attorney. Yup, totally rigged. Oh the humanity of it all.

But politicians of Hidalgo's ilk need that underdog energy to fan the passionate flames of her supporters. It's like Oxygen for their sense of injustice. Without stupidity such as this they have nothing to rally around.

Yes, they could choose to focus on the Texas Supreme Court, who is about to shoot down their Harris First guaranteed income plan, or they could focus on the mean old District Attorney's office, now the Attorney General's office, who have chosen to look into some questionable deals involving contracts related to COVID-19 outreach, but nothing fires up the proletariat like a good old "nerd" kerfuffle.

The media loves it because it allows them to write political pieces at a 3rd grade reading level and basically wake up in the morning and scan their Facebook feeds as research.  Call it HAWK TUAH, journalism if you will.

None of this would be an issue if Hidalgo and Whitmire had played nice in the sandbox from the jump. But since they've had a quiet, not talking to one another, taking juvenile pot-shots during disaster press conferences game of political footsie ongoing since January silly comments like this can be elevated to "cruel" (give me a break) and suddenly become something that's going to survive multiple news cycles.

The proper response to this is to laugh and move on. Refuse to acknowledge the political outrage for outrage' sake politics machine and focus on important matters such as the cost of admission to the Houston Zoo.

An alternate response would be to line them all up in a row. Point and holler: "NERDS!!!!!!!"

Red Rover Red Rover.....

 Let Schlossnagle come over.....

Revisiting the Houston Political Dictionary:

Asphalt. (n): Rectum trouble to an Aggie.

So, 24 hours after having the bats go relatively dead and losing the Men's College World Series to the Tennessee Volunteers......Aggie loses their head coach to. *checks notes*

Oh my goodness the UT-Austin Longhorns.

Just proving that, when it comes to coaching hopes and dreams, nothing beats the dream of having a Brinks truck drive up into your yard and drop a bunch of money.

The isn't the first time coaches have said one thing publicly while negotiating privately behind the scenes. Remember Art Briles' famous "Today I'm happy to be a Cougar" before jetting off to develop a toxic culture at Baylor?

The Cougars have had their share of coaches leave the fan base angry.  Briles, Sumlin, Herman.  All of those coaches improved the Cougar program but, ultimately, left for perceived greener pastures, where all of them fell in spectacular fashion. Hiring a Houston head coach was a trendy thing for Texas major universities for a minute.  Now, not so much.

But coaches leaving has always been the way of the world in College Sports. It's what they do. Especially from the smaller schools. The problem, in the past, was that the players the coaches recruited were stuck, abandoned by those who recruited them and possibly playing in a new system that didn't fit. Now, that's not the case.

In today's college landscape players are free agents. If they don't like their situation, they can bolt. If they think they're not being used correctly, they can bolt. If a school offers them a 7-figure NIL package....they can bolt. If the coach who recruited them leaves......well.

This has made coaches leaving schools an even bigger deal than it used to be. Because now, Aggie baseball is probably going to have to rebuild a program that was on the cusp of a National Championship from scratch.  Surely a lot of plyers who were recruited by Schlossnagle and staff are going to look for other opportunities. The core of this Aggie team is no longer guaranteed to remain intact. This makes hiring a new coach even more difficult as they're going to have to start basically from scratch.

But the news isn't great for Schlossnagle either. I'm sure some of the current Longhorn players are going to look at this news and decide that playing somewhere else is the best idea for them, and Schlossnagle is surely going to want to recruit "his type of player" right?

On that news I would not be so quick to anoint the Longhorns the best team in the SEC just yet. I think the man is a good baseball coach, and I think he might just be able to build a winning team in Austin, but he might also find out that the culture at UT-Austin is much, much different than the culture in College Station.

For one thing, in Austin asphalt is something to be protested, based on the shitty condition of their roads.

News Round-Up: 06/25/2024

 All hail the Saharan Dust Gods.

Wesley Hunt likes his campaign HQ to be swanky. When one is newly elected (finally) to the ruling class it's important to let the commoners know they are being ruled.

So close Aggies. Yet so far away.

Mayor Whitmore continues to expand on his list of targets. Elephants for ALL!!!!

Was there anyone during the Turner Administration that was NOT committing some type of fraud? My Goodness the list is getting long.

No. Just No. It's wrong and I don't care where you are religiously, ideologically etc.

This is also not good. I've no problem with Scriptures being in curriculum, but you also have to include different origin stories. Well educated cannot happen without "well-rounded" education.

A more reasoned take is needed here. The goal should not be to "rein-in" cryptocurrency but, rather, to figure out to embolden the grid to "deal" with cryptocurrency. But that's not the Chron's style.

This has pissed off some. I'm not one of them (I think it's actually damned funny) but, then again, I'm not thin-skinned either. (And trust me, there's plenty of fertile ground to plow regarding how I look. Shit, "nerd" would probably be a compliment to me.}

It says a lot about the incredible incompetency of both major party Presidential candidate that neither of them is very interested in debating the other. We ware governed by idiots and fools.

FREE JULIAN ASSANGE!!!! .... Oh wait. Nevermind.  Anyone else out there need freeing?

Sagging Hooters. Someone had to say it.

Unpopular Opinion Time:  I am actually enjoying The Acolyte The new Dr. Who series? Not so much. (Although the new 4th season of "The Boys" has been much fun.

This place is on my Las Vegas Pizza shops I've not yet tried but want to list.

The last bastion of indoor smoking will be casinos it seems. Your Mileage May Vary on how you view this news.

The ugliest vehicle on the road, and the most useless, sure receives a disproportionate amount of media attention. Usually none of it good. It's a vile, nasty thing.

And finally...

Some memes are neither all that clever or funny.  This is one of those.

It's raining, It's pouring.....

Excerpts from the Original Houston Political Dictionary:

Hurricane (n): 

1. A weather event that triggers an immediate evacuation of the residents of the City of Katy.

2. A rum drink of which it's a better idea to prepare and enjoy in Katy during an actual Hurricane than it is to evacuate the area.

After several, fierce, rain and wind events Houston is finally hunkering down for a good, old-fashioned Tropical Storm.

Well, sort of.  You see, this one is going to miss us to the South by a couple of hundred miles and we're really going to get *checks notes* some rain and probable street/river/bayou flooding. 

Yes, there will be some localized power outages (I guarantee you ours goes out. Our power grid suddenly becoming VERY sketchy since the great derecho of 2024) and some places might see worse rain than others, be careful if you live to the South of Houston, down by the coast, but overall it's expected to be rather mild.

So, of course, it's impossible to find fresh milk in some places (really???? MILK??) people are filling up with gas (a good idea actually) and I'm sure that "I live in Katy, should I evacuate?' has reared it's ugly head up on the various local weather blogs.

It's not dumb to take any potential Houston weather event seriously these days, what with it's creaking infrastructure and will they or won't they electrical grids, you never know when you might need to crank up the old generator, or plan to make arrangements to cook outside for an evening or three.

I have to admit to not getting the 'stock up on milk' thing however. You're buying mass quantities of the one thing that's probably going to spoil in the heat first? I get it, some people have babies and kids that like milk. Understood, but American milk has an incredibly short shelf life. In the past we have purchased the European style, shelf stable milk. It certainly does not taste the greatest, but it lasts forever.

It's also not dumb, if you're able, to give serious thought on whether or not you commute to the office that day. If you can work from home, it could be a good idea to do so. Houston traffic is a mess on the best of days. When some moisture falls from the sky it's an unmitigated disaster. I myself have been watching the forecasts, even though I live in Northwest Houston, which is expected to be relatively spared.

What this should serve as is a reminder that, Hurricane season is here, you decided to live coast-adjacent, and having to soldier through weather events such as this is part of the trade-off. Get your important papers in a waterproof case ready to go, some essentials, and hope for the best. Unless you're down on the coast the worst thing you are probably going to have to deal with is a prolonged power outage. So, stock up on propane and get proficient at cooking outside. Keep your insurance up on your vehicles, and keep a close eye on the weather.

Hurricane season in Houston starts now.  

Abandon Hope, All Ye Who Enter Here.

In the title I'm referring to Houston roads of course. Nowhere else will you find a worse hive of scum and villainy.

The pandemic, and the Government's response to it, fully broke society.

That's it, we're toast. Thank you for playing and please accept your parting gifts as you make your way out.

From road rage to Karen's to porch pirates to pretty much just no one having any respect for their fellow citizens any more. Society is shot.

One of the things that kept society, barely, afloat was the adherence people generally had for the mundane laws. Red lights, rights of way, those types of things. Where is all that now?  Gone. Just this morning, on the commute into work, I watched a truck pull into the empty left turn lane at a red light and just blow straight through the intersection without any regard that a) the other lights were green and b) there were people lined up in both lanes ready to go once our light turned green. He did not even tap his brakes. Blew right through at about 40MPH I'm guessing. (the speed limit on the road in question was 45MPH.)

And you see this more and more. As it stands now, when your light turns green, you have to give it the Houston 5 Second Pause lest you get side-swiped by someone who has suddenly decided that red lights are mere suggestions. When your light turns green, if you just hit the gas pedal and go, buyer beware.

Next to red-light running are the issues of line-cutters.

These people are scum of the Earth and should have reserved for them a special circle in Dante's Inferno. The thing is, they KNOW what they are doing. They drive down in the lane next to the lane that's backed up with their blinker on, telling people that they should just go screw themselves and that their needs outweigh the needs of anyone doing the right thing and getting in line and waiting their turn.

Want to see this in full action? Watch the traffic exiting 59 South onto 610 West. That infamous intersection where TXDOT just spend Eleventy Million dollars to make things WORSE. At some points in the day the line-cutters out-number those waiting in line and the pace is glacially slow. These people in turn cause road rage, too aggressive driving as the poor schmucks who are following the rules try to tailgate one another to prevent them from cutting in front of them (my record is perfect by the way, no one has EVER successfully cut in front of me). Heck, I've even seen Sheriff's drive along, turn their lights on at the last minute, cut in line and then turn their lights back off. When our institutions are not even following the rules.....

Finally you have the Russian Roulette that are the paper tag offenders. Fake registration, no insurance. I think I read somewhere that, should you get in a wreck in Houston, you have a greater than 50% chance of the person you wreck with having no auto insurance. This is why having an uninsured motorist rider on your policy is a must-have, it's also why Houston auto insurance is skyrocketing in price. It's not how you drive, it's how all of the other idiots on the road are driving.

I often have people whom I'm talking to wonder how in the World we got to the position that we're in where all of our elected leaders are trash human beings. I can only assume that there's one answer for this.....

These people that are driving like shit?  They also vote.

News Round-up: 06/04/2024

Some things that peaked my interest today for which I did not think deserved an entire blog post. Not sure how frequently I'll do these. Maybe once per month or so....

Charles Butt decided to stop ice-skating uphill. This made the Chron's Austin reporter very sad.

Regardless of your political like/dislike for Sheila Jackson Lee you should wish this on no one. Here's hoping for a full recovery. Cancer sucks.

Chris Tomlinson hates everything, has no idea how to fix anything. But he will gripe about it without fully disclosing his familial ties to the renewable energy business.

As much as they hate it, the Houston Media NEEDS the oil and gas industry. Houston as a dried-up Southern version of Detroit does not sound all that appealing.

Will the last Sylvester Turner City Employee accused of corruption please close the door on their way out. My Goodness.

Mexico in pending disarray. Too much of a thing is rarely a good thing.

I'm excited for The Acolyte tonight. Although I'm sure many won't be. This doesn't help. We'll see.

Someday this might be a full post. But, for now, I'll just say this: Casino etiquette as a whole has been non-existent since the pandemic. Blackjack has always been bad, it's gotten worse.

The electric promise is short-circuiting The cars are, for the most part, crap, ugly and not near as green as initially marketed.

"Failed Concept" is a perfect descriptor for Virgin Hotel and Casino Miss after miss after miss for this disaster.

A hard foul, some dumb comments, and hot takes. The WNBA never had it so good.

When Chennedy Carter hip checked Caitlyn Clark to the ground you would have thought she mugged the Pope.

Hot takes were everywhere, including Pat McAfee, who did what Pat McAfee does, say something dumb which he would then have to apologize for.

All of this should make the WNBA ecstatic.

As the late, great, promoter P.T. Barnum (allegedly) stated: "There is no such thing as bad publicity." and this new-found attention being paid to women's round ball is only a good thing for them. This kind of anger, and debate, and (let's be honest here) fainting couch drama, is typically reserved for the NFL, or College Football, or the NBA or other sports that, until now, actually mattered to the general populace.

Prior to this the WNBA was a league that, when you saw it mentioned, surprised you that it was still a going concern. "Wait, THEY'RE still around? I admit to not being the biggest of WNBA fans. I pull for the Aces but have only watched a handful of playoff games. I think A'ja Wilson is the hands-down best player in the league, and I think the Aces are still going to win it all, for the third time in a row.

Outside of that? Well, I remember that Lisa Leslie used to be really good and a handful of others, but for a long time I could not have picked any WNBA player out of a lineup. That changed, a little, after the formation of the Aces (I'm a fan of Las Vegas so I'm also a fan of their teams [Except the Raiders]) I started to pay some attention. And the Griner saga was pretty sad/interesting etc. What we did find out during all of that mess was that these players were so low-paid that some had to compete over in Europe in the off-season to make ends meet.

This, of course, drove outrage from those corners of sports and mainstream media who don't quite understand economics, and it led to even more fainting couch OpEd pieces about the terrible unfairness of it all. The problem with all of these pieces was that they ignored the biggest point: It was 100% fair. It was fair because almost no one was watching. The WNBA (I had to go look this up FWIW) at one time had a TV deal on Oprah's little known, and even less watched, network OWN. There were less people tuning in to watch WNBA games than Tuesday evening MAC College football games.

Does this lead to the WNBA trying to do a better job or marketing? Of trying to use social media to improve their brand?

Of course not. It led to several more fainting couch think pieces about how all of us who like sports SHOULD be watching the WNBA lest we find ourselves attending anti-suffrage meetings in the future trying to revert women back to some Butker fantasy state. The problem was not the lack of quality in WNBA play, it was you, you misogynous twit.

But then something happened. The players started getting better. Some real stars started emerging (A'ja, Griner and several others) the quality of play improved and then this rookie class emerged and now here we are. I'm not going to spend any time on this blog speculating whether it was the draft class, or Caitlyn Clark, that is responsible for the sudden boost in interest in WNBA basketball. I will only say this, Clark has certainly been the face of the increased interest but the other players (Brink, Reese, Cardoso etc.) are also playing roles. The quality of basketball talent within the WNBA is higher now than it's ever been, 

As such the quality of play is increased, as has fan interest. The result of this is that media interest and idiocy have increased as well. Anytime the media gets involved, in anything, the hot takes and straight out dumb takes come out of the woodwork as every media personality in the world wants to get up on their platform and remind the world that they, themselves, occupy the moral high ground while everyone else grovels at their feet. This is all done for clicks, views and the hope that people will be either enraged, or overjoyed. You just don't want them to be bored.

That's the lesson that the WNBA needs to take away from all of this. Keep this momentum going. Don't let the fans get bored.

Because if they do, all of this is for nothing.

What to Blog when there's nothing to Blog about?

Twelve years ago I could always find something on which to write a blog post. Back then I was very keyed into politics, especially the local variety, and there seemingly was always something I found interesting.

Fast Forward to today.

Don't give two shits about politics, don't vote, pretty much dislike every politician and political candidate out there, and except for a few close friends, I'm not particularly interested in debating any of the political bloggers still standing. Here's the rub though, there aren't many.  And the ones that are still standing are partisan and boring.

Mind numbingly boring.

Nor do I miss the days when a humorous blog post (usually making fun of a really bad political ad involving a motorcycle or some such) got me labeled as a "thinly veiled misogynist" or *shudder* a Teabagger. Granted, the fist insult probably involved deep research by the poster who had to determine whether they were using the words right (all three of them probably) and the 2nd was just a word thrown around to try and disparage anyone the poor second writer didn't like.  They had no clue what it meant, they just knew their political friends were using it and the Jr. High level humor made them feel wise.

From circular reasoning to begging the question the old political blogoshpere was a minefield of logical fallacies wrapped in a 5th grade writing level package. In short: It was bad. It was a little ironic that I won my one award, but shuttered my blog prior to the Houston Press releasing their issue naming me "Political blogger of the year" or something along those lines. (This was right at the tail end of their "Best of Houston" actually meaning something. In fact, it might have been the end of it meaning something.) [On another note: I miss the old Houston Press]

Political blogging became boring. Politics became boring. The Left disagreed with the Right who disagreed with others on the Right who disagreed with pretty much everyone. When it came down to it though, both sides were the same, it was just different courtiers hanging on to each side, seeking their pile of the public largesse. When it comes right down to it, the only philosophical difference between Team Red and Team Blue is who they want the government to write the checks to.

So, I bugged out, and I never looked back.

At this point you might be thinking "He's saying all of this to announce that he's dipping his toes back into the pool, that he's going to paint himself and some wonderful centrist, smarter than everyone else with a reasoned take on everything that the two parties are lacking."

Nope.

I'm not. For one, I'm not smart enough to try and solve all of the world's problems, shit, I'm not smart enough to solve my neighborhood's problems. Nor am I especially driven to try all that hard. And I'm sure as Hell not interested in talking to politicians again, or talking to political bloggers again for that matter, I'm quite content to leave them to their joyless corner of the World. Have fun kids.

The fact is that I just felt the need to write something today, and I've found that blogs are usually pretty good when there's a little bit of navel gazing going on.  I'm not sure what I'm going to write about on this thing going forward, but it will be something. I've always said that writing like this fills a creative void in my life that my job just cannot (nothing wrong with my job, but the nature of it is not creative).

I've tried to write a book, but I've neither the skill, nor the attention span to keep with it. I think I've written about one tenth of one chapter, then life gets back in the way.

So the accountant in me will continue to work at my job, and earn the money, and the failed, bad, writer in me will continue to pound away on this blog. I might touch on some current events, some sports and sports betty things, and I might just touch on the things I find absurd in this world. Trust me, there are a LOT of those things.

That's the fun stuff that I have been missing from my early days of blogging, just writing about whatever the Hell I want.  I've been meaning to get back to that, so here we go. I cannot promise a post per day or something silly like that, but I should be able to turn out at least one per every week or two. It just depends on what I find that interests me.

Your mileage and entertainment value may vary. At least you'll get out of it what you paid for it.