Tuesday, January 22, 2008




I think I have been to Texas once. I think it was around thanksgiving and I think I was in El Paso, but I cannot say that with any certainty. I do remember not liking neither Texas, nor the drive it took to get there. From that day forward my prejudice towards Texas has grown, albeit at a slow rate. Something about having so much pride in a state unnerves me. Maybe it’s because I grew up in Oregon, where we are happy to be left alone in the rain. Maybe it’s because I grew up in Arizona, where we are happy to borrow Kokopellis and call it culture. Maybe I don’t like Texas because when Texans travel they travel in packs, like locusts. They swarm and consume everything that is beautiful leaving you asking how this could have happened.

Case in point: Last night at the bar the Texans were in full force. Don’t ask me how all of them knew one another, but they did. Don’t wonder why they all wear cowboy hats. Definitely don’t ask me why they need to wear designer cowboy boots when the roads are full of ice. DO ask me why one Texan figures it would be a good idea to bring his acoustic guitar into a bar featuring live, paid-for, music and host a sing along.

Everyone knows that guy that has to bring out his acoustic guitar during a party and start plucking some strings (usually detuned E’s and F’s because they are different and sound “pretty”), but this guy took it to a new extreme. Personally, I blame his friends who have not shamed him enough by now. Due to their lack of action, this guitar-touting, toilet of a person now has the confidence to carry his guitar and setup shop wherever he pleases. I also blame women, who swoon over the simplest of cords and the twangiest of voices because some guy can do something foolish and show his sensitive side. The ultimate irony is a rough and tough cowboy who wears his heart on his sleeve right? His one saving grace was that I did not hear him play a rendition of a pro-Iraq war melody, but I assume he is working on one.

I wouldn’t take issue with the guy if he played music for music’s sake, but he doesn’t. He uses his guitar like a phallace with strings and bastardizes the instrument. It’s like date rape without the drug.


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