Regional Bias

20 Apr

the guy who inspired me to increase my vertical

the guy who inspired me to increase my vertical

I’m ashamed to admit that I bought into the stereotype about Okies being slack jawed locals who were intellectually inferior to Texans.

It wasn’t until I was about 23 when I started questioning this belief that many of us Texans held based on growing up on our side of the Red River.

There was a big game against the Sooners at the “drum” and we hadn’t beaten OU in like eight games. It was a big game, T.J. Ford’s last season with the runnin’ horns.

And it was an exciting game coming down to the last few possessions.

The last time that OU had come to town Brandon Mouton hit a buzzer beating three( happended to be in the corner where I was working courtside security) to send it into OT (and the crowd into a frenzy). It ended up being anti-climatic though and the Sooners won by like 8 or something that game.

But this was different. Texas had yet to beat a top 10 team in a while and OU was definitely among the elite with

Hollis Price running the point, he was tall, quick and smooth, and a pleasure to watch him and Ford go at it. Even Dick Vitale was at the game.

The horns won and the fans stormed the court. Before the game our bosses instructed us to hold the kids off if they tried to take the court. Bad idea.

I had to be taken to the hospital with a concussion. The doctor was asking me questions about what I remembered from the day.

Wide eyed  with what I’m sure was a glazed over look, I replied “I remember……………. Hollis Price.”

Anyways I digress, before the game I was walkign around and talking to fans from both sides, and it struck me how ridiculously cocky the UT fans were (especially for not having won a big game yet).

The Sooners fans were okay, but all I kept asking myself was what made UT so much better than OU.

Granted I hadn’t been to Oklahoma yet and soon enough I’d find out what it meant when fans would rationlize a loss by saying, ” Well who cares, at least we live here and don’t have to go home to Norman.”

I’d forgotten how much i liked Oklahoma State’s baseball team as a kid, watching the College World Series every year and seeing them play.

Ventura, Incavaliaga, Monty Farris……

I had no idea then that I’d begin my fourth decade working alongside one of its finest basketball players at a youth shelter in Tulsa.

Despite my departure from the Lone Star State my love for it grows and grows, and although i doubt I’ll ever move back, it will always be special to me. Too many bad asses have come out of this place to ignore the rugged individuality one must possess to be successful there.

It’s actually that sense of confidence that people mistake as arrogant.

Which prompted a series of T-shirt ideas for me based on regional differences.

“He’s not an arrogant prick, he’s just from Texas.”

“She’s not a stuck up bitch she’s just from California.”

“He’s not an asshole he’s just from New York.”

“She ain’t fat she’s just from Wisconsin.”

I think it’s lead to more understanding among the states.

That being said, perhaps we are a bit too “cocky’ being Texans, but i won’t apologize for it. I was born this way, and I think it beats the attitude of many an Okie here, who have this real sense of defeat that follows them around.

In my opnion that is what the typical Okie lacks is a true sense of swagger.

Although they are very down to earth here. Okies make texans seem like Californians in a lotta ways.

Texans are known for being friendly, but we’re also aggressive and mean, and I honeslty believe Okies are a great deal more hospitable.

And although the women in Texas are better looking, I’ll take the Okie women over them any day of the week. Much more down to earth and actually a little crazier (some ways good, in some ways bad).

If things work out to where I stay through Decemeber as I plan, then I’m going to a Jayhwaks game in Lawrence.  I feel like this is a must do before i leave the region.

Also, I’m done with professional sports. Not the games themselves, I’ll watch all day, the games themselves are great (except for baseball that shit is boring to me these days much more fun to play for sure.)

I just can’t deal with all the timeouts, the big sponsored, fand friendly events, the dot races, the promotional stunts, the dancers, the silly ass jumbotron and loud bombastic music. Too much, remember when the game was enough?

That’s why i prefer attending college games because people actually care who wins. the music isn’t piped in, it’s played by the school band, and the energy is much more intense. i feel like a game at the Phog Allen will be an experience that can only be matched by the Perfect game I saw in Atlanta, my first A’s- Giants game in SF, the first time I went to Wrigley Field, or getting my head almost knocked off when I was trampled by the UT fans back in 2003.

When they screamed “OU sucks!!!!” they meant it, and you could feel it reverberating in the stands.

And you know what? I finally did go to Norman, and they were right, OU does suck.  Ask anybody from Stillwater and they will tell you.

Go Pokes.

PSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYCHCCCCCCCHHHHHHEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Longhorns National Football Champions of  ’09.

(barring major injury of course)

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Paw Paw

16 Apr

What concerns me most about my Grandpa’s passing is how many people have compared us over the years.

My PaPa was a crusty old man with a few strands of hair who was missing most of his choppers, although he didn’t have drool and spittle on the corners of his mouth like some old people do.

He was a peripheral figure in my life. I barely knew him, he didn’t start speaking to me until I was about 18 and had bought my first car, a blue ’87 Toyota Celica.

He owned an auto shop so he was my mechanic.

I guess by most standards he was a good man. He didn’t drink, nor smoke or do drugs. He went to church.

He even served in the navy and fought in the war.

He’d come home from his shop reeking of motor oil and eat liver, or fish, or chicken, or whatevre my Granny had cooked for the evening.

Then he’d stretch out on the couch, his unclipped toe nails protruding out of his smelly black socks and fall asleep on the couch, until my Granny woke him up for bed. For years on end, the couch would hold the pungent stench of his auto shup within its cushions.

My granny had told me once that she’d have to continually chide him for the holes in his underware.

When she passed away in ’03, a relative asked that night at his house if he could have the radio that was in one of the back rooms, stating that our grandmother said he could have it.

” Well I tell you what.” My grandpa said. “Why don’t you go back there and ask her again.”

We all cracked up for some reason he was surprisingly funny sometimes.

he wasn’t the type to tend a graden, or take the grandkids fishing, and whe he retired, he spent his days in front of the televison reading the newspaper.

I’td be another five years before i’d have to make that drive to Dallas, Texas to send the old man out in style.

He’d buried his wife, two sisters, a brother and all but two of his eight offspring.

If there is a heaven and he’s up there to rejoin my granny, I hope she gives him hell this time. she made it too easy for him on Earth waiting on him hand and foot.

I thought for sure he’d be next  in line when she booked the great gig in the sky.

I had to give it to the old kook. He was tougher than I thought. I didn’t think he’d make it as long as he did.

Check

10 Apr

Well,

 

Another goal has just been met. Finished school this past week. feel great. I’m the first McFail to get a college degree.

It feels a bit anti- climatic having taken 12 years to get it done after various breaks, but it feels good.

 

The monkey is certainly off my back, for now.

 

I see myself moving to Oregon in a few months, working in advertising, writing a weekly column, and starting a country/folk band.

I think it’ll be really fun to let it all hang out for a bit.

Then possibly move to Eugene to study history, and film as a grad student..perhaps they’d let me work on my second novel as a dissertation?????

As for writing, well I’m working on a new project, titled Good People, Bad habits. There are bout fifty poems in it and I plan to have it ready for print by the middle of summer.

other than that, just working on booking some gigs, and doing a bit of traveling this summer.

East coast scheming, west coast dreaming, it’ll be a good time. A great summer. So what now? Well,  work, video games, and  gearing up for the summer activities.

And lots of Blazers basketball hopefully.

 

Playoffs?????? Playoffs!!!!!!??????

Okie in Texans clothing

5 Apr

Will the play of this 22 year old kid affect the next five years of my life?

Will the play of this 22 year old kid affect the next five years of my life?

My lady-friend and I went to visit OKC for a museum exhibit and the Thunder vs. Blazers game.

I had jokingly said that if the THunder won I’d stay in Oklahoma and if Portland came out ahead then I’d move back to PDX.

As the ass whupping mounted and the Thunder continued to get pummeled

I started wondering if a move to Portland should really take place.

The Blazers will be good for at least six more years, they have a really nice young nucleus and are a big time defender/three point shooter/rebounder/slasher away from being extremely dangerous.

I’m no sure who’d fit but they look good. I wouldn’t even be surprised if they made the conference finals and took two games from the Lakers.

The Thunder should look to emulate the Blazers success. Good draft picks and savvy personnel decisions are what put Portland in the position they are in now.

The Thunder get two first round picks this year, and if the picks aren’t Ricky Rubio or Blake Griffith I say trade them for rebounding and point guard help.

You have to get Durant some help out there. Westbrook is nice but he’s a two guard, and besides Green they have a lot of scrubs on that squad. I’ve even suggested trying to trade for T.J. Ford or someone like that……

I think if they can keep Durant happy, then the city of OKC will have a happy future ahead of itself.

In five years, they can have a playoff contender team, possibly a Whole Foods store in its city, and more revenue to attract business and people.

I wouldn’t be surprised if five years from now it was a really hip, trendy place to live.

There is a good community of good local artists around mid-town area, and it has a down home vibe to it that is quite similar to Austin’s vibe (especially before all the Californians moved there).

I like Oklahoma City and could see myself buying a house there in a few years, the cost of living is relatively low, and it’s close enough to Texas to see my family.

Lots of people don’t know that for a while when I was a kid, I wanted to play baseball at Oklahoma State. (This was before I got into drugs….and women)

Now you’ll find a plethora of squares anywhere, but something I realized after coming back from OKC was how different the vibes are between Tulsa and the capital.

There is a lot more going on in the “city” of course, and getting a basketball team has certainly helped. But it’s a little more folksy, down home and laid back out there than here in T-Town.

It can definitely be squaresville up here. Don’t get me wrong it’s a pretty town with really nicely designed houses, and the people who are cool here are pretty fucking solid.

But there are lots of folks here putting on airs, obsessed with prestige and image, my co-worker Otis calls them $40,000 dollar millionaires.

There is a lot of poverty in OKC but it is what it is. I can really dig on that.

So maybe in five years (depending on whether Durant stays or goes) you’ll find me in Oklahoma City going to 89ers games, and hanging out on my porch drinking tap water (filtered of course Oklahoma water is pretty gross) and listening to tunes in the afternoon sun……..

in other news, working on a second volume of poems that I hope to have ready for print by the end of the summer, the working title is “Good people, Bad habits.” There are about fifty poems that will be in this volume….already excited about what it will look like.

I’ve got gigs in May. Both stand up and poetry reading. Wichita Kansas, check out Myspace.com/bobbymickey for the dates and listings.

Still working on getting stuff in Ithaca and Brooklyn, New York, as well as Toronto for my east coast trip in June/July.

 

This fall I think i’m gonna take a trip to California and visit old Gary Snyder UC-Davis…..plan to spend a week in the bay, doing some open mics, showcases, and hopefully some good hiking….as for Portland well…..the winds just might take me there by the mid fall……..more to come on that later….and Austin, Texas…haven’t forgotten about you…..maybe in August we can have a little time together…..

 

BM

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H.N.I.C.

24 Mar

Shit man you got it!!!!

Shit man you got it!!!!

You would think that I’d feel a little more at ease now that there’s one of us in the White House.

In fact it’s the opposite, I get these paranoid thoughts that I’m gonna get attacked out of retaliation for Barack winning the election.

It’d be like when I used to get persecuted because I was from Texas and Bush used to be the governor, except I could at least pass as a dude from another state, the best I can say to my attackers is “Hey I didn’t vote this year!!! I forgot to get an absentee ballot!!!!”

This is a far cry from the initial elation of having a brutha in the office. Right after he won, I envisioned myself walking down the street and seeing every black person smiling and giving each other high fives and thumbs up for the next eight years. It’d be black history month every day.

White people could finally say “Hey cut me a break, I voted for Barack.” if they were ever accused of racism

(of course how could you not jump on the bandwagon, he was the sexy, pick. It was trendy. Some didn’t want to be accused of racist, some probably pretended to vote his way but went with McCain at the buzzer. But come on it couldn’t have been that hard dude’s rock star–he just ran the best campaign in presidential history–no one would be surprisd at all if he was on the next Kanye album).

Everybody’s a winner right?

can you imagine back in the early 1800’s. A slave master calls one of his workers in to talk with him.

“Now Jasper what’s this I hear about having these visions of a Negro presidnt?”

“Yessss suh, I had a dream last night that a black man lived in the white house and he wasn’t cleaning the beds or fixin’ supper neitha. He was giving speeches and barkin’ out orders.”

(Slave Master laughs) “I didn’t even know you knew there was a president. Black President man you darkies can’t even vote. Next thang you gon’ be tellin me is that you boys is gon haff yo own schools, and businesses, and clothing lines.

Now you may have predicted that my third baby would have a cleft palatte, and you may have predicted that crop freeze last fall, but I’m a haff to put my foot down on this one. You gotta better chance of us puttin a man on tha goddamn moon than to have one of you darkies as President of the United States.”

And the fucked up thing is that they’d both be right.

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Broke Ass, Black Ass Mufucka

23 Mar

ANYTHING IS POSSIBLE!!!!!!!

ANYTHING IS POSSIBLE!!!!!!!

Sometimes I feel like I’m on a Japanese game show, where every cent I spend and earn is on a television monitor for the all of tv land to see.

“Spill half the macaroni because you didn’t invest in a pasta strainer” ~minus 15 points.

“Find a quarter in the urinal.” ~plus 5 points

“get your girlfriend knocked up because you were too cheap to buy rubbers” ~lose a turn and 500 dollars (250 if your girl goes half)

Every month when my old lady gets her period is like getting an extra life in Mario Bros.

This is the part of the game where I spin the wheel of fortune, but I have the chance of spinning the wheel and landing on a space with a pacifier and baby stroller instead of bankruptcy.

“No baby, No baby, no baby no baaaaaaaaabbbbbbbeeeeeeeeyyyyyyyyy!!!!”

Women get baby showers, I feel like men should get their own celebration when they don’t have a baby.

Once a month, call their buddies up, who come over with bottles of champagne and six packs. They cover the apartment with plastic so the electronics don’t get ruined, then start celebrating like they won the NBA Finals.

I’ve watched tons of Super Bowl and World Series celebrations and thought with envy, man I’ve love to be able to do that. Well I didn’t make it to the professional level as an athlete and there aren’t many occasions that would justifty such a homo-erotic celebratory event, so this may be the closest thing to it.

“I’d like to thank God for making my sex drive so strong and my sperm so weak. I’d like to thank Todd, my pot dealer for keeping me nice and sterile, keeping me outta shape. It was a team effort. And most of all, Thank you JEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEZZZZZZZZZZZUSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!”

“That’s all from the winners, let’s go over to Brent in the loser’s locker room.”

Horns Down

23 Mar

They just didn’t want it. What a game, how can you come from ten down only to lose at the end? To Duke? Messing up

my brackets (sort of–I picked 12/16 for my sweet sixteen and my final four teams are still alive)

But you mean to tell me that you have two time outs with the ball and 30 seconds left, you can’t call a time out?

You can’t draw up a play for AJ Abrams? You can’t pound it inside where you’ve been killing them?

Duke is well coached and they got decent players but I had Texas beating ’em…….it hurts Billy it hurts.

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Credit

22 Mar

I get constantly harassed by creditors, calling my phone four or five times a day. Finally I answered “Look, leave me the fuck alone. Quit harassing me motherfucker!!!!!”

They said, “Look  Mr. Mickey, we wouldn’t have to harass you if you paid up. Wouldn’t you harass someone if they owed you 3,000 dollars?”

“Why no. No I wouldn’t because I wouldn’t lend a total stranger 3,000 dollars without at least meeting them first. Now good day to you.”

Jeopardy

22 Mar

Answer: Alcohol Poisoning at a keg party, eaten by Grizzlies, Stingray bites, skydiving accidents.

“I’ll take ways that black people don’t die for 500 Alex.”

imagine a society

22 Mar

Where men are so comfortable with their sexuality, that instead of shaking hands, they shake each other’s penises like a handshake.

” Good to see you Harold.”

“How’s it going Donny?” They give each other’s penis a firm tug.

Imagine a fiery guy from Houston, ” Hey there you son of a bitch how you doing!!!!!????” 7 or eight hard, eager yanks later.

” Whoa now Bob. Calm down you’re stretching it out, you shake it more than three times you’re playing with it. I like whip cream in my ass and someone rubbing my  back while I’m getting jerked off!!!!!”

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