More mindless rambling!

There's lots of stuff going on, so let's get to it!

It's TAKS week here in Texas. For those of you not from here, the TAKS test (Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills) is the current version of the state-mandated assessment which is SUPPOSED to judge where the kids are in their academic development. "Supposed" is in caps because, contrary to the intended purpose, TAKS is used to guage the job performance of school districts, schools, faculties and administrations more than it is to gauge kids' development. As such, it is a pressure-packed week all around! In a couple of years, TAKS is supposed to be replaced by a subject-by-subject end-of-course test that will test kids on the curriculum they're supposed to get in any given year. It should be better than what we've got now, that's for sure!

Barack Obama says that what his pastor says is reprehensible and that he is not the man he met twenty years ago. Frankly, I have a hard time believing that. I think he's saying the same things now that he said in his well-publicized sermons of several years ago; you know, the things that Obama apparently had no trouble with at the time! Well, he apparently had no trouble with them; he stayed at that church, after all. I mean, I've left churches for a variety of reasons. One I left because I had a philosophical difference with the pastor. He wanted me to teach a Sunday school class that defies scripture. I told him I wouldn't do it. He started making things uncomfortable for me and my family, so I left. I left another church when the "numbers game" became paramount, moreso than the preaching of the Word. So, I have a little experience with leaving churches for different reasons. It would have been real easy for Obama to leave his church, too. You just stop going! When the question arises, you say, "You know, the pastor there is a little misguided in my opinion and he was making a variety of claims from the pulpit that I just didn't agree with, so I stopped going there." Instead, we got a laundry list of excuses. Here's the dirty little secret in my opinion. Obama is just like any other ethnic group, whites included. When racial hatred exists in someone's mind and they find themselves in a mono-racial group, that hatred will find voice. To disagree with the stance is to take a stand against one's own race, or at least that's how it will be percieved by the haters. So, what you do is simple! You don't associate with that group of people if they express thoughts and feelings that you find "reprehensible." Obama didn't do that, which means that, tacitly if nothing else, he agrees with the sentiment. That, my friends, is truly despicable!

Houston is perhaps the worst sports town in the world. It's a shame, too, because we have world-class facilities for all three major sports (a fourth if we ever get hockey) and they're trying to build a new soccer stadium downtown for the Dynamo. (I know....the WHO??? That's our MLS champion soccer team. I've heard they're pretty good, if you're into soccer). Anyway, we have stuff going on here that wouldn't be heard ANYWHERE else, and it's just because we have uneducated, "seat-of-the-pants" type fans who only exemplify what a fan is when the team is winning. THAT doesn't happen very often around here! The Rockets are in the play-offs, but all we here about is how Tracy McGrady melts in the 4th-quarter. Uhhh....he's one assist from a triple-double and because he doesn't score another twenty in the 4th, he's garbage. He's probably EXHAUSTED!!! He hasn't had a break the whole game! Roll off, H-town! Drayton McClown (McClain, actually) is the penny-pinching owner of the Astros. Whenever he gets someone with a future, he runs them out of town. He hires rubes to manage his club because anyone truly qualified would cost him a few extra nickles, so they consistently lose. A few years ago, they got hometown discounts from both Roger "the steroid taking philandering (allegedly)" Clemens and Andy "I only did it twice...errr...make that five times" Petit, and they STILL couldn't win a game. Even the Pirates have a few world championships and they haven't had a winning season since Dimagio's streak. But we're not talking about the teams; we're talking about the fans, primarily. Houston fans pay big to go to a game, then show up an hour late. They stay for an hour; maybe an hour and a half, then they leave. It matters not whether the game is still going on; they weren't there for the game anyway! They wanted to get out with some friends and what better way to do it than pay $18 for parking, $200 for tickets, $10 for a really bad hot dog, and $8 for a drink! Visiting players remark about how quiet Houston stadiums are. It's not because the fans are polite, it's because they're not paying attention! I'd like to comment on Texans games, but I can't - I've never been to one! I have been to professional football in Houston, though. I've seen the Browns play the Oilers twice in the Astrodome. It wasn't much different than an Astros game or a Rockets game. There were more Browns fans there than Oilers fans and the stadium was only half-full to begin with! I have a feeling that the Texans games are much the same. They say they're sold out every week, but when you watch it on television, there are large chunks of empty seats visible! I think the seats are sold to corporations who just don't use them every week. Why they don't put them on StubHub and auction them off to people who'd use them, I don't know. Frankly, I have no proof that that's what's going on in any case, but that's my suspicion. If you want to follow a Houston sports team with a rabid fan base, follow the Dynamo. The games are always sold out, the crowds are boisterous, and the team is good (from what I hear). You won't be able to understand anything anyone says, but you should be able to decipher "G-O-A-L !!!!!" when the announcer hollers it (of course, it IS soccer, which means they only score about once a month!). Pitiful!

MDB is leaving me! Oh....not for good, just for a business trip! I'm going to miss her! It'll be the first time we've been apart for any time at all since we got married. She's going to a "diversity" seminar. I guess it's one of those things that everyone has to do every so often. We used to have to do "sexual harrassment" training every so often at my last job. I guess it was because no one knew how to do it; they had to teach us! Anyway, it's another CYA I'm sure, much like this TAKS test we've been doing.

Well....that's enough for now! - Dan