Everything is Bigger in Texas…Including the Loud Talkers
Tuesday, November 3rd, 2009 |My wife and I are finally back in the states, and since she didn’t get to see her family before we left for Italy, we’re now on a week and a half family tour, including trips to Texas, Virginia and North Carolina, before heading back to Chicago and leaving for Taiwan, our next assignment. I’ve never been to
Texas before, but since my sister and brother in-law and two year old nephew live just outside Dallas/Fort Worth then we had to fly down and see them. It’s been well over a year since we’ve seen our nephew and as you might have guessed he was a bit unsure of who we were. But, the trip was great and we made a connection with our nephew and he now refers to us as something that vaguely resembles our name.
I noticed on the news that Colorado was getting pounded with snow last week and I thought it was great, but then again, I didn’t have to drive in it. I did notice that the university was closed on Thursday and I thought how great it must be to have a snow day. Since I’m doing my classes online the poor weather doesn’t provide a good enough excuse to have a day off. Although, I’ve been getting my work done, I do have to say I have a class this semester that is being administered very poorly by the professor. For the third time this semester he has not published the work for us to do. The readings are published but he fails to open the classwork links and the entire class sends e-mails wondering when we’ll be able to access it. Of course, as uninvolved as he is, he doesn’t respond until Friday where he tells us that he’ll give us another week to complete the work, while he reduces the amount of work for future weeks. Sure that’s all great and all, but I still don’t want to have to do more work than usual on any given week, especially since I’m traveling and have a research paper to do. But, enough about my slack professor and on to my Texas trip.
All in all, Texas, from what I got to see, was really cool. I got to visit the 
place in Dallas where President Kennedy was assassinated and I got to visit the historic stockyards in Fort Worth, where I got to ride a longhorn. We took the nephew trick-or-treating and watched the Texas OSU game on TV. My brother-in-law is an alum of Texas so we were decked out in the burnt orange while our nephew yelled “hook-em.” As you know, everything in Texas is big, including the BBQ ribs we had…awesome, but apparently there are an astounding number of loud-talkers here, and I know you guys know what a loud-talker is. They’re those people who get on a cell phone, or start a conversation with their neighbor, and you can hear their entire conversation from across a large room. Apparently in Texas, you find loud talkers that are so loud you can hear them from across the new Dallas Cowboys arena. I heard an entire conversation from some guy, more than 25ft away with a football game on TV, about his ailing parents and how to trick them into taking walks; it involved a “boom-box” (FYI, the 1980’s called and they want their lingo back), and some inappropriate information on geriatric digestion. WOW…I don’t know why people talk this loud, maybe they think people give a sh!t, but trust me…I don’t, and when it comes to the digestion patterns of someone else’s parents, I don’t think many other people care as well. Be warned Loud-Talkers, and you know who you are…just STOP IT, NOBODY CARES!
So, here I am, again, about 35,000ft above Mississippi, heading to NC to visit some friends and family. Before we head to VA we plan on stopping in Raleigh, NC, our old home, and visiting some friends at our old favorite bar,
The Goat Bar. It’s by far the coolest bar in NC and on Sunday evening’s they have “mystery beer” night, where they reach in a huge tub and pull out several leftover and mix-n-matched beers for only a buck. It sure beats the $5 bottles in Chicago. Rest-assured, I’ll have to post this on Mon, so I can place a pic or two of us at “The Goat” and I’ll definitely have a mystery beer…or five, for you guys….Cheers!
