2june08

Dear people with more money than me, It has recently come to my attention that I am pretty broke, and you know what, it isn’t as fun as my black friends act like. I’ve had to cancel my Showtime package, which leaves me with only HBO and Encore. I must now also limit myself to 1 crack rock and/or back-alley BJ per day. If this piece of

crap rag doesn’t start bringing in some kind of bank then I’ll have to take away my kids cell phones, and if the hard times keep coming, then I’ll just have to get rid of the kids altogether…then who am I gonna get to write this magazine. On a serious note, go and see the Beards at the House of Rock on Wednesday nights (see ad inside). These guys are doing something that nobody else in CC is doing, and they do it well. Also, f*** Time Warner Cable, as well as new managment at the Martini Bar (for now).Love, The Ed

Dear Ed, What’s with the late issue man, I have been sitting at Dentoni’s Pizza for three days waiting for the new Vent. I need my fix. You must be a bunch of alcoholic Indians on CPT to be running this late. Yeah, I said it.Love,Local Racist

Dear Ed, I am so glad that the media finally stopped makin’ so much stinkin’ fuss about my stinkin’ pictures. Sweet nib-lets! Can’t a 15 year old do an artistic photoshoot with her father and not be judged? I don’t think there is anything wrong with it. It reminded me of grow-ing up at home in Tennessee. Those cold nights when my dad and I would sit in front of the bonfire out back and cuddle then we would stare intensely into eachother’s eyes as I ran my fin-gers through the long part of his mul-let and he would tell me how much he loves me. It even reminds me of those

times when we would go muddin’ out in our four wheelers and get all dirty and had to go home and take baths together outside with the water house. Nobody could soap me up the way daddy could. I can’t believe that somebody would take somethin’ so stinkin’ innocent and make it something it’s not. Build a stinkin’ bridge and get over it. My dad said that all daddies have their special little girl and those little girls get to do things that the other little girls don’t, like make their daddies famous again. We are just like everyone else. Daddy’s Special Little Girl,Miley Cyrus

Dear Ed, I don’t know if you are aware, but the font sizes in your magazine are not consistent. One piece will have a 10-point font and on the very same page you’ll have another story in a 12-point font. You guys must be f***ing retard-ed. Next thing you know, you’ll be left aligning everything. I’m not even go-ing to get started on the atrocious gram-mar, my head would f***ing explode. Please lay off the crack pipe and get your sh*t together.

JulieCaller Times

Dear Ed, Zzomgz! I just wanted to thank u guise for supporting our scene. Alot of peo-ple, like, just don’t get us. They are all such conformists. The emo scene is so not about conforming. I mean how can like the thousands of kids that call them self emos be wrong? It’s impossible. So anyway, alot of people just don’t like us and wut we stand for. It makes me want to sit in the corner and sad jerk to My Chemical Romance in the dark. Some-times I feel like a lonely pebble rolling along the road as it gets run over by a car that continuously reverse just to run over that one pebble because the driver had a “bad day at the office” and can’t spend time with his own son so he tries to crush it so that it becomes a small pile of nothing just so he can feel bet-ter about himself. DON’T YOU GET IT DAD?! Just becuase I can’t fit into your FREAKIN’ gravel like the other pebbles doesn’t mean I’m not still a rock! Some-times I wish you would just hold me and tell me I am special. Why can’t you just be there? Sorry...umm.. so yeah, Thanks Vent! <333 Kthanx,So Cold in the Dark Dismal Light of the Razorblade’s Promising Kiss of Ending’s Arrival xx

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Letters to The Ed xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

A Letter From The Ed xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Do we really need a Table of Contents at this point?

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The Vent Daily’s Monthly NewsHomeless Man In Better Place Now

For years now, Corpus Christi has supplied me with all the recy-clable trash that a homeless guy could ever want, none-the-less, it is time for me to move on. I’d like to tell you that I won the lottery or that I finally met the right girl, but the truth is that I simply grew tired of the way this town operates. I just can’t take all the nonsense. If it’s not ridiculous complaints about the Robstown Fairground, it’s some other cry baby B.S. When the City Council stopped supporting Skip Noe, I knew it was time to go. With the closure of FYI magazine, I no longer have a job writing the Party Girl column, but my vow of silence is almost up, and I have been getting a lot of request to start spinning at Club 1 again. Some of you might remem-ber me as DJ Plaztik. Who am I kidding, those days are over. To all my homies at Mis-sion 911, thanks for the memo-ries, keep it real and don’t forget to recycle. Maybe I’ll be back sometime, but for know I’ll be moving on to a better place.

Lake Corpus Christi - Af-ter several vain attempts to drink the blood of a human being, female mosquito 13 Z’s had almost given up hope. That’s when she discov-ered that humans had created a mosquito deterrent named O 2 F’s or Off to us humans. Starving and desperate 13 Z’s decided to fight Off with good old fashioned hard head-edness, just go and suck regardless of the smell. “It burnzzzz your zzzzkin, and it makezzzzz your eyezzzzz water. But I had an all night mat-ing zzzzezzzzion with 1006 Z’s and thezzze eggzzzz are not going to feed themselvezzzzz! Pluzzzz it wazzzzn’t a great choizzze that we dezzzzided to make our home at a campzzzzite,” 13 Z’s told us through a marvelous human to mos-quito translating machine that is ex-clusive to the Vent Daily. Knowing that she only had 26 hours to live or 60 mosquito years, she pursued her task with dil-igence. The first hundred attempts were fruitless, she had been follow-ing 3 year old Albert Macky all day and night. He had been sprayed with the much less irritating Off Skintas-tic! “Mommy changed my poopie pampers,” said Macky after we questioned him about how the mosquitoes were affecting him. 13 Z’s noticed that humans actually dip their children in water, kind of like when mosquitoes lay their eggs in water so that the larvae could survive. One thing was dif-ferent though, humans guided their children through the entire larval process! This is amazingly pointless to mosquitoes, who say that humans should just leave their larvae to fend for themselves in the water and let natural selection take its course. Af-ter taking their child out of the wa-

ter, 13 Z’s noticed that the O 2 F’s smell would dis-appear. This was her time to strike. Only she noticed that they bathed inside and had to get past the wire ‘zzzcreen’ that separates her from the inside of the house. With amazing pa-tience and fortitude, she managed to find an open-ing large enough to fit her impregnated body. “Yeah I know that I am getting zzzzuper zzzzizzzed,” 13 jokes. Now to find the feasting area that they (the humans) left Albert at. Flying through a very large maze, and extremely hungry, she heard a strange sound. Something like a singing mosquito. She entered the room that the noise was coming from and noticed that it, like the outside was full of stars. Except that these stars were the color of a mos-quito killing poison (DEET). After seeing that the stars were harmless she proceeded to follow the noise.13 Z’s had found what she was look-ing for, underneath a bunch of float-ing mini animals lay Albert Macky. “He looked so tazzzty,” 13 says. After a nourishing very high in fat meal. 13 Z’s was starting to feel pain in her belly. Her eggs needed to be laid and fast. Quickly and in a panic, 13 tells us that she couldn’t remember her way out of the Macky cabin, so she flew to the nearest water source. A giant white bowl, filled with very blue water. This is when she said that after laying her 1500th egg, she heard a ‘noizzze’ down the hallway and to her dismay, it was one of the adult Mackys and it was headed for the giant white bowl. “He was taking off his ex-

ozzzzkeleton and going to rezzzzt right on the bowl. When all of the sudden hizzzz new zzzzzzkin didn’t zzzzeeem to be holding well. And that’zzzz when brown goo zzzztart-ed falling around me. I have never been zzzzzo zzzzcared in my entire life,” 13 recalls. Dodging the brown projec-tiles, she flew outside of the bowl and headed outside of the doorway. She said that she heard a strange flushing sound before she left the house. With her newfound knowl-edge, on how to finally beat O 2 F’s, 13 Z’s said she was on her way to tell her 1.2 million friends about her new discovery, when all of the sud-den she fell severely ill. “ZZZo there I wazzz, not being able to go anywhere, and that’zzzzz why I called you guyzzzz at the Vent Daily.” 13 Z’s told us between coughs and deep breaths. “To zzz-pread the knowledge that I have dizzzcovered, zzzo that future gen-erationzzzz of mozzzzquitoezzz can zzzurvive.” ‘[Editor’s note: 13 Z’s died shortly after the publishing of this article. We at the Vent Daily would like to express our sincere apologies and thanks to 13 Z’s and the whole mosquito population at Lake Cor-pus Christi. 13 Z’s funeral services will be held at Dobie Funeral Home in Mathis, Tx.]

Mosquito Determined to Beat Off By Berto Garcia

by Jim S.

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Calallen - The brown-ie, moist, gooey, chocolaty, nutty, an American staple; everything that is right in this world. Just one bite can bring bouts of childhood nostalgia. For 52 year old, Henry Da-vis, a brownie represents the “de-Anglo-Saxonization of America.” So impassioned is he about this ideology, that it landed him behind bars. It all started when Mr. Davis stopped to eat at a Denny’s in the five-points Calallen area. He had an egg whites only omelet, with a biscuit and a glass of milk. When waitress Sue Overland, noticed Henry, it was love at first sight. Af-ter some back and forth flirtation, Mr. Davis asked Sue to surprise him with “dessert”. Sue didn’t real-ize that Henry meant “dessert” as in hanky-panky, and not dessert as in a sweet treat after a meal. “Hell, I’m too old to be get-ting frisky under the covers with anybody. I was just trying to score some brownie points, so to speak,” Sue said with a chuckle. Realizing that his waitress arrived with a decadent, moist hot fudge brownie a la mode, instead of offering to meet him out back by the dumpsters. That’s when things went horribly awry. Henry unleashed what could only be called a full on foulmouthed verbal onslaught not seen since the Eddie Murphy movie Harlem nights.

Witnesses said that Mr. Davis kept screaming that the “Brownies” and “Darkies” were the reason that America was going all to crap. Also, by baking brownies white people were empowering minorities, by implying that they (minorities) are all rich, thick and creamy. Several polite attempts by Ms. Overland to escort Henry off of the premises were halted by his threatening de-meanor. That’s when Denny’s man-ager Juana Suarez intervened. “I just kept apologizing for the inconvenience, offered his meal for free and he just told me to go back to the welfare line where I be-longed. Even though I have a de-gree in business management, so like whatever.” Police were eventually called to the scene where Henry was arrested without incident. “We maced his sorry ass anyway,” an officer confided to the Vent under the condition of anonymity. The brownie refused to press charges.

Racist Refuses to Eat BrownieBy Berto Garcia

It had been a long weekend. The night before, my sister had been married on the beaches of Galveston. The dynasty had extended yet again. A brand new faction of normalcy had been injected into the swirling chaos of my family dynamic. I’ve actually known him longer than my sister has, although I can’t claim credit for their introduction. His name is James and he may be the most reputable person under thirty that I’ve ever met. I don’t think that I could be any more happy or proud for either one of them. Their wedding was simple and clean and without the pomp and circumstance that seems to bind down most other ceremonies. It was a casual affair, replete with chinos and bare feet and save for my little sis and her stunning, hand beaded gown, everyone was dressed in what I would consider golf course casual. There was all of the high drama that could have been expected when you mix menopause and Xanax and financial stress and hereditary alcoholism and an outdoor wedding with an overzealous, fifty-something Asian photographer with a death wish and a limousine that smelled of old shoes. Actually, considering the history that my immediate family has concerning matrimonial ceremonies, everything went dashingly well. There was very little fighting and almost no jealousy. The drunks only got just drunk enough and the bitches never let their bitching get too loud. A wedding only ever makes a single person feel one of two emotions, depression or hope, and hope is just another word for unrealized despair. In order that I better cope with this new wave of gloom that was assuredly about to descend upon my head and heart with alarming clarity, I decided to pay a visit to my favorite watering hole, so that I may ease my own burgeoning pain with the solace of empty camaraderie and strong drink. The warm, dark wood welcomed me. It was to be a typical night in a typical week in my oh-so typical town. The bar had its usual patronage, which on a Monday evening tended to consist of maybe a dozen people. That was fine with me. In fact, that was exactly why I had come, to flirt with the bartender

and pick my own music and relax and get some work done all at once. Then something strange happened. It all started with a box full of green paper wristbands. I was standing at the bar, ordering up a dram of the Mother’s Milk when a friendly face shoved a white cardboard box under my nose. “Here, take one.” He seemed to know what he was talking about. “What is this all about?” My question wasn’t so much because I cared what they were actually for, but more so because I wanted to know if he knew himself. He did not. “I don’t know, they box was just sitting here.” All of the sudden, the bar filled with the faces and voices of a hundred

people that I had never seen before. I moved back to my corner to inspect the flow. The crowd was mixed. I saw older

women and younger men. I saw people that were clearly not from the gulf coast. Mostly I saw a very solid, large group of people having a good night on the town. In the fray, I heard a very large man tell a group of women that as long as they had their wristbands on, they could drink whatever they wanted, within reason. On my way across the room I stopped an older Hispanic woman with graying hair and an infectious smile.“Excuse me, what is all this?” “This is the annual conference for the Texas State Board for Textbook Revision and Insight. We’re from all over the state and every year we all get together for a big party.” “ R e a l l y , that’s interesting. I’m Mike. It’s nice to meet you.” I’m yelling now because the band has started up again. She looked

at me suspiciously, “Where did you get that?” She was pointing at my bracelet and eyeing me with what seemed to be humorous understanding. “Don’t worry, I’m not the enemy.” This, plus a good old fashioned smile seemed to appease her enough so that she let me walk away without calling my bluff to her co-workers. I made my way towards the bar and managed to take up residence next to a comely young lady who wore her auburn hair under a communist-style military cap. She was with two younger guys who looked like locals, but claimed to originally be from Michigan. One of the two men obviously didn’t appreciate my presence and he made sure I understood his position at every possible turn. His face was ruddy and he seemed very unhappy about his lot in life. The other however, seemed to be quite fond of me and he and I immediately struck up a conversation concerning the finer points of general rabble rousing and binge drinking for the sake of journalism. After several rounds and countless toasts to the Gods and everyone, I found myself alone with the Midwest beauty. She was solemn

and her skin was flawless. She told me that she had fallen in love with a boy that had run off and joined the war. She had known him for only three days and she had followed him to Texas because she was sure that her indefinable lusting was the thing that so many dreams were made of. Then she told me that while in Iraq, her one true love had been fatally stabbed in the femoral artery by a young boy during a supposedly friendly soccer game with the locals and had bled out

on a dusty pitch in the middle of the desert in less than two minutes. “You want a story, write about that.” Her face was expressionless and I

knew that it wouldn’t be very hard to take her to bed just then. It seemed that she almost needed me to, but I wouldn’t. Not her, not then. At that precise moment, the world’s finest barkeep came up behind me and quietly informed me that the aforementioned large man in charge of the tab had discovered my ruse and was currently trying to locate me so that we could come to a better understanding about my portion of the bill. I bid my pretty lady adieu and snuck out through the back like a delinquent. Too bad though, it would have made a great story.

No Tickertape For You

She told me that she had fallen in love with a boy

that had run off and joined the war.

The drunks only got just drunk enough and the bitches never let their bitching get too loud.

by Mike Skinner [email protected]

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Celebrity Music Review

First off, you will have to ex-cuse me every now then, as I think I have been affected with Salmonella St. Paul, nothing saintly about that. Let me start with a question, What is the difference between Flogging Mol-ly, The Bouncing Souls, Dropkick Murphys and most of the tracks on the latest Briggs album Come all you Madmen? Go ahead and think about it as I step outside for a moment. [ Oh god here it comes again, rrrfffttugh!!! rrrawwchhaggu! oh that tastes nasty, not again ffffftttttppplosh! ugggh, oh okay there.] So have you figured it out yet? Well let me tell you, blughh, excuse me sorry about that. Not much really, the album starts off with an Irish sing along type song, Mad-men, but if you’ve heard the other aforementioned bands you’ve heard them all. Don’t get me wrong, this a great fist pumping kick off to a very promising album. For example ‘Not Alone’, speaking of alone can you give me a minute. [Plrrrrrrrrp, fffffffft, oh that is rancid that is rancid, pfffffffyyyk-kkk why now of all times why? Frrrrrrrrapppp ppppp plosh. Damn no toilet paper, no Glade, looks like I’m just going to have to wing it.] As I was saying ‘Not Alone’ starts of slowly then builds up into this great punk rock ballad, peppered with in-fectiou… (wait maybe that isn’t an appropriate word) addictive Woah Oh Ohs that anyone who is anyone can sing along to and not screw it up. ‘Final Words’ is a different track al-together from the rest, think 90’s al-ternative rock bands like Weezer and the Toadies meet 1987 Surfer Rosa Pixies. A great song by the way that

seems a little out of place with the Irish punk and California punk songs that are spread throughout the album. It is the actual high point of the entire album, although I’m not sure if that was the bands intent; but it shows that if the Briggs wanted to branch out into another genre of music they are more than capabluggh shrrrrow-wwshh splat oh my I think I barfed on my keyboard. Awwwshooow-shstttppppr!!! No more god please blechlllll pfffft. Come all you Madmen can lay the Irish bit on a little too thick, especially on ‘Molly’ an all acous-tic number that seems to reach for romance, but only grabs pointless-ness. ‘Oblivion’ seems to be the only filler of the album, a song trying to be clever by using as much outdated phrases as possible especially in the chorus “I’m standing on the edge of Oblivion” tell me this song doesn’t bring up memories of Collective Soul and Creed in a bad way. Overall Come all you Mad-men shows a band that can branch out in any genre of punk rock and is extremely capable of differentiat-ing themselves from other Irish punk rock acts. It is, like I said before, a very promising album that leaves you wondering what the Briggs 5th album will sound libluuughcgh rttttttttttkkk uhgg man I really have to go to the doctor, but before I leave just letting you know that ugghhh sploosh kerpppllslslsllshh this is an album that I can throw myself at in a good way. Therefore I give it 3 _ cherry tomatoes. I got to go before I start dehydrating so much that I be-come sun dried.

By Infected Tomato

The BriggsCome All You Madmen

SideOneDummy RecordsRelease Date: June 17th 2008

Sun. June 15thTwo Day Recovery And Pineapple Protein -MulligansOpen Blues Jam W/ John Cortez & 7 Day Bluz -The Mug RoomAlligator Dave With Blowing Trees -Dr Rockits

Tues. June 17thScarecrow Peolpe -Exec. Surf ClubVenia - The Compound

Wed. June 18thSaving Abel, Endever After, Jet Black Stare, Electric Touch -House Of RockHal Ketchum -Concrete StreetCathouse -Dr Rockits

Thurs. June 19th“Friends & Lovers” Art Show -House Of RockKinda Smooth -RevolutionStephanie Briggs Band -Exec. Surf ClubStoney Larue W/ The Pear Ratz -Brewsters St.

Fri. June 20thNothingmore, 8 System, Hindsight -House Of RockBushbullit -Exec. Surf ClubThe Hotness, Sever Yor Ties - The Com-poundDead Thoughts Run Red, -ZerosAnother Level -Brewsters St.Same Affliction -The Mug RoomThe Bystanders - The TexanTopaz -Dr RockitsBig Sexy -Havana Club

Sat. June 21stZion -Exec. Surf ClubCut-Off Midway, Southern Point, Vi-sion Of Hate, Chamber Of Pain, Re-lease -ZerosSevendust -Concrete StreetStruggle Of Saints - The TexanLatin Talk -Havana Club

Sun. June 22ndIn Times Of Distress - The CompoundPyrosona & Daltons Eyes -Mulligans

Carrie Underwood -American Bank CenterGraham Wilkinson And The Under-ground Township -Dr Rockits

Tues. June 24thRock Paper Scissors Tournament (FI-NALS) -House Of RockScarecrow People -Exec. Surf Club

Wed. June 25thMongos Stereo -Dr Rockits

Thurs. June 26thThe Supervillians, And Soultone -House Of RockHenry & The Invisibles -RevolutionAloha Dave And The Tourist -Exec. Surf ClubVicious Rumors, -ZerosEli Young Band W/ Ryan James -Brewsters St.Blackscales -The Mug Room

Fri. June 27thMad Mexicans -House Of RockScarecrow People -Exec. Surf ClubCity Upon A Hill, -ZerosThe Groove -Brewsters St.Mr.Lamb And The Jilted Ones - The TexanJolly ranchers -Havana Club

Sat. June 28thSouth Austin Jug Band, HOBO, Ty Di-etz -House Of RockHouston Marchman -Exec. Surf ClubHanna’s Reef -Brewsters St.Frenetica -The Mug RoomRefueled - The TexanJolly ranchers -Havana Club

Sun. June 29thThe Legends And Puppies Tour: Kinky Freidman And Steve Frolmholmz -Exec. Surf ClubDead Albatross, Fortold Defiance - The CompoundDiasporic An Friend -Dr Rockits

Bands and Venues Send Concert Listings To: [email protected]

Corpus Christi Entertainment Calendar

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Ladies and gentlemen, on behalf of The Vent Daily, I’d like to introduce you to Corpus Christi’s very own Bad Boys of Rock n’ Roll. I guess. I’m talking about the two guys in the morning, or as they are known by their Christian names, Rex Gabriel and Gino Montalvo. These guys are serious, seriously. They are essentially the flagship program for C101, the city’s most rockingest rock station, by default. Gabriel, who to his credit has been manning the wheels of plastic at 101 for over a decade and a half, has cornered the market on small t-shirts and hair gel. He fancies himself comically inclined and compared to the other morning D.J’s in town, I sup-pose he may be the funniest, but that’s like winning a gold medal in the Special Olympics or coming in first in the Harlem National 200 meter freestyle. Gino is the hipper, fresher (read younger) member of the duo. His style is a little more con-temporary, and while his t-shirts are equally as tight, they tend to have cooler logos. He’s the tat guy.

Also, he’s the Mexican. Good thinking C101. Rex might be a local legend but you still have to have someone who can speak Spanglish free from irony. A lot can be learned from their prospective pages on the C101 website and since I have never actually interviewed or even met either one of them, this site and the snippets of the show that I’ve caught over the years are my sole points of reference. Rex is the true blogger of the group. He’s been in the busi-ness longer, plus he’s older so that means he has more to say. He waxes intellectual about current events and local media stories with the unrelenting fervor of a morning FM disc jockey. He also includes lots of pictures of himself sitting on motorcycles, jumping motorcycles, standing next to motorcycles. The guy likes motorcycles. Gino’s page has a much greater viral video vibe. It’s reminiscent of Myspace or Youtube or Fa-cebook or whatever the name of the next one will be. Plus Gino has a lot of pictures of his family, which

also helps with the His-panic ele-ment. Good for you Gino, m a x i m i z e your posi-tion, because before too long, Rex is probably go-ing to have a different sidekick and you’ll be using your name to pick up underage girls at Club 1. Hold on tight Corpus Christi. The Dastardly Duo is going to wreck your brainpan with a lethal combination of pithy recounts from the daily po-lice blotter and powerful surges of Puddle of Mudd. Once you ride this hogg you may never walk straight again.

Rex (right), Gino’s arm (left)

Two Guys in the Morning: The Bad boys of Rock

The Bad boys of Cock Rock

The Jerk-offs ofCock Rock

Why does this town seem to hate itself so much? At first glance, I am reminded of the girl in high school who was far too infatuated with the Cure. You know the one I’m talking about. She always wore intentionally heavy eyeliner and her wardrobe consisted mostly of black. She probably came from a middle-class family with moderate to lib-eral leanings and when she decided to try out a new lifestyle, her parents chalked it up to boredom and the precociousness of adoles-cence. She was smart and did well in all of her classes but she played it off so as not to disaffect her social cote-rie. She was the closet intellectual,

reading the contemporary classics in between bouts of clove smoking and psychotropic experimentation. This is what I initially thought about this little city when I first at-tempted to peel back her layers. I

imagined an alien-ated soul that hid her beauty and her brain so as not to seem pre-tentious or conceited. I am now finding out that this is just not the

case. Instead, this city is the popular girl, the rich girl, the girl in the plaid Ralph Lauren summer dress that she is embarrassed to wear around her friends more than once every couple of months. Her ears and neck adorned with three generations worth of pearls.

S h e s p e n d s more on her hair and nails than she does on her en-l i g h t e n -m e n t . Her Dad-dy comes f r o m m o n e y that isn’t half as old as it is soiled. She has a fine au-tomobile and an expensive education but lurk-ing just u n d e r -neath the veneer is plain, old-fashioned east Tex-as coastal trash. T h i s

town just seemingly refuses to grow. I’ve been here for over six years and the only thing that has expanded is my fucking waistline. I don’t know a whole lot about city politics, being that I don’t support the local newspa-per or the local televised news pro-grams, but my simpleminded under-standing of the way things work around here is as such: The families that control this city are the ones with the oldest money, as is to be expected. These people own a large majority of the valuable prop-erty in the more desirable sections of the city and they continue to hold out and bully their way through perfectly reasonable offers in order that they protect their illusions of hegemony. I could be way off, but I doubt it. I’ll try and help you to under-stand. In the past fifteen years, the powers that be in Corpus Christi have turned down proposals for Sea World, The Old Bass Pro Shop, the Lan-dry’s move, and a new Toyota plant, at least. Now, I’m not a member of the city council so I will never know about the details behind any certain decision, but that seems like an awful lot of revenue. Three of the four busi-ness ventures that I just listed went to San Antonio. The odd man out being Landry’s, but they already have their hands all over the dining market in that city anyway so I consider it to be a non-issue. San Antonio has a more stable housing market, lower cost of living, and a higher median income. Not only are we unable to compete with them on a fiscal level, but they’ve got to be five times the tourist draw that we are, and the Alamo’s boring as shit. What do we have though? The Lexington, really? Does anyone think the Texas State Aquarium is worth the price of admission? It took them over a decade to build a dolphin tank. This is supposed to be a tourist town for God’s sake. The American Bank Center cost the city an estimated

50 million dollars (thank you Mayor Garrett) and has yet to draw any na-tional acts on any sort of consistent basis. I’m no economist but I’m fairly certain that the taxpayers aren’t going to be able to repay that debt with the proceeds from Ice Rays tickets. The beach you say? Oh you

beautiful stubborn bitch. I have a very serious love/hate re-lationship with the beach. I was born and raised in the Rio Grande Valley and I

spent a great deal of my youth, includ-ing almost every part of my adoles-cence that wasn’t spent in Mexico, on South Padre Island. The gulf is a sul-try lover who beckons me through the clear and backlit nights. The moon is full now and I can feel it pulsing and swelling over sets of naked breakers, calling me out to sea. I work on the island and at the end of a shift, when the earliest hours of morning are just starting to build up steam, I glide along highway 361 with the windows down. The humid smell of brackish tidal pools fill my nose and inundate my senses with nostalgia and regret while the steady hum of rubber on as-phalt helps me to forget my past trans-gressions. Sometimes, when the moment speaks to me, I pull off of the road and drive down into the dunes. It’s the closest thing that I’ll ever have to equate to Lewis and Clark reaching the far west. When I’m standing all alone on the hard packed sand at the water’s edge and the only light that guides me is natural and white and the salt is on my lips and the hot wind is in my ears, I really do feel like an explorer. When I wade out into that tumultuous bathwater, I truly feel free. Come to think of it, maybe I’m thank-ful for this town. Maybe I should be glad that it isn’t going to get any big-ger any time soon. Maybe I’m just small-time and small-time is all I’ll ever be. As long as it’s the ocean that keeps me honest, I suppose I can live with that.

Social Distortion:Bi-Coastal Disorder

She spends more on her hair and nails than she does on

her enlightenment.

The gulf is a sultry lover who beckons me through the clear and

backlit nights.

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by Mike [email protected]