Articles about whimsy
Another Awesome Mavericks Video, Because They Are Awesome At Making Awesome Videos
Somehow, I’ve neglected to put this up for, like, 18 days. I regret the error. Oh, what’s my favorite part? I guess I’d have to say: YES.
Semi-Regular Friday Afternoon Pre-Happy Hour Hypothetical
Would you rather drink whatever kind of beer/liquor you prefer, but you can only drink it one day a week, OR drink 7-Eleven’s own branded Game Day beer as much as you want, whenever you want? You still have to pay, and you can’t break any current laws. I mean, if you want to drink one in the car, OK, fine, I guess, but just know you’d still get pinched.
(Also: I know Game Day isn’t new; just picked it because it’s local-ish. And, not to taint the results, but we’ve had some here at the office. The most gentle review I can give it is it does seem to actually be beer.)
Jason Schwartzman Interviews Ben Kweller and His Stunt Double
This is sort of charming, and relevant to Dallas because Ben, who’s from Greenville, got his start here and used to call me at the Observer and leave, like, seven minute voicemail messages wherein he’d basically narrate what he was doing. Like, “It’s pretty hot, I think I’m going to put on some shorts” and “I think I’m going to make a sandwich” and so on.
Yorvit Torrealba Has Plenty of Time Now
In something you probably will never see in a Major League Baseball game but probably would love to, Texas Ranger Yorvit Torrealba (who has been playing winter ball in his home country of Venezuela, has been handed a 66-game suspension for letting his hand get in the way of an umpire’s face. Or hitting him, whichever description you’re semantically inclined to adopt.
If you are bad at math, or do not know how long a season of Venezuelan winter baseball lasts, this will keep him from playing for about a season and a half. This also means he will be well rested and possibly gentler with the umpires when he comes back to Texas. According to ESPNDallas.com, Rangers GM Jon Daniels and staff will go over the details of the incident before deciding what if anything they will do about it. Penalties from Venezuelan winter ball (or Honduran, Colombian, Antartican, Panamanian, Arctic, Djiboutian or any other country’s winter ball) do not carry over to the MLB.
The Last of Jerry Merwin’s Christmas Ties
This isn’t one of the treats that Jason is planning, but nonetheless … here’s the last of Jerry Merwin’s Christmas ties, 2011 edition. The St. Paul Place 
security manager got this one after his wife went shopping on Black Friday at the Dollar Tree in Richardson. “She came home and said, ‘I got you two new Christmas ties,’ ” Jerry recalls. “I said, ‘OK. Now I’ve got 10.’ Of course, that was before I got Sponge Bob.” Like his other new Dollar Tree tie — it has Christmas lights on it — this one plays Jingle Bells, very softly. “People like ‘Frosty,’ ” Jerry says, “because it’s Christmas-time.”
Haiku Review Seeks $65,000
Three Dallas guys — Stu Hill, Wes Hendrix, and Brad Alesi — want to build an app that only publish reviews of restaurants and bars and suchlike in haiku form. Is it as silly as it sounds? Maybe not. They’re using Kickstarter to fund the project, which is explained in the video below. PS: Today is National Haiku Poetry Day, so there’s that.
The Return of Jerry Merwin’s Ties, Cont.
Yesterday we reintroduced you to St. Paul Place security maven Jerry Merwin, first line of 
defense against angry marauders against the D Empire — and notorious wearer of Christmas ties. The “Sponge Bob” tie you see here — it says, “I do believe. I do believe. S-S-S-Santa!” – is his latest. “A friend of my wife gave it to me as a Christmas present last week,” Jerry explains. “She decided she wanted to add to my collection of ties. I thought, ‘Sponge Bob? I don’t know if I’ll wear it.’ But I did. I’ve had quite a few compliments on it. People have said, ‘Nice tie.’ Nothing extraordinary.”
The Return of Jerry Merwin’s Ties
Faithful FrontBurnervians may remember Jerry Merwin (pictured) from last year 
around this time. Jerry’s been the security manager at St. Paul Place, where D is located, for 11 years, under four different security companies. Gruffly authoritative, but calm and loveable, he’s known for his eagle eye — and for the colorful ties he wears every year at Christmastime.
Subtle, they’re not. You might call the ties “festive.” He’s got 11 of them now, and he starts wearing them the week after Thanksgiving. Tomorrow and Friday, we’ll show you two of his newest ones.
The ties are Jerry’s way of spreading Christmas cheer. Not that he’s really all that pumped up about the holiday. Asked what he wants for Christmas, he says, “I have no idea. … Usually if there’s something I want, I go get it. My wife says I’m impossible to buy for.” So, what did she get for him last Christmas? Jerry thinks for a second and says, “I don’t remember.”
Newy Scruggs and Terrell Owens Are In a Fight
And a Twitter fight, no less, which is like when people had fights with graffiti in bathroom stalls in days of yore, in case you are not on the Twitters and have never seen a Twitter fight in action.
The Dallas Morning News (because Twitter fights are awesome and so why wouldn’t Dallas’ paper of record cover them) has the rundown here. But basically, here’s how it went:
Former Bengal/something else/Cowboy Terrell Owens (from his couch, since he’s kind of unemployed at the moment) makes fun of Terence Newman, sort of, for tackling Brandon Marshall and failing to bring him down during last week’s game, likening Newman to a “superman cape” hanging around Marshall’s neck as he ran in the TD. But he totally added “LOL” at the end of that, which should’ve made it cool in the Twitterverse.
Local NBC sports anchor Newy Scruggs then points out that Owens is unemployed, and says that his mocking of Newman was “petty.” Then it gets interesting, because OMG – Owens straight up called Scruggs fat. To be accurate, he called him “fat-so.” He then insisted that he wasn’t slamming Scruggs, but instead gave him some weight loss tips, like “u’re FAT & need 2 hit the treadmill ASAP!!”
Scruggs then reiterated that while he might be rubber, TO is glue, and whatever he says, bounces off of him, and sticks to Owens. Or maybe he just said something to the effect of, “I have a job and you do not, kind sir!” And then maybe it went back and forth for a little bit longer, with Scruggs telling Owens to pay his child support and quit claiming poverty.
But Owens got the last word, which was “fatmeat.”
Why isn’t there a market for Twitter war play-by-play?
“Gasbags” Group Undeterred by Fracking Study
Sure, a just-released UT study found no direct connection between natural-gas fracking and groundwater contamination. Coming as it does on top of a recent Fort Worth report showing little to no adverse impact on air quality from gas drilling, you might think drilling and fracking opponents would begin to notice a pattern here. But if you did, you’d be wrong.
“We continue to believe there are many, many things we will continue to blame on drilling and fracking,” said Ted “Teddy” Angus, coordinator of the Garland-based Gasbags Against Drilling and Fracking group (GADF). “I mean, what about all those earthquakes we’ve been having? You think they just up and happened, for no good reason at all?
“And what about the wildfires, which coincidentally have been increasing, just as gas drilling has gotten really, really popular?” Angus went on. “We also think fracking has something to do with the ice caps and global warming. We haven’t figured out exactly what–not yet, anyway. Our List committee is compiling a list of other things drilling and fracking probably causes, too, and we will be issuing that list to the news as soon as we can’t think of any more things.”
When Algur Meadows, Byron Nelson, Bob Hope, and Billy Graham Shot a Round of Golf in Dallas
I’m a little giddy right now, not because last night I got lost for a few hours in old clips of Woody Allen appearing on the Tonight Show, but because I think I just managed to drum up an obscure piece of Dallas nostalgia that Robert Wilonsky hasn’t yet posted on Unfair Park. At about 2:14 of the video below, Bob Hope, appearing on the Tonight Show with Woody Allen in 1971 (guest hosting right as his latest movie, a little old thing called Bananas, was released), mentions a golf foursome he participated in over the weekend at the Byron Nelson in Dallas. Who’d he play with? Byron “Lord” Nelson, “Al” Meadows (“this great philanthropist,” as Hope puts it), and Billy Graham. “We were billed as ‘The Supremes,’” Hope jabs. Enjoy.
Occupy Dallas Steps Up Its Game
With a standoff over insurance issues threatening their ability to stay in Pioneer Park, members of the Occupy Dallas protest committee knew they would have to act fast. So around 8 this morning, as light rain fell, the leader of the group’s so-called Committee of Public Safety–he wore a Guy Fawkes mask and wouldn’t give his name–was directing a Ryder truck as it backed into a handicapped space, not far from the park’s famous cattle statuary. Over in one corner of the “main committee” tent, meantime, a woman who identified herself only as “Mrs. LaFarge” was knitting intently.
Not far away, six or seven other committee members were poring over street maps of North Dallas and Highland Park, marking red “X’s” over the home addresses of the area’s most prominent rich people. Soon, it all became clear: Another group of four or five protesters began unloading two, 6-feet-tall guillotines out of the Ryder truck. Then they proceeded to roll the “1792 Machines” on dollies across the park, toward a little wooden stage that had been set up near the cattle. Reading to reporters off a sheet of paper, the guy in the Fawkes mask said the afternoon of guillotining to follow–while “really, really regretful”–nevertheless would be necessary to “send a signal” and to “advance the cause of the 99%,” who “have been kept down for too long, in chains.” Tomorrow, he added, they would worry about the insurance.
NOTE: THE PRECEDING HAS BEEN A SATIRICAL ARTICLE. NOT TO BE TAKEN SERIOUSLY.
Occupy Dallas New Yorker-style Cartoon Caption Contest
Now it’s your turn. Have fun in the comments!
Get Out Of My Face on Tony Romo
The latest project from The Onion is a weekly video series that spoofs ESPN talking-head shows like Around the Horn and Pardon the Interruption. Here is the first. And now I’ll completely spoil the Romo part. Riffing on the idea that Cowboys receivers are begging Romo to throw the ball harder:
“His handoffs are even worse! It’s like watching a water nymph place a sugar tea cake in the tiny, trembling hand of a meadow fairy.”
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