Happy Birthday To The Mrs., and God Bless The Pit Bull in Pumps

Today, The Mrs. celebrates another b'day. Happy Happy Happy, Baby!

One of these days, if I say my prayers, eat my vitamins, and am on Santa's good list long enough, I will write almost as well as my friend Geveryl Robinson. Perhaps a better way of saying it would be, "when I grow up, I want to be a black woman voracious wordsmith with an "Oh no, you didn't" streak the size of a bill that Congress passes without reading. If you don't read Gevvie every Sunday in the Savannah Morning News, you are missing a treat. Yesterday, she ripped Barbara Walters a new one, and it couldn't have happened to a more deserving person (or pewrson, as Babs would say).

The reason for Geveryl's wrath was Paula Deen's recent appearance on "The View", which quite astonishingly I missed! Nothing says stay-at-home dad like enjoying a four-cheese omelet
and a six-pack of Yuengling Light with a wardrobe of a wife-beater and boxers(1), all the while watching Joy Behar et al fail to understand why they can't get a decent man in their lives. In a nutshell, Ms. Walters, the most overrated journalist of the last half-century, essentially told Miss Paula, "I can't beweeve you are twying to make ouw chiwdwen ovewweight, with the fwied this and fwied that." Okay, I am paraphrasing. Miss Paula was simply making the obligatory appearance on 'View' to pitch her cookbook for kids, which is excellent by the way and doesn't actually involve much fwying at all.

First, if anyone needs a dose of obesity, it's Barbara Walters. I guess lobbing softballs at celebs and politicians for a few decades burns a lot of calories. Secondly, what is everyone's problem with Paula and the Deen family? I always knew there was a segment of Savannah who didn't care for the Deens, be it jealousy or just to appear to be one of the "cool kids" that criticizes popular people and things. I thought all that would eventually fade, but I was wrong. I keep hearing stories from folks like "well, I heard she curses." The answer is; yep, having been around Paula a few times, she does. She even let so many worty dirds fly during an in-depth interview with me on "The Last Talk Show"(2), a complaint was sent in to the Savannah Morning News's "Vox Populi" section. Also, in case you don't know, if you work in a professional kitchen, the boss is going to yell at you. Even if you are the best line cook, prep cook, prettiest waitress, or best dish washer in the world, the boss will say nasty things about your parentage and bodily orifices from time to time. It happens in every professional kitchen, and if it doesn't, that professional kitchen won't be open for long.

I have also heard complaints about the boys, Bobby and Jamie. "Oh, they aren't as nice as everyone thinks." Really? I can only speak for myself, but those guys have been nothing but fabulous to me in the dozen or so times I have been around them, both in public and in private. What you have seen of the boys on TV is exactly what I have seen off camera. Look, I'm sorry if Bobby doesn't want to date your desperately single self, but that doesn't make him or his brother a jerk, and perhaps you should watch something other than "Sex And The City" reruns to learn about guys.

"Oh, the food at Lady And Sons isn't that good." You know, maybe it isn't as good as it used to be. That I can't answer, as I wasn't around for the early days of Lady And Sons. But while it is pricey, it is also less expensive than some of the worst downtown Savannah restaurants, and without a doubt, sister restaurant Uncle Bubba's is fantastic (we actually prefer it to Lady And Sons, no offense boys). I love Bubba for a number of reasons, but mostly because he offers the Cialis Of The Sea, chargrilled oysters. Oh....my........gracious.

I know I know. Everyone has their own story. "Well _____ said this directly to me/my momma/my great aunt Georgie Poo." Whatever. I'm sure we all regret just how somewhat insulated the Savannah area was to the recession because of folks who were still coming to town to eat at the Deen's restaurants and to buy stuff with Paula's name on it. Sure, we had a downturn, but imagine the recession without the lure of the Deen name. It would have been like living in rural South Carolina for cryin' out loud. And I'm sure America's Second Harvest Food Bank gets incredibly p-o'd every time the Deens show up to make another gargantuan donation of food. Dang it, Deens, don't you know the Food Bank has work to do?

So go ahead, hate on the Deens. And when you have a better idea to attract millions in tourism dollars to Savannah and to donate enormous resources to the Food Bank, Safe Shelter for battered spouses, and Bethesda Home For Boys, let's see it. As Miss Paula might say, you do that, and I'll be hotter than a $&@*!&$#()@.


(1) - full disclosure, I don't own a wife beater. Boxers, on the other hand....

(2) - "The Last Talk Show" is my pet name for my old show on 630 WBMQ, since, pardon my snippiness, there isn't a real talk show left in Savannah.

Pittsburgh's an excellent choice for G-20

Because when the nut job protesters burn down the city, Pittsburgh will be a great place to live for the first time since KDKA's Harold Arlen broadcast the Harding-Cox returns. That said, I am guessing the open burning of trash is illegal nowadays, and it might run counter to the environmental beliefs some of the protesters claim to espouse. We can only hope there is a Beavis in their midst.

I must say, though, one of my favorite childhood memories was of my grandmother letting me burn her trash on a giant rock behind her house whenever I stayed with her. Nothing says loving like giving a seven year old a giant box of kitchen matches. Before you say anything about my grandmother, keep in mind that a portion of the rest of the kids in Dade County, Georgia were proficient at distillery by the age of 7. I was not.

The future of Lady And Sons; Organic Bean Sprouts and Pomegrante Mineral Water

Sure the title is supposed to sound stupid, as ludicrous as the thought of Bob Barker donning wrestling tights for Vince McMahon, though that reality was perilously close to occurring a week ago. However, just as insane as the thought of Paula Deen doing a yoga headstand while Jelly Roll walks out of the kitchen with a plate of fat-free bean curd, rice and watercress hoecakes was a headline in the Savannah Morning News Exchange section Sunday: "The future of car buying in the U.S.: Don't supersize me." Please, don't make me choke on my bag of cracklins.

To be fair to the Morning News, the article was not penned by one of its scribes. It was written by Tom Krisher of what has rapidly deteriorated into one of the sloppiest news organizations in the world, the Associated Press. No, that is not a commentary on (cue the timpani and deeper- than-whale-dung voice guy) "liberal media bias", so please, the "Obama is Josef Stalin in black face" crowd should refrain from commentary. The A.P. has, like many traditional news organizations, simply become lazy, and Mr. Krisher was too lazy to even make a cursory glance at history and human nature.

The gist of Mr. Krisher's argument is that "American car-buying habits have changed forever. Scarred by the worst financial crisis since the 1930's and still leery of high gas prices, people are walking into showrooms intent on spending less." While Mr. Krisher acknowledges the exact same thing happened in the 1970's, which is when the actual last "worst financial crisis" occurred, this time things are different thanks to the biggest group of self-serving individuals outside of Members of Congress and the Dallas Cowboys of the 1990's; the Baby Boomers.

The Boomers, who all of a sudden are as young as 44 according to Mr. Krisher (which would also make them eligible to be Young Democrats and Young Republicans, at least in Chatham County!), make up one quarter of the population. They drove the economy out of recession in the 1980's, but now Mr. Krisher says the poor babies are too "scarred" by what happened a year ago, so they aren't spending money this time around. If they are spending money, they are buying smaller, more fuel efficient cars and aren't going back to the muscle cars and SUV's of the past because this time, Mr. Krisher assures us, gas prices are staying high (cue the kid with the glasses from "The Sandlot") FOR-EV-ER!

If Mr. Krisher had told us that South Carolina would never, ever win a mythical national championship in football, that we could believe, but to say that gas prices will never again be low, relative to inflation, is absurd. It might never be 89-cents a gallon, but just as economic highs and lows are as sure a thing as Kanye West going ballistic because he was accidentally served a vanilla milk shake at a McDonald's drive-thru, gas in the next few years will be affordable enough for most of us to go out and get that BMW 5 Series with the 4.8 liter V-8 cranking out 360 horsepower.

"But but but", you stutter, "surveys show we all want 'green' cars now, cars that get 87 miles to the gallon and run on cow farts and distilled water." You would be correct but for one cruicial fact; we lie. We lie and we like doing it. "Sure, I'd LOVE a hybrid car." "Oh, yes, more public transportation is a GREAT idea." "I LOVE going to non-Thirsty Thursday Sand Gnats games. No I wasn't disguised as an empty seat!" Those phrases are among the many that should bring forth the fire extinguisher for your trousers. We like lying so much that we elect people to public office who lie, then we re-elect them until they die and, at their funeral, we forget about their pathological career and hail them as the greatest thing since sliced white bread...oops, sorry Kanye...and ice cream. We tell people what we think they want to hear because we are terrified of causing offense.

The truth is that we Americans love our cars, and we love driving them even if it takes us three hours to travel down Bay Street and five hours to find a parking space. Guys also love fast cars and, yes, so do gals. "Oh, come on Ray, the stereotype of the woman from 'Grease' who loves a guy because of his fast car died 50 years ago." Um-hmmm. And super dentist Brad Durham's next trendy creation will be permanent installation of "Bubba" teeth. You put any woman behind the wheel of a Bugatti Veyron that goes zero to 60 in two-and-a-half seconds and they'll sound like they're on their honeymoon with Brad Pitt. Yes, outgoing Chief Berkow, too much speed kills. But it is also sexy, and we love it as well as the gallons upon gallons of gas it burns.

We could make life easier by telling the truth so writers like Mr. Krisher wouldn't embarass themselves, but since we won't cooperate, get ready for more "news" stories telling us how much we love our hybrids even though they aren't being bought in great quantities, how much we long for the days of the AMC Pacer, and how we Americans are "green for good." Just remind me to tell you I told you so when, in a few years, the same news writers are "shocked" and "stunned" at the enormously successful comeback...of the Hummer.