PARAMOUR DEPT. Last Saturday, Gov. Veto El Obtúsè embarked upon Wife No. 2 half a year after shedding Wife No. 1.
The timeless words of a legendary interpersonal relations innovator seem appropriate: “A man usually owes his success to his first wife and his second wife to his success.”
Who was that wise man? Oft-married actor and forever James Bond, Sir Sean Connery.
ADVICE FOR WANNABE COMEDIANS: Trust me. Never, EVER, tell that Connery joke unless you are certain of the personal histories of everyone within earshot. I tried it the wrong way only once and the frosty stares in the room would have chilled the seventh circle of hell.
TRANSLATION DEPT. My one and only wife was a southern gal (Oklahoma with a little Tennessee) so she taught me how to speak southern.
In those parts, if you ask somebody about their paramour, they are likely to say “that’s what you mow your lawn with.”
The latter is a much better joke to tell in mixed marital company. Trust me.
RENTvolution.org Redux. Plan A of my renters’ rights organization needs a boost. I asked everyone who signed up if s/he had a Facebook page. Nada. Plan A requires renters posting info about landlords. Local artist Erik Holland published some increases from a local apartment house in his weekly Reno News & Review political cartoon. Last week, Trib reporter Kayla Anderson did the same for a high-priced Sparks place opening next year.
People need help. The Sparks grandmother whom I lined up with the London Guardian last month is being forced to vacate her longtime apartment due to price gouging.
“My rent is going up another $69.00 to $1,144, which is three dollars short of all of my Social Security,” she says.
Who needs to eat?
Information is power. A network of sites sharing info can turn into a Hotels.com or Trivago or PriceLine source. So spread the word, especially about “application fees,” another name for extortion. I’m also developing an earth-shaking Plan B but lawyers take their own sweet time.
GET CANNED AND BOXED FOR KICKS. A can of food for the Food Bank gets you into two events this Friday at W. Moana soccer pitch. We dedicate the long-awaited Fight of the Century plaque at 4:30 p.m. and the UNR womens’ soccer team plays its first match at 5:30. I’m recording the dedication for a one-hour TV show.
“Great White Hope” James Jeffries came out of retirement to fight the first black heavyweight champion in Reno on July 4, 1910. The fight site and Johnson’s training camp already have historical markers. This will complete the triangle.
Muhammad Ali rightly called himself ‘the greatest of all time,” but was quick to point out he emulated Johnson’s style. I think a head-to-head matchup would have resulted in a spectacular draw.
Ironically, in a nationally-syndicated radio series of mythical “computer bouts” back in the 1960s, Ali was matched against and lost to Jeffries in a round-robin elimination to choose the greatest heavyweight of all time. Like Johnson, he would have creamed slow slugger Jeffries. But Ali was disfavored for draft evasion at the time and the producers dared not have him beat the much smaller Rocky Marciano, the computer winner.
POLITICAL PORN PROLIFERATES IN OLD PIZEN SWITCH. The ink is barely dry on the Lyon County School District and Yerington Police settlement for endemic and overt racism, a scandal broken first nationally by the Barbwire last Oct. 18. (See “We Don’t Need No Education” at NevadaLabor.com/). Now comes a Lyon County Sheriff’s Commander wearing everything but the white sheets while running against his boss.
Frank Hunewill hugged a guy whose face was painted like a confederate flag, then posted the shot on his website.
The Yerington High flap started when a Lyon sheriff’s deputy’s son posted a photo of his almost-naked self with a rifle and knife captioned “we bout to go nigga huntin’ “ The unretouched photos are posted permanently at NevadaLabor.com/
The two African-American Yerington High School sisters who won in federal court had their lives threatened and were almost run down in a fast-food parking lot.
As the old saying goes, the Lord created the world, mankind built the cities and the Devil thunk up the small town. Speaking of whom…
DEALS WITH THE DEVIL. Last week came the news that your tax dollars are now helping fund Al Qaeda which is killing people in Yemen with our ally, the oil- and blood-soaked Saudi Royal Family.
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832) is famous for two things: “Faust,” his epic poem about Satanic soul-selling, and his observance that “we become what we despise.”
The US military and Al Qaeda, brothers in arms.
I hear Satan laughing with delight.
Be well. Raise hell. Esté bien. Haga infierno.
Andrew Barbano is a 49-year Nevadan and editor of NevadaLabor.com. Barbwire by Barbano has originated in the Tribune since Aug. 12, 1988. E-mail <barbano@frontpage.reno.nv.us>
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