2013 Update on the Don and Birdie Reeder Global Emergency Fund

Mom, Abigail and Caitlyn

 "The Reeder Fund is used to help children and youth around the world with emergency needs resulting from war, threat of trafficking, hunger, clothing, medical needs, or housing."


Many of you know that after my mother's passing, we initiated a project through the Children's Emergency Relief International organization, in her and my father's name, that helps children throughout the world cope with emergency and other exigent situations. I wrote more extensively about the Fund in a prior post you can read here. And I believe I've posted updates at the end of every year, describing the Fund's successes. Last year, sadly, it was around the time of the Sandy Hook shootings. Still hard to believe something that monstrous could happen.

Along with my brothers and sister-in-law,  and many of her friends and family, I helped initiate this fund to honor my mother, Birdie Reeder, who passed away in 2007. She spent the balance of her life caring for, and in many, many respects, ministering to children. A devout woman her entire life, her very favorite Bible verse was “let the children come to Me.” She and my father made several mission trips throughout the world, all to help children. She spent many years working as a teacher’s assistant in the Humble ISD. And also spent many years teaching Sunday School and running the nursery, and running the Kingwood FBC Mother’s Day Out program. Thousands of people were taught by or sent their kids to Miss Birdie, who cared for them and hugged and loved them as she taught them about Jesus and about life.

Anyway, another year has come and just about gone, so I thought I'd relay some highlights that the Fund achieved this year.

Moldovan teens provided housing

The fund helped provide temporary assistance to orphans leaving orphanages (due to age) in Moldova, thereby helping to keep them away from human traffickers preying on their vulnerability. Through the Fund, I've learned much about this problem. Russians (often) will lure teens to Russia or other countries through the promise of a job. They'll arrange transportation, but then confiscate their passports and other travel documents, making it impossible for them to leave and quite literally making them sex slaves. Through the Fund's assistance, it becomes possible for teens emerging from orphanages, lacking many connections, to become established in their home and resist such victimization.

The Fund provided medical treatment resources to over 500 patients in Coatzacoalcos, Mexico, including over 1,500 prescriptions provided to families residing in that impoverished seaside town near the Yucatan Peninsula.



Hope Orphan Ministry, Central African Republic

The Fund, along with other CERI resources, helped provide for children and war widows in the Central African Republic, which experienced a coup against the government during March. The Hope Orphan Ministry orphanage, a CERI beneficiary, was unable to continue sustaining itself through its on-site farm. The Fund helped provide interim resources to prevent the children and staff from experiencing starvation and malnutrition as the extreme circumstances continued.

The Fund helped Sri Lankan flood victims who lost homes and gardens needed for food.  In addition to other projects along with a Baptist Christian Life Commission grant, the Fund helped sponsorship programs in nine villages with over 100 children participating. The Fund help complete a home for an orphan who lost her father in the war and mother to cancer, gaining considerable positive publicity throughout the area.

Assistance during Sri Lankan floods

The Fund helped provide South Africans with resources to plant and maintain sustainable gardens. It furnished not only initial seeds and tools, but also taught the recipients efficient farming techniques and how to teach other local residents as well.

We've expanded the Fund's mission and scope over the years. Initially, it focused on individual and transitory needs. Like helping children emerge from orphanages or paying for utilities or rent, or tuition for an apprenticeship program. The Fund now can be used to pay for other needs, such as shelter, medicine, or food and farming. Its startling and awe-inspiring to think there are "Reeder Houses" in various parts of this world, providing shelter to children as a legacy of my mom's care for children.

So we have great ambitions for the Fund as it heads into its sixth year.  We know that through our involvement, and CERI's management, everything the Fund does, and every project to which it contributes, represents something that Mom would have approved and tried to assist. That's the only direction we've ever provided CERI, and its yielded astonishing results.

Certainly we encourage donations from anyone who would like to help further this type of mission. Many of our friends and extended family have graciously helped support the Reeder Fund's work over the years, and we are extremely grateful for that. If you would like more information about the Fund, or CERI, the website can be accessed here. And you can donate at this page. It has a drop down menu where you can designate your donation to go to the Fund. Or you can send a check, designating your donation for the Reeder Fund, to:

CERI USA Headquarters
1406 Stonehollow Suite 400
Kingwood, TX 77339

Thanks for following along and learning a little bit about the Reeder Fund and its important successes throughout 2013. I'm sure Miss Birdie watches over this and helps steer it along.

Merry Christmas Everybody, Merry Christmas Everyone

Work has kept me from writing. I hate when that happens. I still aspire to write a couple more posts before year end. But that's not going to happen before Christmas Day.

So let me wish all you Affirmers a very Merry Christmas. Thanks for reading my posts, which by all accounts seem longer than War and Peace or a calculus textbook. Just trying to "infotain."

Do try to overeat and indulge this Christmas, but lay off the political arguments. Don't debate abortion, or gay marriage, or health care on Christmas Day. At least have the good sense to put the guns and knives away before you do so. You don't want to wind up on KPRC Channel 2's "body count" style local newscast. ("Thanks for joining us tonight and we hope you're enjoying a nice holiday. In our top story tonight, we take you to [insert first year reporter's name] in the Greenspoint area, where a 49 year old man allegedly has shot his brother, his brother's girlfriend, and his neighbor arguing whether Katy Perry is better than Miley Cyrus.") Local news, ugh.

Instead, try to spend time with your loved ones looking over old photos and talking about the good times. Unless you had some kind of Mystic River childhood, in which case focus on the now.

I'm going home shortly, just in time to miss Christmas Eve services with my own family. I might try to crash another church service. You never know in Kingwood. I'd check out the Catholics but the parking is always abysmal and they keep me out of the receiving line (or as you call it, "communion"). They need a bigger parking lot. The Lutherans put on a good service as I recall, courtesy no doubt of former Rev. Brookover, but it happens too late.

Ok, the more I write the more this goes downhill. I totes picked the wrong day to buy the first Velvet Underground album (or was it really the right day?). And, look at the time! I must be going.

Let me close out by once again sharing with you Steve Martin's Christmas wish. This is what I really wanted to say. Everyone hunker down, stay safe, pray for peace, and only think happy thoughts. ¡Feliz Navidad, y'all!

Top 5 Texans of All Time

Texas Ranger Joaquin Jackson

"Earlier today, we heard the beginning of the Preamble to the Constitution of the United States, “We, the people.” It is a very eloquent beginning. But when the document was completed on the seventeenth of September 1787, I was not included in that “We, the people.”  I felt somehow for many years that George Washington and Alexander Hamilton just left me out by mistake.  But through the process of amendment, interpretation and court decision I have finally been included in 'We, the people.'

Today, I am an inquisitor; I believe hyperbole would not be fictional and would not overstate the solemnness that I feel right now.  My faith in the Constitution is whole, it is complete, it is total.  I am not going to sit here and be an idle spectator to the diminution, the subversion, the destruction of the Constitution."
--Rep. Barbara Jordan, 1973

The Grand Finale. The piece d' resistance. The last Top 5 list for a long, long time.

This is gonna be lengthy, but y'all will just have to suck it up. Because this is where I talk about Texas.

I know its supposed to be Top 5 things that make life worth living. But that seemed a little heavy and preachy. So, I thought what better way to bid farewell to the lists than to talk about my favorite place in the whole world? The place I'll probably never leave. The place that will be my home for nearly my entire life? The greatest state among 50 great states.

Ok, geez, get on with it.

Texas!

The only state to have been an independent country. Revered in myth, movies, books, art, and music. The most famous of the United States. The only state where it means something to be from. The state that treasures its past but always looks forward.

Bluebonnets and Paintbrushes, Texas Hill Country

Numerous libraries are devoted solely to the topic of Texas. Numerous educational and research institutions exist focused solely on Texas or Texas-centric topics. Even in every third world, backwater, jungle-ridden, malaria infested pit, most everyone has heard of Texas. When I visited New Zealand, I took a tour of their national capital. The guide asked everyone to say which country they had come from. People listed off places like France, England, Australia, Germany, Japan. I said "Texas." No one said, "that's only a state," or "what do you mean," or "that's not a country." They all just got it.

By contrast, no one has ever heard of, or will ever hear of, Delaware.

I've lived in Texas for nearly 50 years, and there's four things you have to accept if you hope to understand it at all.

Colorado River, McKinney Roughs

• Texas is wild. The land is wild. Even today, you can't live in Texas and be some namby pamby sweater wearer. Well, I mean, maybe in Dallas. But it takes stones to live in Texas. Its either as hot as the surface of the sun or as cold as Derek Jeter ditching last night's conquest the next morning. The soil is pretty much dust over vast stretches. South of San Antonio consists mainly of mesquite, cactus, and wild hogs. Tornadoes, ice storms, Jerry Jones, and Neiman Marcus sales blow out huge swaths of north Texas. Hurricanes, subsidence, mosquitoes, encephalitis, and refinery smoke takes care of southeast Texas. Mountains, canyons, and plateau dominate west Texas. Piney woods and rolling hills cover the east. Despite all that, Texas is beautiful, the same way that anything wild and free is beautiful. The Texas Hill Country, Big Bend National Park, Palo Duro Canyon, Padre Island National Seashore, the Big Thicket, the Nueces River valley, Caddo Lake...these places all inspire the imagination and the senses. Consequently, the people are wild. Texas was settled by two kinds of people: Germans and Bohemians, and criminals. Its the Australia of the United States. You came to Texas basically because you had to. You couldn't get along anywhere else. So naturally, to survive you had to do what you had to do once you got here. You had to fight the land to survive. And you didn't want some pointy head bureaucrat telling you what you could and couldn't do. That attitude survives today, in spades.  "Don't fence me in." Carry guns? No problem. Low taxes, low government spending, fewer laws, few lawsuits, private property rights. Politicians come and go, but Texans basically want to live their lives the way they want to, and are prepared to fight for it. "Come and Take It" was no lie. So Texans are audacious. Translation, we tend to tear ass all over the place. Chess players and encounter group attenders we are not. Hunting, fishing, camping, hiking, shooting guns of all kinds, whooping and a'hollerin, driving fast, playing sports, racing boats, dancing, eating everything in sight, makin' noise, tellin' stories. Accidentally running over your cheating husband. Three times. Hey, accidents happen, people. Especially when you're sleeping with your receptionist.

Enchanted Rock

• Texas is about contrasts and contradictions. These abound. As I mentioned, the land itself is full of contrasts: beaches and mountains, grasslands and deserts, forests and plains. You name a kind of terrain, you'll find it in Texas. Maybe not tundra, but whatevs. Its a state that relishes partying and good times but also strongly embraces religion. It has a strongly racist history and yet some of its most famous and cherished figures are minorities. Its known as the reddest, redneck state, yet has multiple world-class research universities, one of the most accomplished medical centers in the world, NASA, dozens of Fortune 500 corporation headquarters, and leading artistic, musical, and performance centers.

Sunset near Abilene

That's a long way. Better stop at the winery for supplies

• Texas is big. Vastness defines Texas. Look to either side of your screen. That's Texas. When you cross the Sabine River on IH-10 going into Orange County, you see a highway mileage sign that says "El Paso 857" That's longer than the distance from El Paso to Los Angeles, and longer than the distance between Orange, Texas and Jacksonville, Florida. A drive in the northeast that would span five states usually wouldn't take you out of even one part of Texas. As such, everything Texan is bigger. Haven't you heard? "Everything's bigger in Texas." The mascot at the State Fair is named "Big Tex." In some parts of Texas, you can drive an hour...to visit your next door neighbor. We have the world's biggest rodeo, rattlesnake roundup, football stadium, honky tonk, so on and so forth. The space defines everything. Cities keep expanding outward. People want big lots, big houses, big vehicles, big TVs, big barbecue grills, big furniture. Big everything.

• Texans support each other. No matter what. You'll never see Texans rioting, or looting after a storm, or tearing down barricades, or burning stores or cars. You will see them bringing food to storm victims, or helping their neighbors, or calmly pitching in during a crisis, or greeting their new neighbors. We will take in thousands of New Orleans storm victims when no one else would. University of Texas students will donate blood, money, and other items to Texas A&M students and families affected by the Bonfire collapse, and lead memorials in their honor. Central Texas will take in Houston refugees fleeing a hurricane. Relief efforts will spontaneously spring up throughout the state to help Jarrell tornado victims, West explosion victims, Texas City disaster victims, and so forth. When a famous Texan or Texas team succeeds, we all feel pride for their success. When they fail or suffer, we all feel it. In the end, Texas isn't a place, its people. Bound to a place by tradition and respect.

Texas, though a relatively young state, has produced national and international leaders in nearly every imaginable field. We're the home of major universities, corporate headquarters, NASA, military installations, energy production, cutting edge medical treatment and research, finance, movie production, music and art, outstanding cuisine, sports, and plain ol' havin' fun. Texans have produced invaluable achievements, and produced some of the foremost leaders, in:

• politics (Ann Richards, Bush 41 and 43, Sam Rayburn, John Nance Garner, John Connolly, Henry B. Gonzalez, Jim Wright, Lloyd Bentsen)
• military (Chester Nimitz, Audie Murphy, John Bell Hood, Claire Chennault, Earl Rudder, Roy Benavidez)
• arts (Stanley Marsh 3, Elisabet Ney, Wyatt Hedrick, Tex Avery)
• science and medicine (Dr. Denton Cooley, Robert Lee Moore, Steven Weinberg, Paul Chu, Ilya Prigogene),
• music (Van Cliburn, ZZ Top, Roy Orbison, Buddy Holly, George Jones, Ernest Tubb, Ray Price, Bob Wills, Ornette Coleman, Willie Nelson, George Strait, Lyle Lovett, Doug Sahm, Roky Erickson, Selena, Don Henley, Jerry Jeff Walker, Steve Miller, Steven Stills, Usher, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Lee Ann Rimes, Janis Joplin, Tex Ritter, Beyoncé)
• fashion (Stanley Marcus, Jerry Hall, Lois Chiles)
• movies and theatre (Tommy Lee Jones, Farrah Fawcett, Aaron Spelling, Rip Torn, Tom Mix, Pola Negri, Dennis and Randy Quaid, Ginger Rogers, Mary Martin, Robert Rodriguez, Richard Linklater, Terence Malick, Cyd Charisse, Steve Martin, Carol Burnett, Jamie Foxx, Larry Hagman, Jennifer Garner, Jennifer Love Hewitt, Bill Paxton, Debbie Reynolds, the Wilson brothers, Sissy Spacek, Tommy Tune)
• journalism (Bill Moyers, Dan Rather, Molly Ivins, Liz Carpenter, Walter Cronkite, Sam Donaldson, Dan Jenkins, Frank Fallon, Dave Campbell, Bud Shrake, Linda Ellerbee, Rex Reed, John Henry Faulk, Jim Lehrer)
• business (Red McCombs, Conrad Hilton, John Mackey, Ross Perot, Sid Richardson, Mary Kay Ash, Trammel Crow, Charles Butt, Mark Cuban, H.L. Hunt)
• education and scholarship (Bill Moore, Frank Erwin, John Silber, Umphrey Lee, Herbert Reynolds, Sul Ross, Earl Rudder, Edgar Lovett)
• sports (Nolan Ryan, Earl Campbell, Hakeem Olajuwon, Tom Landry, Doak Walker, Adrian Peterson, Drew Brees, Bobby Layne, Jack Johnson, Babe Didrikson Zaharias, Carl Lewis, AJ Foyt, Ben Hogan, Byron Nelson, Lee Trevino, Michael Johnson)
• agriculture (Robert Kleberg, Charles Goodnight, Richard King)
• energy (Glenn McCarthy, Walter Fondren, Ross Sterling, George Mitchell, Howard Hughes, Sr.), law (Leon Jaworski, Joe Jamail, Tom Clark, Racehorse Haynes, John O'Quinn, Kenneth Starr, Rusty Hardin, Walter Umphrey)
• writing (Larry L. King, Larry McMurtry, O. Henry, J. Frank Dobie, Billy Lee Brammer, Horton Foote, Elmer Kelton)
• philanthropy (Ima Hogg, Ben Taub, the Hobby family)

And on and on.

And I didn't even mention how we have the best women. Beyond those mentioned above, we have Lady Bird Johnson, Laura and Barbara Bush, Oveta Culp Hobby, Joanne King, Susana Dickinson, Nellie Connolly, Carrie Marcus, Miriam "Ma" Ferguson, Katherine Anne Porter, Bonnie Parker, Sarah Hughes. And Jessica. And Jaclyn. Top that.

The Top 5 Texans embody these attributes in every way. They symbolize everything that makes up Texas, and everything that has ever made Texas. Both good and bad.

5. Matthew McConaughey. The most bro-tastic guy ever. Ah, just kidding. Obvs. This isn't Men's Health. "Alright, alright, alright."

5. Sam Houston. First President of the Republic of Texas. Commanding General of the Texas Army that defeated Santa Anna at San Jacinto. To my knowledge still the only person ever to have been elected to the US Senate from two different states. Governor of the States of Tennessee and of Texas, the latter post from which he resigned rather than take an oath of loyalty to the Confederacy. First in a long, long line of great Texas statesmen. Despite the prevailing sentiment against the Natives, Sam Houston spent much of his childhood among the Cherokee Indians of Tennessee, and was a lifelong friend of the native peoples. Like many, many other great Texans, he came to Texas as a broken, down alcoholic who ran out of options in his native Tennessee, hoping to rebuild his life. He had a Cherokee wife, ran a trading post, and was so bad off the Cherokees called him "Big Drunk." He came to Texas and within three years assumed command of the Texas Army, which was little more than a collection of farmers fleeing the army Santa Anna had sent to put down the fledgling Texas rebellion, though wounded badly at San Jacinto. Within a few months, he had beaten Santa Anna and negotiated an accord that allowed the new Republic to commence. After a long career as President, Senator and Governor, he resigned as Governor rather than support the Confederacy. Ol' Sam was a great storyteller, and was quick to turn a phrase. When he was baptized in a river he was told it would wash his sins away. He responded, "Lord help the fish down below.” When David G. Burnet, who stood 5' 1" to Houston's 6', challenged him to a duel, he refused, saying "I refuse to fight downhill." He could be eloquent as well. When local authorities refused to let him speak during his 1857 campaign for Governor in the courthouse, he told the crowd to follow him to a large oak tree on a hill just outside of town, "on the soil of Texas. I have a right to speak there because I have watered it with my blood." To this day, schools, streets, hospitals, counties, and the fourth largest city in the nation bear his name. And, fitting for such a towering figure, the first word uttered from the surface of the moon was his name, "Houston."

Dr. Michael E. DeBakey

4. Dr. Michael DeBakey. Most people don't think "world class medical center" when "Texas" comes up. But they should. Dallas boasts the University of Texas Southwestern Medical School, one of the nation's top medical schools. The Texas Medical Center in Houston, led by the University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, the University of Texas Health Science Center, the  Baylor College of Medicine, and the Methodist and St. Luke's Hospitals are on the cutting edge (no pun) of medical research, education, and care. Every year, the Medical Center and other Texas medical institutions treat thousands from all over the world. Countless people from other states and nations travel to Texas, and particularly to the Medical Center, to seek groundbreaking treatments. Dr. Michael DeBakey led the way in the Medical Center in attaining this status. Born in 1908 in Lake Charles to Lebanese immigrants, he graduated from Tulane Medical School. While still in medical school, he developed the roller pump, an essential component of the heart-lung machine that makes open heart surgery possible. He performed his residency and internships in New Orleans, where in 1939 he was one of the first doctors to connect smoking with cancer. After serving in WWII, where he helped establish the MASH unit concept, he joined the Baylor College of Medicine faculty, serving as Chairman of the Surgery Department for nearly 50 years, and later became President and then Chancellor of the College. The College was on academic probation among accreditation societies, and broke, when he arrive in 1948. Today it is among the finest medical schools in the world. His career included a number of landmark first procedures, and was one of the first surgeons to perform a coronary bypass surgery. He helped develop the artificial heart. He invented a surgery to repair the aortic dissection, using a Dacron graft to repair the artery, a surgery that he himself would undergo some 50 years later. He was one of the first to surgically treat blocked carotid arteries. He was one of the first to perform a heart transplant. He treated world leaders, such as Boris Yeltsin, the Shah of Iran, the Duke of Windsor, Lyndon Johnson, and Richard Nixon. He helped found the VA Hospital system to care for returning war veterans. He helped found other Medical Center institutions, including the Methodist DeBakey Cardiac Center, which treated my own heart ailment. He helped support the original 1965 Medicare legislation. Dr. DeBakey practiced medicine until the day he died, nearly 100 years old. The inventions and procedures he helped pioneer are now commonplace. These procedures, these institutions, these devices, have saved millions of lives. People all around the world have gone on to have families, create great works, and enjoy longer and happier lives than they would have, all because of Dr. DeBakey.



Congresswoman Barbara Jordan

3. Barbara Jordan. Another larger than life figure. She was born in 1936, and grew up in Houston's impoverished Fifth Ward as the youngest of three girls. Her father, a warehouse clerk, helped her attend Texas Southern University, where she graduated magna cum laude. She graduated from prestigious Boston University Law School thereafter and passed the Massachusetts and Texas bar exams. She practiced law in Houston until 1967, where thanks to federal voting rights legislation and redistricting that created more opportunity for minority candidates, she became the first African-American elected to the Texas Senate since Reconstruction, and the first black woman ever.  Rather than becoming a lightning rod, however, she was a pragmatist and worked to gain her colleagues trust and admiration, a feat many Senators never accomplish, to obtain legislation favorable to her district. She was elected to Congress in 1973, the first Southern black woman to achieve that feat. She rose to national prominence during the Watergate hearings, where even though a freshman (back in the days when a member had to have been in Congress for several terms to have any real sway), her powerful questioning and advocacy helped galvanize the nation against Nixon. Her speech at the hearings represents one of the most powerful instances of oratory in that body's history, and maybe in American history. People forget, but for quite awhile after Watergate broke, Nixon's popularity remained unaffected. It was only after Leon Jaworski and the House Judiciary Committee began uncovering evidence that connected Nixon to the break in and the larger "dirty tricks," and as hastened by Jordan's and Sam Ervin's relentless pursuit of the truth that the tide turned against Nixon. She had been considered as a potential Vice Presidential candidate that year, and several others thereafter. The Democratic Party chose her as the keynote speaker for the 1976 Convention, where she delivered a powerful speech on unity, equality, and accountability. One delegate even voted to nominate her for President despite the fact she had never been a candidate. She served in Congress only six years. Though in later years, she was mentioned for prominent Cabinet appointments, she began to suffer health problems. So she returned to Texas and became a Professor at the University of Texas LBJ School of Public Affairs. She was the commencement speaker at my own University of Texas graduation in 1986. I still remember her theme phrase "conviction values" ringing through the years, in her magnificent, authoritative, booming voice. The campus features a statue of her near the Texas Union building. Barbara Jordan came along at a unique moment in history, where the Imperial Presidency, emboldened by the Cold War, threatened to distort Constitutional precepts. One of the primary functions of a legislative body is to hold the executive accountable. At a time when few were willing to take on President Nixon, Barbara Jordan did so in a thunderous, steeling way. As the product of the 1960s invigoration of Constitutional civil rights, she fittingly and ultimately became the voice for Constitutional government. Barbara Jordan showed minorities and women that they could accomplish anything they set out to do. And as a lesson to those who have followed in her wake, she also proved she could obtain her goals in a collaborative way in partnership with others rather than as a shrill voice always pronouncing judgment.

Howard Hughes, Jr.

2. Howard Hughes. Our very own Charles Foster Kane. Not many people seem to remember Howard Hughes, or even know he was a Texan. Ok, for a time, Howard Hughes was the richest man in the world. The Bill Gates of his day. But Howard Hughes was born and died in Houston. He led a life that makes someone like Richard Branson look positively sluggish. His father, Howard Sr., invented the rotary drill bit, which was responsible for unlocking most of the oil in Texas. Through good business sense he built the Hughes Tool Co. into a thriving company. He died while Howard Jr. was still a teenager, but left him most of his fortune and the company. Howard Jr. was an inventor at an early age. He built Houston's first radio transmitter at age 11, and the first motorized bicycle at age 12. He began to fly planes at age 14, and audited classes at Cal Tech. He briefly attended the Rice Institute, but after marrying, he moved to Los Angeles to make movies. He won an early Academy Award for Directing, and produced numerous other movies over the next few years, such as Hell's Angels, The Outlaw (the one with Jane Russell lying in the hay...what up, girl?), and the original Scarface. He acquired struggling RKO Pictures and built it into one of the major studios of its time. While in California, Hughes created Hughes Aircraft, which pioneered early American aircraft development and later became Hughes Aerospace. He famously built the "Spruce Goose," the world's largest airplane. His planes set new speed and distance records, and were important in developing fighters and bombers during World War II. Hughes himself was a test pilot, and set many records in craft he helped develop. He bought TWA Airlines, and built it into one of the world's largest airlines. Other pursuits included the Hughes Medical Institute, acquiring and running nearly half of the Las Vegas hotels and casinos during the 1960s (thereby running the mob out of town for a time), and the Glomar Explorer. Sadly, his later life was marked by obsessive compulsive disorder, physical pain, drug use, and depression, which gave rise to substantial public ridicule. He may have spent most of his life elsewhere, but Howard Hughes was the classic huge Texas personality: restless, distracted, ambitious, insistent, and way over the top. He built an empire that both glorified himself and employed thousands. He developed innovations that helped America through the war and to develop as the economic superpower it became. And, in the end, what's a little weirdness among friends?

President Lyndon B. Johnson, 1968

1. Lyndon Baines Johnson. The greatest Texan of all. I didn't even much like his politics. I remember very clearly when he died in 1972, our elementary school sent us all home that day. The assistant principal, a bustling young black man named Mr. Baines (ironically), had to hold back his tears as he announced to us that that day was not a holiday, not a day to play, not a day for fun, but a day to mourn, to reflect, and to celebrate the life of a hero. Such was the respect that LBJ still commanded in Texas and particularly among minorities, while the Vietnam War still raged on. This is my favorite Johnson photo, and maybe my favorite photo of any President. He's listening to a tape his son-in-law, Capt. Charles Robb, sent from Vietnam. Captain (later Senator) Robb was describing the conditions there. This wasn't some maniacal war criminal bent on murdering innocent civilians, uncaring what toll it took on American soldiers and their families. This was a man who felt every death and who took all the violence personally. This was a man who struggled with the awesome weight of his responsibilities, but who carried on because he had no choice. That's a quintessential Texan trait.

OK, millions of words have been written about President Johnson, but its difficult to cut it short because he led a fascinating life at nearly every age.  Robert Caro's four volume work provides the definitive resource.  Johnson was born in Gillespie County, Texas in a house with no electricity, and ascended to live in the White House and become the most powerful person in the world. He graduated from the then Southwest Texas State Teacher's College in San Marcos, and later taught school. He became Congressman Richard Kleberg's secretary, and began meeting people all throughout official Washington. In the first of a long string of fortuitous decisions, he married Lady Bird Taylor, a cultivated, affluent woman from East Texas. She helped run his early campaigns, drawing on her experience as a journalist to make sound decisions as against Johnson's innate impulsiveness. After Johnson won election to Congress on a New Deal platform, his manner and brashness alienated many Democratic members, and the administration. But he had an in with Texas oil millionaires, and was able to spread that money throughout Washington to help members facing difficult re-election campaigns. Money buys friends, and LBJ saw his influence growing. While in Congress, he championed the Rural Electrification Act, which brought electricity to rural areas including his native Hill Country, and later listed it as among the accomplishments of which he was most proud. He briefly served in a combat position as a Naval officer during WWII, but returned to Washington once the military prohibited serving Congressmembers from participating in war zones. The 1948 Senate election against Coke Stevenson, which he won by the razor thinnest of razor thin margins through Duval County vote fraud, earned him the nickname "Landslide Lyndon." But, that was just another example of a Texan doing what it took to succeed. For all the caterwauling over that election, everyone forgets that back then, vote fraud was just a common thing. Coke Stevenson did it too. LBJ was probably the greatest Senate majority leader of all time. Within a few short years he became Majority Leader. His mastery of the Senate exceeded all others. Alternatively imposing and flattering, he could work a colleague like no other. The "Johnson Treatment" became legendary, in which he used his imposing frame to lean into someone's personal space and command their attention through cajoling, flattery, threats, exuberance, pleading, commands, and so forth. He knew everything going on in Washington, knowledge he used to push through his agenda. He agreed to become JFK's running mate after his own Presidential campaign fizzled, and immediately regretted it. He felt like he had become useless, and had no role in the administration given the Kennedy advisors' disdain for him (particularly Robert Kennedy).


The Treatment, with Sen. Richard Russell

He never thought he would become President, but didn't apologize when he did. He appointed the Warren Commission. Assailed in its time, the Commission is now (I believe) regarded as having conducted a superb investigation and analysis during an incredibly difficult period in American history. He immediately moved to push President Kennedy's stalled legislative agenda. Using his legislative expertise, he pushed through his Great Society agenda: Medicare, Medicaid, the Anti-Poverty Act, the Civil Rights Acts of 1964 and 1968, the Voting Rights Act, the Immigration Act of 1965, he created the National Endowments for the Arts, and for the Humanities. He kept the Six Day War from escalating, despite Soviet/Egyptian furor. He helped tamp down violence after the MLK assassination. Of course, there was...the War. What can I say? Except this. People forget the politics that led us into the War. Barry Goldwater and the Right were screaming about appeasement of the Soviets. Kennedy had been humiliated at the Bay of Pigs. We had "lost" China and half the State Department was purged as a result. McCarthy had ultimately been put down but the fervent "better dead than red" sentiment that he exploited remained very strong. Korea had been viewed by many as an unacceptable stalemate, and Kennedy had after all committed the nation to "pay any price, bear any burden...oppose any foe" to assure the survival of liberty. That's the "read my lips no new taxes" of the 1960s. What was Johnson supposed to do? Just give in? Politically not an option at the time. Of course, totally bungling and mismanaging the thing should have been off the table too, but those instincts that had served him so well in the Congress utterly failed him as Commander in Chief. Delegation, command, discipline....these things are not the legislative way. Wars don't come with personal, one on one solutions, nor are they won through mediation. But you'll notice it took foreign policy experts Nixon and Kissinger five more years to extract us from Vietnam. I'm not sure how it would have been different if Abraham Lincoln or Franklin Roosevelt had been in charge. But Johnson's failure was a glorious one, over the top, momentous, in some ways gallant. A very Texan kind of failure.

So there you have it, the end of the list, and of the Top 5 lists.

I'll just assume we've all had enough to last for a long time.

NEXT-a report on the Don and Birdie Reeder Global Emergency Fund

Top 5 Bill Murray Scenes

Lost In Translation

First off, thoughts and prayers for the Kennedy family and our nation. I have to say, prayers for the Tippit and Oswald families too. They were also victims that weekend. All these Kennedy documentaries and remembrances have a distinct 9/11 feel. I can hardly imagine what a horrific weekend that must have been. The President belonged to all of us. President Kennedy inspired an entire generation to service. His youthful vigor symbolized American energy and enthusiasm in the 1960s. I know his memory will continue to do so.

So naturally its the right day to talk about Bill Murray.

Only Tom Hanks comes to mind as an actor who started off as a limited "one trick pony" but evolved into a truly gifted, versatile performer. Murray doesn't get the same credit though because his comedic gift is so transcendent that it tends to overwhelm his more subtle, dramatic moments. And he simply doesn't work as often.

What the hell is that?

If you don't know Bill Murray, I wonder why you even bother reading what I post. Because we clearly live on different planets. He started on the National Lampoon radio show, along with Dan Aykroyd and Gilda Radner. When passed over for the original "Saturday Night" cast, he spent that season on the competing "Saturday Night Live" on ABC starring Howard Cosell (that's right, look it up, the NBC program was originally entitled "Saturday Night" while the ABC program's title was "Saturday Night Live"). He later replaced Chevy Chase of course, and the rest is history. Only it almost wasn't. The audience inexplicably missed Chase and hated Murray. More proof that nearly every American up past 11:30 during the '70s was a cokehead. Murray famously turned it around on the strength of an inspired "confessional" and the even more inspired lounge singer character. Then the nerds, Weekend Update ("Woodman!"), Walter Cronkite, the drug distributing record produce (Jerry L Dini), Triumph inevitably ensued.

Movie success built upon itself. Meatballs and Where the Buffalo Roam hardly suggested the monumental heights that he would reach. He was offered the Peter Riegert role in Animal House (Boon) but turned it down. Caddyshack was the first major success. As the largely improvised Carl Spackler, Murray created a role for which every man worth knowing has memorized nearly every line. (Put it another way, if you're a man who doesn't have just about every Caddyshack line memorized, I won't waste my time on you). Then came the enormously successful Stripes, followed by a role in Tootsie that kept expanding beyond the script as Murray's skills impressed Dustin Hoffman and director Sydney Pollack. Ghostbusters, of course, really broke him. If you don't remember Murray from SNL or Caddyshack, you remember his as Dr. Peter Venkmann, and lines like "back off man, I'm a scientist," or "he slimed me!" or "its true, this man has no dick."

Groundhog Day

Murray backed off from stardom after that, appearing in some money-making roles such as Groundhog Day or Scrooged, but working in some more meaty performances, like The Razor's Edge, a remake of the old Tyrone Power movie. Basically he slowed down, emphasizing quality over quantity.

Rushmore marked the turn toward more nuanced, complicated roles. Herman Blume represents my favorite Bill Murray performance. A man, not unlike Murray himself, beaten down into resignation despite outwardly appearing very successful, finding meaning and in a way, salvation, in connecting with an incredibly maladjusted, fantasy-living high school student named Max Fischer. Murray is funny, but not uproariously funny. He is serious and somber, without becoming apoplectic as if participating in some mid-town acting school project. His mere glance or shrug or posture conveyed worlds of inner turmoil and emotion. Yet, the character was funny too.

Rushmore

From there, Murray blended funny roles with more serious. More Wes Anderson collaborations followed, in which Murray's characters sometimes blended into the ensemble (The Royal Tennenbaums and Moonrise Kingdom), and sometimes took main billing (The Life Aquatic). He almost won an Oscar for Lost In Translation, where he played another world-weary famous performer, who connects with another young person. I loved that movie, though its not quite as challenging to appear drawn to Scarlett Johansson as to Jason Schwartzmann. Broken Flowers, though underrated, also showcased Murray's burgeoning depth, as a man forced to confront his past as he searches for the woman who may have anonymously notified him that she had borne him a son many years before. Most recently he's won acclaim for portraying Pres. Franklin Roosevelt in Hyde Park on the Hudson. An acting journey that takes one from Carl Spackler to Franklin Roosevelt makes for one hell of a ride.

Its also pretty cool to have been the first guest ever on the David Letterman show. Both the CBS show and the original "Late Night With David Letterman" NBC show. Letterman didn't book Murray as the first guest just because he was a big name. That shows respect.

So here's my Top 5 Bill Murray Scenes:

5. Star Wars. The lounge singer on Saturday Night Live, Nick Winters. In his full glory with the mustache, gold chain, shirt opened to the navel, and Paul Shaffer accompanying him on piano. He would reprise the character several times to great success. That character just skewered every self-aggrandizing, two bit, incompetent performer you've ever seen. And its perfectly Murray-absolutely committed 100% to the joke, pouring every ounce into the premise, working totally without a net.

4. The Dalai Lama. "So I jumped ship in Hong Kong...." Totally improvised. 1:20 of sheer brilliance. As he's poking a pitchfork into his scene partners neck. Now, it was completely insane. Carl Spackler, caddying for the Dalai Lama who was playing golf? In Tibet? OK, sure. Why not? It helped explain the character's full on craziness later in the movie, and provided a nice contrast to when he caddied for the Bishop ("I don't think the heavy stuff's going to come down for some time!"). All in all, inspired. "So I've got THAT going for me. Which is nice."

3. Haircut scene. From Rushmore, and not one of his more well known scenes. Its not even funny. Its just incredibly revealing. After learning that Max's dad is a barber and not a neurosurgeon, in one look, he completes his bond with Max Fischer and completely understands not only Max's life but his own. I love how sometimes, just a look or a gesture can convey so much more meaning than words. Only a truly gifted actor can reveal so much of a character through such a seemingly small but truly profound act. You're not going to see Keanu Reeves do that. Or, really, much of anything except breathe and occupy space and grunt.

2. Are You the Keymaster? The scene that most perfectly showcases Murray's sarcastic, flippant persona. He encounters Sigourney Weaver, made up and semi-dressed, slithering and cooing in the most lascivious way imaginable. Only problem? She's possessed by Zuul, the minion of Gozer. Murray struggles with whether to accept her..."advances," but ultimately reasons "you've got two people in there already. It could get a little crowded." By the way, he tells Egon that he has "whacked her up" with about 300 cc's of Thorazine.  Which he has...why? He goes over to Dana's apartment to pick her up for their first date. I know I always carry certain things with me on all dates. Let's see...money, ID, keys, altoids maybe, a syringe, Thorazine, handkerchief....Hmm, that's totally not creepy. Anyway, its still an incredibly compelling scene. "Bad news honey. I gotta go to work. Will you stay here in bed until I get back?"

1. Cinderella Story. OK, really, its this scene, and then there's everything else. Probably the funniest improvised scene ever filmed. "Tears in his eyes I guess...." The shooting script just said "Carl re-enacts a childhood sports fantasy." Murray had the crew move the row of mums to the set. He nailed it in one take. That's every golf announcer there's ever been. "It looks like a mirac- ITS IN THE HOLE!! ITS IN THE HOLE!!!"

Honorable Mention: This man has no dick. "Human sacrifice! Dogs and cats, living together! Mass hysteria!"

NEXT-we've come to the end. The last Top 5 list. Its supposed to be Top 5 Things in Life That Make It Worth Living. But will it? Tune in and find out!

Top 5 Biggest Douchebags

A-Rod's number one fan

Has anyone seen my sharkskin laptop sleeve?

Can someone get my towel? Its in my room next to my Irish walking cape.

I'm like a sexual snowflake. Each night with me is a unique experience.

Pine has no place in this loft. Its the wood of poor people and outhouses.

Damn it! I can't find my driving moccasins anywhere!

Has anyone seen my good peacoat?

Bathtubs are medieval filth cauldrons.

You're listening to the radio and writing with a pen. What decade are we in?
--quotes from Schmidt, the douchiest character on the New Girl

Well, Formula One weekend has descended, like locusts or Mexican cross-boundary wildfire smoke, upon Austin. Can it be a coincidence that we've arrived at that spot on the Top 5 list where we must contemplate...the douchebag? I think not. Like New York's rats or LA's traffic, the d-bags are well on their way to taking Austin as their prize. Combine money, fashion, and pretentiousness, and you inevitably attract the douchebag like garbage brings flies. That's the Austin events calendar in a nutshell.

What's a "douchebag" exactly? I mean, in the modern parlance. Urban Dictionary defines it as:  "An individual who has an over-inflated sense of self worth, compounded by a low level of intellegence, behaving ridiculously in front of colleagues with no sense of how moronic he appears." The still hilarious web site "Hot Chicks with Douchebags" explains:  "A douchebag is not defined as simply a series of hand gestures, facial expressions, overly gelled hair or a giant Jesus bling around the neck. A douchebag is a state of mind. It is a place where men go to become scrote. Where machismo mixes with testosterone to form a foul cocktail of rank sewage that smells vaguely of cheap cologne." In other words, everyone on the Jersey Shore. Or who lives in Vegas.  I think of it as an umbrella term that encompasses a particular lifestyle, aesthetic, conduct, attitude, and appearance.

Full house

What oh so subtle, tell tale signs mark the douchebag's natural habitat/breeding ground? Helen Keller couldn't miss them (what...too soon?). And, like a 12 car pile up, you can't help but look despite his ghastly appearance. Look for someone reeking with undeserved arrogance. Consumed with preening. Incessantly making largely meaningless hand or arm gestures. Dripping with adornment (you know, "bling"). Axe body spray. Sufficient tattooing to support that "fierce" look. Comically sculpted and processed, multi-level hair, including designer facial hair (numerous varieties of either the Prince Valiant pencil thin beard or seemingly unkempt beard but in reality meticulously trimmed to maintain that "not maintained" look). Ed Hardy clothing or some other "sad to be so skin tight" get up. Like...skinny jeans. "Overtrained" muscles (sometimes lurking under 25% body fat, other times with "I spend eight hours a day training because I can't keep a real job" body definition). Machismo lacking in substance. Sunglasses worn inside. Fake glasses taken from Elton John's Captain Fantastic-era collection.  Backwards or tilted hat wearing (tags still on, obvs). Rejection of responsibility. Self-inflated ego, usually with unrealistic appraisal of individual importance to the rest of society. In the case of quasi-celebrities (hey "Entourage" guys, what up?) this is known as the "do you know who I am" denouement. Intolerance of anyone else drawing attention in their presence. Mall-gotten airbrush tan. Manwaxing. Obliviousness to other people's feelings or welfare or disease history. Using bizarre and shortened versions of words (because entire words require too much effort, hence, doing something "on the regz," or something is "obvs" or you'll "probs" do something). Not tipping. Treating everything they do like its the most profound and serious activity known to man. Spending far more money than the actually have (gotta represent, yo). Consumption of mass quantities of over-priced alcohol at poseur clubs where the "BOOM BOOM BOOM" sound drowns out any conversational possibilities (which is just fine because the D-bag's nod is his "go to" move). Smoking (often "e-cigarettes"). Ye shall know them by their place at the poolside bar. Or at the W Hotel.

Is it the death stare or the tight shirt that the babes must have?

Poolbags

Oh, and, natch, absolutely crawling with STDs. I mean, so far gone the Centers for Disease Control wouldn't touch them. Dr. McCoy couldn't cure what's crawling through these guys.

Can women be douchebags? Interesting question. The answer is "yes." Absolutely. Check the list. Usually its the plastic surgery crowd. Women who have 35 "best girlfriends ever" and who run in packs of at least 10 at a time everywhere they go. Who constantly scan the room everywhere they go, no matter who they're with. Generally found at hot yoga, Starbucks, malls, marginally upscale salons (featuring nail care and "sunless tanning"), Pilates studios, and the hottest club in town. Wearing clothes at least two sizes too small and 15 years too young. Cheap makeup (hiding permanent breakout and clubbing-induced premature aging spots). Cheaper, clashing color nail polish. Fake hair. Or, chemically processed, trash dyed hair. With roots. Botox. Other, uh, obviously fake attributes. Expensive but ill-fitting and poorly maintained shoes. Purse with frayed lining, which goes with nothing they own. But, like their male counterparts, they too over-adorn, possess unreasonable delusions of attractiveness, a "what can you do for me" attitude, and absolute "me first" back stabbing, run over anyone in the way sensibility. Have you not seen Real Housewives?

Now that you know what we're dealing with, the Top 5 almost writes itself.

5. Kanye West. Going full on crazy ass mofo on Taylor Swift at the VMAs. ALL CAPS TWEETING!!! Showing up late or not at all. Bizarre live TV diatribes. Posing as Jesus (complete with douchy crown of thorns) for Rolling Stone. Saying the government invented AIDS to destroy black people. Yelling at the Grammys to stop playing music until he finished his acceptance speech (which, really, is on the Grammys for giving him an award in the first place. Number of Grammys won by Elvis Presley for rock songs...zero-say whaaaaaaat?). Calling himself the voice of his generation. Uh, ok.


You're fired!

4. Donald Trump. The hair, or whatever kind of animal pelt sits on top of his head, obvs. Modelizing. Delusions of grandeur. The voice. The over-the-top-and-back-down-the-other-side lack of taste. Spending other people's money. Trump made his money in real estate by putting together investment trusts rigged such that he'd make most of the profits while his partners would incur most of the losses. Nice. Putting his name on every project. Trump Plaza. Trump Tower. Trump Country Club. Ego, much? You just know this guy has a vast array of man rings. And a butler.

Hanging on

3. Bieber. Everything that is wrong with this country can be summed up in one word: "Bieber." Vanilla Ice thinks this guy is a little bit much. Shirt baring. Pants hanging. Crotch grabbing. Tatting up to deflect otherwise babyish features. Bling bigger than his entire body. Going to the Anne Frank house in Amsterdam and writing in the guest book that she's have been a "Belieber." Showing up at NBA games wearing the home team's gear (nice loyalty). Driving an Audi with cheetah pattern painted on it. Buying a monkey, then abandoning said monkey on a trip (Ross on Friends reeeeeeeeeally hated that). And, appearing in public looking like this. Teenage girls go crazy for this...why? This is why the Chinese own us.

2. Kris Jenner What can you say about a mother who distributes her daughter's sex tape to the media and then uses that to push her daughters into reality show fame? Milking that for all its worth, all the while emasculating her former Olympian second husband (the first one died after divorcing her, and representing OJ Simpson was only the second worst experience of his life) and hogging as much on camera time as the kids, browbeating them all along. Telling her story non-ironically is to mock her. Like when Tina Fey impersonated Sarah Palin by repeating, word for word, her answers in a Katie Couric interview. Kris Jenner reminds me of what Norman Bates' mother must have been like, before, you know (spoiler alert) ending up in a rocking chair.

Chris Brown's Greatest Hits

1. Chris Brown OK, now we all know this 'bag, right? Rihanna's not the most sympathetic person ever, but there's no call for treating her like your personal speedbag. Then mocking her about it after. Sending out homophobic tweets. Blowing up his Good Morning America dressing room (its one thing to do that if you're Keith Moon, but that act is played my man). Threatening valet parking attendants over $10. Starting a pitbull breeding business. Bar fights. Battered woman neck tattoo. Engaging in hit and run. Why the world has any use for this guy eludes me. Chris Brown,  ARE the biggest douche.

NEXT-Top 5 Bill Murray scenes. Finally, something I actually want to write. "Big hitter, the Lama."

Top 5 Worst Jobs

Ahh, I'm also gonna need you to go ahead
and come in Sunday too, kay?

Peter Gibbons: Michael, we don't have a lot of time on this earth! We weren't meant to spend it this way. Human beings were not meant to sit in little cubicles staring at computer screens all day, filling out useless forms and listening to eight different bosses drone on about about mission statements.
Michael Bolton: I told those fudge-packers I liked Michael Bolton's music.
Peter Gibbons: Oh. That is not right, Michael.
--Office Space, 1999

Well, the magazine P.O.V. came out this week, with a list of the best and worst jobs to have in the next century. The three best were, in this order: Multimedia Software Designer, Management Consultant, and Interactive Advertising Executive; while their worst, for the third year in a row: Crack Whore.
--Norm MacDonald, 1997

Man do I miss Norm. I think the following year when the "worst jobs" issue came out, he said "crack whore" had been replaced by "assistant crack whore."

Which is pretty much a given. But what are the other worst jobs?

So what makes a job horrible? Overbearing bosses, criticizing your every move and treating you like a five year old, or having you work all weekend because they couldn't manage the place more efficiently during the week. Asking if you got the memo on the TPS reports. Rude or overbearing co-workers who won't let you have one moment's peace. Uncaring and dehumanizing customers who seem to think they will obtain better service by yelling at you or complaining. Unsafe or unbearable working conditions. Wearing a name tag. Answering to consultants. Constantly having to justify your job and performance of that job. Reporting to unqualified supervisors. Making less than people at other companies who do the same job. Women laugh at you when they find out what you do. Did no one watch Office Space? Its pretty much all there.

Pretty much my summer job working in the un-airconditioned Humble school district warehouse. It was even worse than that. I couldn't drive, so I caught a ride with my parents' friend who worked for the district. During the day I had to ride around with this other guy who thought Christopher Cross was the most amazing performer ever. He insisted on rocking to such hard core tunes as "Sailing," or "Ride Like the Wind." At day's end, I was praying for sweet death. Which thankfully never came or I would never have known most of you. Hey, I was grateful to have a job at all. I think I used my entire earnings to buy speakers and a stereo receiver at Pacific Stereo. All in all, a pretty sound investment for a 16 year old (no pun intended).

In listing the worst jobs, I'm only focusing on American jobs. Even though 2/3 of all American jobs are now on the other side of the International Date Line. There's no point in listing jobs in the Philippines, or some other malaria-infested backwater without worker safety laws. Or really, laws period. Where a third of the population is missing one limb or other "digits." Or works 80 hours a week in dimly lit, no air conditioned factories making Air Jordans for 10 cents a day. Or, even better, spends all day crawling on trash heaps outside Mexico City or Buenos Aires looking for food and clothes. Sidebar-no matter how badly you think the Democrats or Republicans have performed in office, I'd temper the "our country is going down the tubes" talk until you see gigantic open air trash mounds outside major cities with thousands of people crawling over them to sustain themselves.

Or illegal jobs. Like crack whore for example. Or Mafia murder scene trouble shooter (actually, I could see myself being the Wolf). Drug dealer doesn't seem like a good long-term career move. Oh, sure, maybe one out of a thousand might clever his way into some Tony Montana-esque lifestyle. But eventually, competitors decide its easier to kill you than compete with you. Or worse.

The Wolf

I've always had fairly modest job ambitions. Which may account for my present situation in life. Basically I'm content to have any job where I don't have to work outside or wear a name tag. That rules out retail sales and slogging through ditches and pouring coffee at Starbucks. Actually my ideal job would be stocking grocery shelves at night after the store closed. You work inside, don't have to deal with customers, and you can work at your own pace. As a kid, I wanted to be a football player or an astronaut, like everyone else. But I really wanted to drive a TXI cement mixer. We had to pass a TXI facility when we drove to my grandma's house in Galena Park. That seemed totally cool. It actually still does. I also aspired to become a television repairman. I wanted to work at Oaks Television (off Bellaire Boulevard as I recall). I can't remember why exactly. Hey, drive a cement truck or fix TVs. A boy can always dream big, huh? Since then, I can only remember wanting to practice law. Well, not so much practice law as argue with people, which basically is what I do. Imagine getting paid for doing what you do with your family for free. It's pretty sweet. I lack any other employable skills. Basically I could only do two other jobs: play-by-play announcer or game show host. The former pays very little (unless you're the lead network announcer) and the latter has become virtually obsolete. Secret agent would be pretty cool too, but the whole getting shot at for government salary levels kind of takes the swag out of it. So lawyer it is!

BTW, I thought about putting "roughneck" on the list, until I remembered roughnecks make pretty good money, no one abuses them, its a respectable job, and they're in high demand even when drilling goes down somewhat. So, not roughneck. 

Deckhands

5. Deckhand. Most of you don't know this, but I went to deckhand school at a marine towing company, Hollywood Marine, when I began my first attorney job in New Orleans. My firm represented Hollywood Marine, and sent all new lawyers there to learn a little bit about life on a boat. I think I was the only guy there who hadn't gotten out of prison within the last six months. They loved having me there. My firm handled a lot of Jones Act (personal injury on maritime waters) lawsuits, so we all needed some idea what these people did. I learned about tying off barges, handling cargo, working with liquid hoses, and basic safety principles. It...sucked. You had to cover all exposed skin, whether it was freezing or burning hot outside. You have no shade because you're out on deck all day. You must quickly tie off heavy barges using heavy steel cables. You must work two week tours, on the job 12 hours and on call the other 12 hours. And you're often exposed to some of the most noxious and deadly chemicals imaginable. But I guess you don't have to wear a name tag. Which is something. Oh, wait, you do, sewn on all your shirts.

4. Roofer. Standing on an uneven surface two or more stories off the ground. Check. Using dangerous tools. Check. Frying in the sun reflected off the roof? Check. Getting skin cancer from years of sun exposure? Check. Yep. Sounds like a dream job.

3. Farmer. I know, I know. Farming made this country great. Farming evokes myth, Americana,

Do the chickens have large talons?

images of clean cut kids by the fire after doing their chores. Riding in a surrey with a fringe on top to the hoedown. Ropin' and a ridin'. Well you go ahead and cling to that image because modern farming has nothing to do with that. Farming is the most dangerous occupation in America. By far. Pesticide exposure. Heavy equipment accidents. Animal diseases. "Runoff."  Not to mention that unless you're some giant enormous corporation, the classic American family farmer simply can't make money over the long haul. Food prices are too low; investment costs are too high. Did no one see Field of Dreams? Ray had to turn the farm into a baseball field to stave off bankruptcy. And you have to work before sunrise to after sunset for long stretches of the year. Rain or snow, hot or cold.

¿Que?

2. Waiter. Or as I like to call it, "actor." What's the old joke? New York has 100,000 actors and not a single waiter? Unless you're working at a very upscale restaurant (and sometimes even then), waiting tables amounts to day after day of humiliation, disrespect, stress, and physical burden. Waiters don't really make a salary. They get a paycheck for below minimum wage and often don't get any insurance or other benefits. They rely on tips, and from what I know, most people tip only a pittance. Just about everyone dumps on waiters. Ordering food at a restaurant represents many people's only chance to give another human being instructions. So a lot of people abuse it, of course. Barking at waiters, undertipping them, complaining about the service. The waiter only fronts for an entire team, of course. Busboys, bartenders, dishwashers, cooks, prep, buyers, food deliverers, managers. But customers only interact with waiters, so they give waiters all the blame for anything that goes wrong. Trust me, your waiter didn't put lipstick on your glass, or tell the busboy to use a glass with lipstick on it. And your waiter didn't ask to serve 25 tables at 7:00 p.m. If you want instantaneous service at all times, where the waiters telepathically know when its time to refill your water or if your foie gras is overly insouciant, I recommend you dine at French Laundry. And pay for the resulting service level. Otherwise, get off the waiter.

You talkin' to me?

1. Taxi Driver. Yeah that movie was no lie. Imagine having to sit in an uncomfortable chair, every day or night. Drive all around town and risk being in a wreck every minute. Or spending hours in a line at the airport or a hotel. Paying for your own cab. Then sitting in a cab with God only knows who. Worrying about who'll be the one that attacks you, or doesn't pay you, or tries to make you become a Mormon, or smells like they just left a rendering plant, or insists on talking your ear off about whatever boring subject is on their mind. You have to drive all over town, good areas and bad. The scum of the earth gets in your cab along with high society. "Taxi" may have been a fun TV show, but its not the reality. But I guess you do get to wear whatever you want (feel free to haul out that Members Only jacket) and act like a psycho, so maybe its not all bad. Maybe you could meet Jodie Foster.

NEXT--Top 5 Biggest Douchebags. Oh, yay. Another positive post. Look out Bieber.