Damn The Torpedoes

May 06 2008 – Moving -I remember when it was as easy as throwing a guitar and a sack of really ratty clothes into my convertible VW bug and driving to a new city.

Apr 22 2008 – If you think it’s tough selling a house, try selling one during the recent crime spree taking place in Mobile.

Apr 08 2008 – Surely there are soap operas that might rival the David Thomas saga in terms of twists, turns and crazy behavior, but since I don’t watch the soaps, DT’s life will have to provide the entertainment.

Mar 25 2008 – If you can’t say anything nice about Boeing and Seattle, don’t say anything at all? Well, not exactly. Rob Holbert tries to stay positve (kind of) about the West Coast sore losers.

Mar 11 2008 – The following is an interview I conducted with my personal psychic adviser, Nostrildumas "The Man Who Nose The Future." I frequently turn to Nostrildumas when I need advice about the future, and other than the time he told me to hang on to all my Internet stocks, he’s been eerily accurate.

Feb 25 2008 – I wonder if Roy Nichols wishes now that he’d made the school board members sign that pledge not to micromanage?

See all 66 articles in Damn The Torpedoes...

Hidden Agenda

May 06 2008 – After a long hiatus, one of our favorite "concerned citizens" and council regulars Mrs.

Apr 22 2008 – Last week at the Mobile City Council meeting, Councilman Clinton Johnson sought to have about $900,000 transferred to a drainage project and bridge repair in his district.

Apr 08 2008 – Poop may be most people’s least-favorite topic, but Mobile’s City Council is interested in tackling the smelly problem of pet excrement.

Mar 25 2008 – Mayor Sam Jones and his girl, Mobile, were all curled up together on a lazy Sunday morning.

Mar 11 2008 – It takes a village…and a flag I knew The Villagers of Spring Hill were back when I saw a bevy of classy ladies dressed in turtlenecks and multi-colored blazers filling the seats of the GP auditorium at the March 4 city council meeting.

Feb 25 2008 – The big "nontroversy" in the presidential campaign last week (besides McCain’s alleged little lobbying lady love story) was Hillary Clinton’s assertion that Barack Obama plagiarized a speech from Massachusetts governor, Deval Patrick.

See all 63 articles in Hidden Agenda...

Jubilee

May 06 2008 – Courtesy of our friends in Montgomery, residents of Baldwin County will have a chance on June 3 to vote on a Proposed Constitutional Amendment allowing for collection of up to four additional mills in ad valorem taxes to pay for transportation infrastructure improvements.

Apr 22 2008 – So it’s April 22. Earth Day. No biggie. Not much attention – especially since it comes just a week after Income Tax Day.

Apr 08 2008 – The hard-fought and fairly won aerial tanker award is under attack from all sides.

Mar 25 2008 – This potpourri of announcements and commentary leads with the Fairhope mayor’s race.

Mar 11 2008 – "Jubilee" in the last Lagniappe got unexpected (and rare) kudos for describing and praising the Fairhope City Council’s strategy for separation of the mayor from Public Works.

Feb 25 2008 – Hot stuff here in ESho-land. Local politico to get 200 percent pay raise.

See all 66 articles in Jubilee...

To Whom it May Concern

May 06 2008 – I hereby move that we rename the state of Alabama. I don’t know if I need to get a petition signed or pay up a lobbying firm, but I think it is only appropriate that we change our state name to Nanny-bama.

Apr 22 2008 – I think the country music super-group Alabama said it best when they sang "So let’s leave some blue up above us, Let’s leave some green on the ground, It’s only ours to borrow, let’s save some for tomorrow, Leave it and pass it on down." Other than just being another pearl of wisdom from the limestone bluffs of Fort Payne, it is also a big example of what is wrong with the environmental movement.

Apr 08 2008 – I just finished arguing with my two-year-old daughter about the limits of her television entertainment options.

Mar 25 2008 – Well it is officially here, the days and nights have evened up in length and now it is springtime.

Mar 11 2008 – A new study out by the group "People Who Study Stuff That the Rest of Us Already Know" has come to the conclusion that husbands who spend more time doing housework have wives that spend more time doing "bed-work." The actual group who did the study is the "Council on Contemporary Families" and they researched how men’s roles around the house have changed in the last 40 or so years.

Feb 25 2008 – There are some obvious places young children shouldn’t be taken to, like crack-houses, strip clubs, Gary Glitter’s apartment, nuclear weapons proving grounds, dog fights, the Centers for Disease Control, Chinese toy factories and church.

See all 63 articles in To Whom it May Concern...

Kudzu Queen

Feb 12 2008 – I generally don’t get upset when slurs are directed at me.

Jan 28 2008 – My mother has been my mother all of my life. It’s a dirty job, but somebody has to do it.

Jan 15 2008 – The Beginning: One rainy afternoon in late December, the sun briefly broke out of the clouds, and I had an epiphany.

Jan 01 2008 – Chaos Theory says something like a butterfly flapping its wings over the Pacific Ocean can set in motion a chain of events which leads to Atlantic Coast hurricanes, famine in Bangladesh, or Britney Spears shaving her head and beating a photographer’s car with her umbrella.

Dec 18 2007 – I needed something to do one summer, so I decided I’d demolish the hulking garage, which loomed like a rotting, redneck Leaning Tower of Pisa in my backyard.

Dec 04 2007 – The Big Book, which is the veritable Bible of the alcoholism recovery set, compares practicing alcoholics to tornadoes.

See all 57 articles in Kudzu Queen...

Letters

May 06 2008 – The Best Team wins! To the editor: Now what kind of true Southern Belle would I be if I did not stand up for my town while Mr.

Apr 22 2008 – Gettin’ the straight poop To the editor: I grew up in Mobile and moved to Portland, OR about 5 years ago.

Apr 08 2008 – Ethanol exposure To the editor: US taxpayers, according to DC legislators, desperately need to fund another farm subsidy.

Mar 25 2008 – OK, final word on The Flag To the editor: I hope I’m not too late to the party on the I-10 Confederate Battle Flag controversy, but I just found out about it while reading your March 12 issue.

Mar 11 2008 – Seems the Rebel Flag controversy will never die. Readers write in to offer their take on the Battle Flag.

Feb 25 2008 – Mucho gracias, Sharman Sharman: I want to thank you for your January 15, 2008 column regarding the downtown merchants because it let me know that both my marketing team and myself need to do a better job of keeping downtown merchants in the loop with respect to my condominium project.

See all 44 articles in Letters ...

County View

May 06 2008 – Awaiting the April 29, 2008 County Commission meeting to commence with prayer and allegiance to the flag, it occurred to me I was perhaps sitting in the very spot I had as a teenager about to embark on a five-day journey to San Francisco.

Apr 22 2008 – A tear, irrepressible, seared my cheek as I watch a wrecker’s ball have its way with the Cimarron Club on Old Shell Road, April 16, 2008, 12:07 p.m.

Apr 08 2008 – The last two days of March sadly included three fatal motorcycle accidents in Mobile County, making front page news and leaving many wondering what’s up with traffic.

Mar 25 2008 – At the March 10, 2008 County Commission meeting Parsons Brinckerhoff, Inc.

Mar 12 2008 – A retirement ceremony for Ronnie Poiroux, head of Mobile ALDOT opened the Feb.

Feb 25 2008 – As I was patted down and made worthy of initial passage through the regal doors of the Mobile County Commission auditorium, I thought I heard the guard ask me, "Are you now or have you in the past been associated with Jeffrey Poor, one of your Lagniappe predecessors and now an alleged correspondent based in Washington D.C.?

See all 48 articles in County View...

Internal Ramblings

Oct 10 2006 – By Amanda Hardy Lagniappe staff Since the day Job was pelted by God with cosmic disasters some thousands of years ago, people have always asked why bad things happen to good people.

Jul 19 2006 – It appears my end is coming near here at Lagniappe.

Jun 21 2006 – I don’t know if this is a touchy issue, but I need to talk about it.

Jun 06 2006 – Hello, everybody. You may not know me, but I am the new kid on the block at Lagniappe.

Beltway Beat

May 06 2008 – WASHINGTON – Last month, former Rep. Sonny Callahan announced that he would be campaign chairman for Greenville businessman Tim James’ 2010 gubernatorial campaign.

Apr 22 2008 – It’s the story that just won’t go away. Former Gov.

Apr 08 2008 – WASHINGTON – You might want to consider the source, but in the name of fair time, Rep.

Mar 25 2008 – WASHINGTON – Before the announcement late last month, many thought Boeing was a sure thing for the US Air Force tanker contract award.

Mar 11 2008 – A Bonner for Governor in 2010? WASHINGTON—Since Rep.

Feb 25 2008 – WASHINGTON – He wasn’t the most outspoken candidate for the spot on the committee, but when the stars lined up, he was thought to be the best fit.

See all 26 articles in Beltway Beat...

Tossing Mullet

May 06 2008 – "Water, Water, Everywhere, Nor Any Drop to Drink!" Samuel Taylor Coleridge wrote "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner" in 1798 and the theme obviously deals with the threat of drinking salt water, which has dire consequences to our delicate systems, but the phrase has evolved to represent a number of contradictions where there’s a lot of something that we can’t figure out how to use it – even energy.

Apr 22 2008 – The challenge to the Northrop-Grumman/EADS tanker deal has dominated Mobile chit-chat for the better part of a month, but it has barely dented the communal euphoria as the "city of perpetual potential" emerges from the dark ages of post-WW II.

Apr 08 2008 – No Sewer? There is a raging debate in south Mobile County over the rebuilding of the Bayou La Batre sewer plant ravaged by time, mismanagement, and finally Hurricane Katrina.

Mar 25 2008 – It’s not that we have lost a passion for nature and the environment – it’s the simple fact that we have so seriously altered our modes of interaction.

Mar 11 2008 – Harvey Jackson is a professor of history at Jacksonville State University up "north" who recently wrote (Jan.

Feb 25 2008 – There was a workshop recently in the Panhandle held by NOAA’s (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) office for coastal research, which was intended to scavenge the brainpower of the Mississippi-Alabama-Panhandle region concerning research needs relative to sea level rise.

See all 8 articles in Tossing Mullet...