Hold me, mommy, I’m scared. It’s Texas, and you know what this place is like: full of Bushites and fundies and creationists and people who talk funny. Fortunately, the first thing I saw when I walked into the hotel was a swarm of natives, including Matt Dillahunty and Aron-Ra, so I was reassured — there are some good people here. And then I learned from my host that convention attendees have almost entirely bought out all the rooms here in the Hyatt, so the place is packed with My People, a little island of concentrated sanity in the great sea of Texas. Actually, I’m getting the impression that a lot of Texans are more than a little exasperated with the loonies who have soiled their reputation.
Anyway, I’m the first speaker here at the Texas Freethought Convention, so I need to get ready. I’ve been told that most of the attendees will be registering this morning (I haven’t, I got in late), and the lines may be long. I’ve been told I have permission to crash to the front of the lines and get my registration stuff, but I’m afraid if I do that, I’ll look like a great big arrogant dick.
Oh, wait…they think that even when I’m polite. Stand aside, peons!
Squeeeeeeee! I’m absolutely wet with excitement!
Not every well-wisher of yours can get to the convention this week, PZ. We manage to survive as well, just not happily or freely. Don’t let them tell you that all the sane people in the state fit in one hotel.
Come to Austin. We’ll protect you. (And we’ll certainly buy you a beer!) We probably had more people “occupying” our downtown yesterday than are in lower Manhattan.
In this part of the state, we have a long history of freethinkers (read up on the original Mavericks, for example): http://www.ffrf.org/legacy/fttoday/2002/dec02/fisher.php
I was in Texas last summer. The place was hot and on fire (and I don’t mean figuratively).
I live in texas…none of us are that bad! I wanted to go to the Freethought Convention, but forgot about it and didn’t buy tickets at a good time. :( Hope it goes well!
I hope you have fun in Houston. Unfortunately I won’t be there, but I will be at Tim Minchin’s concer tomorrow.
I deny that Texas is any worse in the religious idiot per capita department than any other state east of New Mexico and south of New Jersey. Texans are just louder.
I wish I could be there. Make some Texas-sized noise for all us reasonable people, PZ.
Keep your eyes forward and don’t stick your hands through the bars.
All hail Tpyos!
That should have read “I will be at Tim Minchin’s concert.”
I live in texas…none of us are that bad!
Bullshit.
I’ve lived here 40 of my 49 years, and thus can assure everyone that this state has fare more than its share of stupid, mean and hateful.
You’d think it would do better when all those Yankees from Minnesota and New York and Michigan moved here during the 80s. But nope, most of what we got from those places was their stupid, mean and hateful people.
Welcome to Texas PZ. I have to work this weekend and will not be coming down. We have more than our share of the misinformed but there are a hell of a lot of great people. Enjoy the hospitality since that is most of what you will find.
Welcome to Texas PZ, glad to see you bring some reason and critical thinking to Jesusland.
#10
Color me jealous, I really want to see him again. But, he’s not coming to my area on this trip. But, you will not be disappointed in any capacity. Incredible, that’s about the only word for it. Though I understand he had a little difficulty securing a piano, being called a demon that hates god when the piano rental place youtubed him.
Interesting Texas experiment: First, count flags. My last trip down it was 2-1 Lone Star vs. American. Then do an informal poll. Ask people what they consider themselves, “American” or “Texan.” This was almost universally Texan with some attempts at weaseling with “Texan American.”
They really should secede. We’ll make room for the sane in the other 49. Or at least the dozen or so sane states of the other 49.
My first two trips to the US were both to Texas, and I survived. Maybe my online friends just sheltered me from the crazy.
Not any more! Governor Goodhair
violated the establishment clauseasked Jeebus to make the rain happen (we don’t know how rains works, apparently), held his Jeebus Concert and then it rained for 40 days and 40 nights (±40 days/nights) and now everything is hunky dory!!1111YOU LIE, you science guys with your THEORIES and EVIDENCE and uh… THINKING!!!
Texas has an interesting history of freethought. Check this out. Freethought in WACO, Texas, of all places, considering its recent history.
http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/fsh41
Aren’t you afraid that the mass of concentrated sanity will have adverse consequences? It could suck all the sanity out of the surrounding regions, leaving Texas bereft of sanity …. oh, wait, this is Texas.
We can always hope that the sanity will reach a critical mass and EXPLODE, spreading sanity all over the world, leaving a smoking crater where the hotel and much of Texas used to be. If that happens, I’ll sanely send flowers.
IIRC, you were going to be in Houston at least part of that time – I recommend having someone take you to the Hobbit Cafe. No cephalopods, but it’s one of the few things I miss about that city.
A Texan goes to Alaska and tells a young Alaskan, “You know son, Texas was the biggest state, until they made the mistake of letting Alaska into the Union. Don’t mess with Texas” The kid replies, “Actually, we’re thinking of dividing Alaska into two equal pieces. That would make Texas number three. Don’t fuck with Alaska.”
I won’t be able to make it over there, but I’m another sane Texan, here. If you survive, I’ll probably try to attend the next Texas event you go to.
Same thing happened with the California migration to Idaho and other western states.
Maybe we should annex Greenland, split that into three pieces and Texas wouldn’t even be in the top 5 anymore.
And next week you will be within spitting distance (almost) of Ken Ham’s fortress of fantasy, the creation “museum” when you speak to the Free Inquiry Group’s 20th Anniversary celebrants. But you’ll be among friends and familiar faces in this section of bibleland. figat20.com
If you’ve got the time (and a little cash to burn), I’d highly recommend dining at Reef. It’s gulf seafood with a twist, amazingly yummy, and unlike anything you can get anywhere else in the country. It’s also about a half mile hike from the Hyatt — which will help burn off the calories.
Sad that I can’t go :( $150 is a lot of money for a PhD student on stipend!
the Hobbit Café is great! I once went there with someone who was from the same year at Oxford as Tolkien. Though back then at Oxford genders were segregated, so that person didn’t run into him, despite having a lot of interests regarding English language history as well…
The Hobbit Cafe is a bit of a hoof.
If you’re going to walk that far, you might as well hit Empire Cafe for breakfast (Italian toast + Milky Way cappuccino = YUM!) and Chuy’s for lunch (ask for the Creamy Jalapeño dip for your chips)!
You know, while you there, maybe try and get AronRa to join us here on FTB. I think he would be an interesting addition to the family.
Which reminds me, whatever happened to the Richmond Line?
Saw a great t-shirt: “Don’t Mess With Texas. It’s not nice to hassle the mentally handicapped”. Funny though, for all the talk about Texas, here in Milwaukee the hospital I work in has several guys in the Engineering Dept who think Kent Hovind is an intellectual and a great teacher. One of ’em was valedictorian of his high school before flunking out college. Twice. And this weren’t some Ivy-League or public Ivy type school, it was UW Whitewater. So Texas don’t have a monopoly on cement-heads, and some really cool people have come out of there, Molly Ivins, Jim Hightower, Ornette Coleman and of course the aforementioned Aron Ra and the whole Atheist Experience bunch.
My girlfriend is one of those progressive Texicans. And I’m a Floridian, so we get to take turns hiding our faces in shame.
I wish I could have made it, but Houston’s just a bit far from Wichita Falls, and taking off from work just isn’t an option right now.
On no fewer than 2 occasions, different Texans in my acquaintance have failed to recognize my home state (Montana) as a place. Seriously, it’s not that they didn’t know where it was, it was that they didn’t even know that something in the world was called Montana. I blamed it on Montana’s obscurity, but then a different Texan failed to recognize that Minnesota was a state too, and I started to suspected that Texans can’t identify anything less than 200,000 square miles on a map.
The Richmond Line hasn’t been built yet, but there’s still hope.
There will be at least one Happy Monkey at the convention with a car, but downtown, we can more easily walk. “Usernames are stupid” suggested a couple of places that sound good, but I’d vote for heading up to Market Square (just go east-ish along Polk or Dallas to Travis, then head north).
For those of you looking to lunch (I’m not there yet), Treebeards in Market Square is excellent, although a bit crowded, and not open after 2 p.m.
If there *is* a lunch outing, or other gathering, I’d be most gratified if one of you can call or text me at the number temporarily given here: http://havlak.web.rice.edu/index-phone.html
And I’m a local, so any lost Pharyngulites who can’t find the group should feel free to call and I’ll try to help. I’ll be around Friday & Saturday afternoons and evenings.
Happy Monkey, y’all.
MGM @34:
“Texans r stoopid, hurr hurr”
Porcupine, ass, sideways.
Re Texas is big: a friend of mine from Alaska who lived in Texas for some years told me that quite some Texans couldn’t get over the fact that Alaska was bigger than Texas. She liked to add, in those cases, that even if you split Alaska in two, the resulting halves would each be bigger still…
At the rate things are going, pretty soon the biggest fear about being in Texas won’t be the bushites and fundies and creationists, but dying slowly and painfully from thirst.
And if you REALLY are still afraid of Texas, you can take heart – it may not be long before the whole thing shrivels up, dessicates, turns to dry dust, and blows away in the wind….
amphiox,
the economy has been booming, a lot of transplants from out of state.. making more and more worried if Texas would be the USA of the future..
They did have some budget troubles, but then a huge fight erupted about something Krugman had said about it, leaving me, a non-economist, unable to judge which side was right…
Texas big?
Pfft. Most of the Canadian provinces, excepting the Maritimes, are roughly as big or bigger….
It goes both ways, though. The increase in out-of-state transplants can also start making the USA the Texas of the future.
During my two years working in Houston, there were parts of that city that were shockingly liberal (well, relatively speaking, anyways).
amphiox, Alaska is the biggest US state, Texas no 2. So for some US Americans, that might matter.
It sucks on road trips, 10 hours after you’ve left Houston, you’re still in the state, even though it’s a different time zone. From an European perspective, it’s all too big. I went to BC once, and was thinking of driving around in Canada, but gave up after I realised how long the distances were….
There are parts that still are. As I wrote upthread, Houston is now the biggest city in the US with an openly lesbian/gay mayor.
Fair enough speedwell, I guess I deserved that. I apologize for being offensive.
This is such a great straight line. But I’ll be nice. I’ll forgo the pleasure of using it. Now please pardon me while butter doesn’t melt in my mouth.
On no fewer than 2 occasions, different Texans in my acquaintance have failed to recognize my home state (Montana) as a place.
Ex-Texan, ex-New Yorker, can’t resist…Mon-wha? Is that one of those little Pacific Islands or what?
Actually, having lived in Iowa for a while I sympathize. Iowa, Idaho, Ohio…whatever.
But if I may again invoke my Alaskan friend, when she was back home working in tourism there, she was asked by American (!) tourists many times if they needed a passport to be in Alaska. So geographical ignorance is not exclusive to Texans.
Also, lest that Europeans get too smug, you can get enough TV shows in Europe too where they interview random people on the street and challenge them to place several countries on the map, failing miserably…
Don’t forget to get your Greek on! Niko Nikos has an outlet right smack in the middle of the ‘Square. And they’re open until the last customer leaves (no foolin!) :)
Also, lest that Europeans get too smug, you can get enough TV shows in Europe too where they interview random people on the street and challenge them to place several countries on the map, failing miserably…
But do they fail to identify states/provinces/Lander/whatever you call the divisions within their country. For a Texan to fail to identify Montana or Alaska as a state is more like a German (probably Bayerish) failing to identify Schleswig-Holstein as a state rather than failing to identify whether that country somewhere in the east is Estonia or Latvia.
Texas isn’t worse than anywhere else in America.
Some of them are just very very good at gerrymandering and appointing their dumbass cousins to high level positions.
probably not, but the US is so much bigger, in size and geography, so in that regard I’d rather compare it to the EU.
Some random mnemonics:
the Baltic countries: in alphabetic order from North to South: Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania (works in many other languages too!)
US West Coast: Wok pan: Washington, Oregon, Kalifornien (yes, there was a time where I would confuse Washington and Oregon)
@ #11:
It would appear you got the entire passenger contingent of the C-Ark.
I was born in Texas; it’s a nice place to be from.
Oh, good grief!
I have lived 33 of my 37 years in Texas and it’s not as bad as y’all make it out to be.
Admittedly, I get a little lonely being the somewhat rare liberal, atheist, science geek, but you just can’t beat the Southern hospitality here.
(Plus, I lived in NYC for the 4 years I wasn’t here. Talk about a h*llhole full of rude jerks!!!! I will never ever ever live in the North East again!)
@Vinny
I just don’t get that flag thing.
@LRA
Hmm.
http://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2011/10/07/calling-all-radical-homosexuals-take-this-survey/comment-page-1/#comment-88795
Aquaria seems to have a different opinion.
I particularly like this hospitality.
I think I’ll take Texas of my bucket list.
Thanks for the info on that. I wrote it off as merely another charge, but I’m going to consider it just as before.
Oh, right, Max. I forgot. Crazy psychopaths only live in Texas. Yes, that’s why the unibomber was from Texas, and Tim McVeigh was from Texas, and John Wayne Gacy was from Texas, and Pol Pot was from Texas, and Stalin was from Texas, and Hitler was from Texas…
That’s right. Bad people ONLY live in Texas.
Whatever.