Mapping Racist Obama Re-Election tweets

[bryandurel]

most of them are from the south as expected.

i soemtimes think that the south should just secede and get it over with. i know this is a generalization and harsh but i feel that from time to time. it must be a lot harder to be gay in the south than it is in new york city.

http://www.floatingsheep.org/2012/11/map...se-to.html

[Pix]

Something else I think worth pointing out is when I went back to my hometown in East Texas back in 2011 I didn't know anyone who tweeted. Internet and phone service was, at best, 10 years behind the curve, and only a few had cell phone (not smart phone) or internet service. I expect there was more in a larger town near us (the closest Greyhound gets), but as they provide the service that sucks I doubt many use it (or at least not that much). And btw, this area literally has more Confederate flags than US and Texas combined (and shortly before I visited the courthouse was forced to lower the Confederate flag from the courthouse which had some in my family mad).

In contrast, it seems no matter how small a town in CA there are still people texting & tweeting everywhere.

So that makes me wonder just how much worse that would be if the rural regions of TX were as wired as in CA (and that goes for plenty of other states). I can't help but notice that most of the tweets in TX came from the more urban areas where I'm sure they got good (or at least decent) service and texts & tweets are no doubt very common there.

[pellaz]

... wonder just how much worse that would be if the rural regions ...

try it sometimes:
if you overlay US demographic maps of insufficient education and or religion, with maps of anti interracial marriage and or anti gay/black issues you see a direct correlation.

[ceez]

what's really scary is that a lot of them are high school and college kids, I don't think racism is going anywhere especially with the bigots passing the hatred down from generation to generation.

is racism this bad in every country?

[bryandurel]

if you don't mind me asking - what was it like growing up over there?

Something else I think worth pointing out is when I went back to my hometown in East Texas back in 2011 I didn't know anyone who tweeted. Internet and phone service was, at best, 10 years behind the curve, and only a few had cell phone (not smart phone) or internet service. I expect there was more in a larger town near us (the closest Greyhound gets), but as they provide the service that sucks I doubt many use it (or at least not that much). And btw, this area literally has more Confederate flags than US and Texas combined (and shortly before I visited the courthouse was forced to lower the Confederate flag from the courthouse which had some in my family mad).

In contrast, it seems no matter how small a town in CA there are still people texting & tweeting everywhere.

So that makes me wonder just how much worse that would be if the rural regions of TX were as wired as in CA (and that goes for plenty of other states). I can't help but notice that most of the tweets in TX came from the more urban areas where I'm sure they got good (or at least decent) service and texts & tweets are no doubt very common there.

[Pix]

What was it like? I think I'll answer in 2 posts. This first one I want to describe the area, the East Texas Bible Belt, aka Behind The Pine Curtain. It's been called "behind the Pine Curtain" for decades at least given how incredibly religious it is ("cow pastures & church steeples" in the words of my partner, and where churches are often used as landmarks to give directions) and the different denominations can often be hostile to one another...even the same denominations can come into conflict if they're too close and thus in competition. And some Christians who can hate and even attack others (that includes rival churches), including gays if any dare show themselves, and they have this weird way to rationalize it that lets them get away with it, they say they "love you as a Christian, but don't like you as a person" or some such (it's too messed up for me to remember). It's mostly guys 25 and younger (and backed by many friends) who engage in this kind of behavior, however (I've heard them called "shit kickers" because they "kick the shit out of people").

Many counties are also "dry" which means sale of alcohol is very restricted if not outright prohibited, though the various dry counties (at least those under 30, especially teens) like to brag they're the "wettest" (meaning they drink the most). The liquor stores in "wet" counties make a lot of money off this but even the wet counties impose many restrictions on alcohol sales.

As a general rule, the larger the city the more likely it is to be more modern, and cities like Dallas & Houston are actually very modern & cosmopolitan (both have areas where gays feel free to be themselves, too), I think in large part because so many people live there from other parts of the world and that has mixed with Southern hospitality to create an extraordinary tolerance (for the most part, there are still plenty of bad elements).

And btw, Southern hospitality does exist,though just because they're nice to you as a tourist doesn't mean they'd accept you as a resident (and Oklahomans and Tennesseans sometimes have problems), so an openly gay couple from California passing through will likely to be tolerated and may even be treated well (if gossiped about in an unflattering way after they left) but if they were to move (or grow up) there then it would be a different matter.

Racism usually isn't overt as long as mixing isn't done much outside of certain rules (a man having sex with a black woman is usually ok as long as he doesn't marry her, for example, and of course sports teams are usually an exception where different races mix well), and as long as "each knows their place." Generally speaking, whites who are completely friendly to say black janitors could still see Obama and other successful black people as "uppity" and feel hostile to them. (And racists come in all colors, btw, some of the mutual race hatred I've seen in Houston and heard of in Dallas is downright scary.) One of my friends in my town was a girl I think adopted from Vietnam raised by a white family and the town didn't approve...no one moved against her that I know of, but she wasn't allowed into many homes, though the ones who shunned her blamed the white parents saying the girl would have no place among either whites or "her own people" and ignored the fact that this was so because they insisted it be so (many of these people probably wouldn't have shunned her, at least not as much, if she was "with her own people"). And an older cousin of mine worked for a black guy who hired a white guy to front for him as that was the only way to thrive if whites (who were the majority) thought it was owned by whites (they were ok with thinking the owner was one of the cooks, however, and btw I should point out that someone described similar practices in even the Silicon Valley of CA). A great aunt of mine supposedly had her heart attack because Obama won and thought whites were in danger though she swears she's not racist. The school I went to in East Texas tried to make it appear that slavery wasn't so bad and blacks were better off and taught us hatred of "carpet baggers" (Yankees who looted the South after winning the Civil War) and gave back handed compliments (like "black history month" might feature George Carter who would be praised as "giving us peanut butter" while ignoring his other accomplishments to give the subtle message that they could never be as accomplished or successful as a white person, but very few would say that outright in public). Nevertheless, it's a rare person who would do something overtly racist like burn a cross, and as long as they don't burn crosses then they feel they're not racist. Though don't get me wrong, plenty aren't (I suspect the racism tends to be subtle because someone overtly so in the wrong company would be confronted), but it's easy to grow up that way there.

You might find this of interest (and they don't surprise me), and more reasons why it's said to be "behind the pine curtain":

http://www.hackcollege.com/blog/2012/09/...d-gay.html

http://cafe.comebackalive.com/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=6298

http://www.dallasobserver.com/2004-04-08...toy-story/

Some parts can be confusing. For example, I wasn't really able to explain to my partner why people could seem so patriotic and yet at the same time there were more Confederate flags than any other type there (I believe Rick Perry's call to secede in response to Obama winning the first time encouraged it, but a few months before I visited in 2011 Palestine, the closest Greyhound gets to my town, was forced to take a Confederate flag down from their courthouse which had locals, even in my family, angry at what they saw was the federal government butting in). Another thing that confused my partner was why that guns seemed to be as worshiped as God (a common sticker was "Pro Gun, Pro Life, Pro Family, Pro God" with sometimes "anti-Obama" added in, and she saw plenty of guns yet also saw how churches were everywhere) as she thought Jesus was more about peace and thought maybe people who depended on guns so much didn't have enough faith in God (granted, my partner has very little experience with either Christianity or the gun culture and her having grown up in California made rural East Texas a culture shock for her).

Oh, yeah, she marveled that my Granny had 4 guns (and also that this wasn't considered to be that many) yet didn't have cable (or dish), internet, cell phone, or even AC (when it got 110F/43C). At least the kids got to see a rotary phone (with a dial instead of buttons) for the first time, however.

Another strange thing is that Rick Perry was so popular despite that the Force (God) wasn't with him (seriously, every time he publicly prayed for something the exact opposite seemed to happen, but many still think God likes him).

And it's not unheard of for teachers to treat kids like witches with real magic powers (this is very rare, but I'd think any educators doing this and keeping their job is noteworthy but in Texas it's rarely more than a news blurb when it does happen), and various schools have had public prayer and passing out of Bibles and teachers have even been fired just for being SUSPECTED of Atheism...this happens all over Texas so it's not restricted to the East.

And btw, East Texas is more with the South in attitude, while West Texas is more of the US West (it's also a lot drier and few pine trees which might be why it's not "behind the pine curtain") and while Bible Belt it tends to be less racist in attitude. Oddly, Austin (the state capital) is surprisingly liberal locally despite that conservatives rule the state from there.

And as for Palestine (the place that flew a Confederate flag on their courthouse), I heard of a school there that responded to tornadoes touching down by taking all the kids suspected of satanism such as goths, metal heads, D&D players (the lore was that if people "read the spells backwards from the rule books then they worked for real" though one guy I know hoped it was true and was disappointed when he couldn't actually throw fireballs and lightning bolts around ) and locked them in a lab full of glass and told them if a tornado hit they'd be killed. The "reasoning" (by TEACHERS!) was that one of them called down the tornadoes with his or her infernal powers in the first place and could send them back. Granted, this was back in the Satanic Panics that gripped the entire US in the late 80s but I was warned about this in the 90s after I told a boy I was a witch (I'll share about that in the next post).

Palestine had park where gay men were supposed to meet (one cousin swore he found a pic of male genitalia in the restroom there) but cops and gay bashers sometimes patrolled it at night to keep that down to a minimum (though it's said men would even park there in the day to cruise for sex, don't know how well that worked for them...and while the deputies have a decent reputation the Palestine police had a horrid rep for corruption & abuse and also included fundie Pentecostals on the force that made a point to go after "satanic elements" so I'm sure gays would rather not meet them).

And Palestine also took PRIDE in being "behind the pine curtain" as this shows:

http://palestineherald.com/opinion/x6207...t-Texas-if

ETA: had to add this from the Palestine paper as well:

http://palestineherald.com/opinion/x6917...-agreement

Anyway, I'll post again soon to share my own personal history there.

[Pix]

I'm not going to name my hometown because if someone from that area were to ever do a netsearch they'd likely find my post and they'd recognize me (and I'm not out in that town) and my family and could create trouble for them as well as me (for example, I've shared about a cousin who makes pot brownies before and so if identified then that's cause for a warrant and maybe even seizing the farm, and I'm not going to do that to them).

Also, I didn't realize I was gay as a child there (not that I cared about it, and I did have sexual experience with a girl outside of Houston, but not gay sex in that town) so if that's all you're interested in then don't bother reading (ETA: though in the next post I briefly mention visiting with a girlfriend when I was 21)...OTOH, if you want to know what life is like in a town like that then read on...

So anyway, I spent most of my first 4 years on the family farm. The farm is old fashion and not a factory as too many people have come to own too much land that's worked together (and we all share our own dump on the land, and there's even a small private cemetery) and it would cause bad blood to organize it like a factory for which I'm grateful. Most of my memories then were pleasant (and Granny, whom I lived with, called me Pix back then, short for Pixie, and did again in 2011 which is why I thought to take the name for this site when I joined a little over a month after returning from Texas, btw), though not entirely.

One uncle whom I'm currently not on speaking terms with (because I insulted his precious FOX News when I visited in 2011) got upset when I started crying as I saw calves strapped to a table and branded and when he told me it didn't hurt them I asked him why he lied to me (very upset, I never expected him to lie but knew he did). His response was to feed me a burger a few days later and then tell me after that it was from my favorite cow that he'd butchered just to feed to me (he sold what he didn't save of course) as I needed to learn "they're livestock, not pets." As I was only 4 years old I didn't understand and said she tasted good and somehow mixed up the idea that her providing meat was no different than milk and she was still alive. It took me a few days to realize she was dead and I felt such guilt (he did it because I loved that cow so in my mind I killed the cow) and this left an impression I still feel to this day. (And I got in trouble a few years later in elementary school near Houston after I complained about being forced to see Old Yeller again, and as a teacher told me we had to learn about death I shouted, "I know about death, Uncle Travis killed my cow!" That and mentioning a boy DESERVED to be eaten by a bear for playing with bear cubs but the movie said it was ok, and that was stupid, and in a tone they didn't like, but I LOATHED that movie....and I was still mad at both my uncle and myself over that.)

Shortly before I turned 5 my mom (Granny's daughter) took me to spite Granny and I spent years in the outskirts of Houston, though I did spend many summers with Granny. But a few months before I turned 14 Mom was in a vicious divorce and couldn't take care of me so she sent me back to Granny's where I stayed several months (arriving in the Summer of 1996 and staying into the middle of Spring of 97) and that was quite the experience...though the town was even weirder back when Granny was growing up (with like kids who played a game where they threw actual knives at each other's feet on the school playground and had one teacher who'd taught multiple subjects in the same classroom who'd say, "Now's it's tahm to gets outs our books and do some readin'.")

The town so small that many maps don't show it, it's almost an hour's drive away from the nearest Greyhound (and that's based on my cousin driving me, and he doesn't obey speed limits), and it depends on the county for cops & courts. Beyond farms & churches (and the school) there's only a "shopping center" of 3 stores (one a gas station that sells treats and lunch snacks, another a pharmacy which was ran by a busybody back when I was a kid who loved to report any purchases of condoms or "suspiciously sexualized" behavior to parents & grandparents, and the other selling things useful for farming, hunting, and fishing).

The school was 3 small buildings (plus an even smaller one that served as a very small cafeteria with most kids eating outside even when it rained, though there was a sheltered part for that) next to each other that housed elementary, middle, and high school (and no sports teams which is considered a great shame in TX) and was also where they parked the one bus (and it was older than me) that picked up the kids for all 3 schools at the same time (granted, some walked or drove themselves, and I didn't consider it a big deal to walk home from school on nice days, plus I sometimes used a skateboard Granny got me for my 14th birthday). It was kinda funny in how age segregated it was, basically the higher grade you were the further back on the bus you sat (it wasn't an iron-clad rule, it's just how it seemed to work out most of the time). It wasn't unknown for some high schoolers to drive trucks there and they sometimes had long guns in plain view on a gun rack in the truck but it was no big deal (however, that was not allowed at the high school I later attended in the Houston area, and this was also before Columbine), and kids who brought guns to school were still paddled over trivial offenses (called "licks").

But I got ahead of myself. So the summer is nice but as church is so important Granny (who stopped attending, and for good reason but that's another story) took me to the Baptist church that most in my family (and many in the town) go to in order to meet people and be able to call it my church when people asked. This was what's known as a "fire & brimstone" church where the goal is to make you want to grab the pews to keep from sliding into Hell (seriously, it was described that way to me by people who think they're the best kind of church) with rants (emphasized by hitting the pulpit) and describing the wrath of God for everything imaginable. And one custom the preacher had was to glare at anyone new like the vile sinner he knew they were (many loved this, too, but not me). I, being 13 (and having already experienced worse than him in my life) couldn't figure out why he was glaring when Granny dressed me up so pretty and I was sitting as patiently and good as I could despite being bored out of my mind. After a few minutes of this I became really bothered and a little offended so I reached into Granny's purse to get some gummi worms which I chewed up (as he continued to glare while shouting about his angry god and proud, sinful youth) and then stuck my tongue out with the chewed up candy on it. My plan to disgust him so that he'd stare at someone else instead of me did not work, however, and his rant intensified with genuine angry shouts that caused others in front of me to look behind them at me and then SMACK! Granny's hand came down on my leg hard and I swallowed the candy.

When the service ended Granny couldn't get out fast enough but the preacher went out a back door and actually sprinted around to catch us before he left to interrogate Granny on who I was. Granny tried to get him to sympathize with me as she described the horrid divorce my parents were going through but as he heard I was from Houston he turned to me and started saying hatefully that they didn't like punks from the big city and he'd make sure that I wouldn't corrupt his town with my big city ways, blah, blah, blah until I asked him, "Do you know how boring you are?"

As he started to spit & stutter Granny grabbed my arm and dragged me to her car, and I got a major scolding on the way back (as well as her explaining how important church was and she wanted me to make friends with other kids there) though at one point she did mutter, "You're 13, what's HIS excuse? Man of God, my ass." I was very careful not to let her see me smile.

The preacher turned the entire town against me, and the tales of what a devil's child I was just grew with each retelling. One claimed right in front of me to see me kill a cat for Halloween but was struck speechless when I shouted (angry at the thought of someone killing a cat), "Yuck, why didn't you stop me or call the cops? You're sick!" Later on a boy on the bus turned to me and asked fearfully, "Do you really worship the devil?" And I got mischievous and said, "Yes, and I cast spells, so shut up." He did, turning away from me in fear and he never spoke to me again (I laughed, and I wondered if I sounded like a cackling witch to him). My friends and my cousin who also lived with Granny thought that was hilarious but others in my family said I shouldn't have done that and that's when I heard about the kids locked up in a school lab in nearby Palestine over the tornadoes that I mentioned in my last post (among other equally insane stuff).

But thing was, a few kids LOVED how I ticked off the preacher and considered me really cool. Of course we were all outcasts, though a few believed in God while considering the churches to be "pharisees" (I especially loved the boy who'd always add "incorporated" after mentioning any church, he ticked off so many doing that ). One of those in our crowd, btw, was that adopted girl from I think Viet Nam that I mentioned in my last post who was shunned by the town (personally I thought it was cool to see someone with strong Far East Asian features yet dressed & talked like us and had an accent just like the rest of us). And a few times they had me meet them by that "shopping center" I mentioned and then have me guess which church just let out as the cars passed (a few stopping for gas or getting something quick from the convenience store which was allowed to stay open on Sunday as they sold the gas) and I got real good at it. (Yeah, it got real boring sometimes...) I also got dragged to church a couple of more times with friends and I'll just say it made me glad it wasn't a habit (though those other times weren't as memorable as the first time).

But on the first day of school I walked home with 2 boys I met and got along with (they were fans of my ticking off the preacher) and Granny got a call from the lady who ran the drugstore saying she saw me having sex with the 2 boys. Granny knew me better than that, and also knew the town, and reminded her of the commandment against bearing false witness, but she had a talk to me about it after I came home saying people would talk and I'd get a reputation and though she knew it was unfair the God fearing people there held me responsible not only for my own actions but that of the boys, even full grown men (which meant even if a man raped me it was my fault) and I was deeply disturbed by it. But she also got my older cousin (who liked me despite tormenting me at times) to make it clear anyone who hurt me would answer to him and others in the family (many in my family didn't care for me but they'd close ranks against outsiders who tried to hurt me) and I believe that's why none of the Christians dared to rape me despite the reputation I had as a Satanic slut (though many boys did hang around hoping I'd give it up and even when I didn't do anything at all with them, which was the case most of the time, they'd lie so my slutty reputation was maintained, and as I had delayed puberty I got made fun of in the locker room--which wasn't a real locker room, btw, but a row of shelves with trays for us to put our stuff in while we wore gym clothes, though there were a pair of shower trees with almost no water pressure we could use--as both a neuter and a slut).

On a car ride Granny played a station for old country songs (not that there were a lot of choices) and she got furious at Coward of the County (btw, my name is Becky, too, just like the woman who gets gang raped in the song), and the idea that the "coward" beats up the gang rapists somehow made up for it infuriated her and she said the song implied the crime was messing with another man's property, not against the woman, and Becky should've used her guns, but it was an attitude many locals did have. (The song I REALLY loathed, however, was Achey Breaky Heart which played constantly.)

But I did mess around...that town was where I first smoked pot (and more than once), went to my first kegger (which the deputies raided but most of us got away, including me and my cousin who'd brought me as the high school kids wanted to see the girl that ticked off the preacher), saw hardcore porn for the first time which kinda freaked me out, my cousin and his friends snuck me into see Beavis & Butt-head Do America in Palestine, I experimented more sexually with boys than I ever had before though it wasn't much, I shot a gun for the first time that another boy had "borrowed" from his dad (without getting permission), and even got offered harder drugs including meth though I said no to that. My cousin once stuck a stick of homemade dynamite (explosives were kept on the farm to get rid of certain pests and stubborn tree roots) with a burning fuse which made me scream and throw it just in time with me beating him up after as he was laughing too hard to stop me and Granny said it saved her from having to whip him for that when she asked about his bruises (she did whip him when he nearly shot my eye out with an air gun that shot pellets, though that started with him shooting me in the back and I grabbed the other pellet gun and we shot each other that stung a lot until he accidentally got my face and nearly took my eye which messed my face up really bad), and Granny once dealt with my getting really sick (after I fell into a flooded creek and swallowing its filthy water) by making me drink whiskey so that I slept through most of it. In retrospect I don't know why the preacher thought I was going to corrupt THEM!

Perhaps the most interesting bit was when I tried shrooms with my cousin and his friends (mostly in tea but I ate a raw one out of curiosity, too). I had mystic visions as well as insight into myself that I think did me some good, but I also tripped out of my skull at times, too. And apparently I was replying to people's thoughts which including one guy who was sober who spread I was a witch with a demon in me that let me read minds that also bothered some of the good Christian folk (something I recall every time I see from Firefly after River was about to be burned for having replied to a preacher's thoughts). About a week later I had a flashback in class in the form of a huge giggle fit (with me burying my head on my desk to smother it as much as possible) that lasted I think about 5 minutes, but luckily the teacher seemed confused, and yet most kids were able to figure out I'd done the shrooms that grew from the cow patties.

Granny also took me to a festival that literally celebrated Bonnie & Clyde in Jacksonville, TX (and shared how older relatives of hers, now dead, had sheltered the duo and spoke of them as folk heroes and Robin Hoods--or is that robbing hoods? --and told me, "Sometimes justice is on the other side of the law") and also took me to see the Tyler Rose Parade (just a couple days before I turned 14 and that's when she secretly bought me a skateboard to give to me on my birthday), and as we were going to the "big city" she took her .38 snub nose. In Tyler (hours away) she decided to have our car cleaned while doing some shopping and got out leaving the gun in the car and I wasn't sure if she should do that and didn't want to yell after her about her gun so I put her gun in my shorts and under my shirt and told her in the grocery store that I had her gun and she thanked me saying she'd forgotten it.

The skateboard was wholesome fun, something I didn't get very much in the Bible Belt and good for the many boring days. I spent months getting banged up from riding down badly maintained farm roads (once crashed into bull nettles in a ditch and another time into a yellow jacket nest just off the road) but over the months I got pretty good with it and even used it to get to and from school sometimes. If it sounds dangerous then compare to my cousin who (like many other boys his age) liked to race on "roller coaster lane" which was a winding farm road very thin (so it was very hard for cars to pass each other going the opposite direction) which sometimes resulted in deaths when 2 high speed trucks crashed into each other. (He did lots of stupid stuff but I think that takes the prize.)

I also did a lot of horseback riding and walking in the woods and saw more than one cottonmouth (also known as a water moccasin), one that chased me. Of course I had all kinds of chores in keeping house and on the farm (including in helping in digging out the sewer line once, fence posts, and hauling hay and I became very strong, relatively speaking, from it, and saddling up a horse took some strength, too), and I didn't get an allowance, if I wanted money I had to find extra things to do from someone else. I learned to fish, make polk salad when I was 13 (and had I made it wrong then I might've died, but Granny said kids learned to eat it since the Great Depression as adults ate before the kids which sometimes left very little for growing children and it was very nutritious, "like spinach"), and as I was under doctor orders to gain weight (so that I could get back into puberty) she'd not only have me drink raw milk straight from the cow (it was delicious!) but also gather wild berries in the woods that she'd make into fattening pies (but I was so active that it didn't work).

Nevertheless, I preferred it to living with the 'rents so I took it very badly when Mom made me move back in with her so that she could get child support and after that I wouldn't return until I was 21...

[Pix]

I will add that when I was 21 (2004) I got a ride from a lesbian and we became lovers on the road. While in TX one cousin asked me if she and I were lovers and I said, "I'm not going to answer unless you ask me again, but if you ask me again I'll tell the truth so make sure you really want to know before asking." He didn't ask again.

But many relatives took me to my favorite restaurant in Palestine (best crawdads EVER!), the one secretly owned by a black guy that I mentioned in the previous post, and my girlfriend was a tattooed blasian (from South LA) and I guess some rednecks took exception to her sitting with us blonds (most of us are descended from Swedish settlers and it shows) and all of a sudden I heard my cousin yell, "WHAT!?" very loud and harsh and several other male relatives took to glaring with him at rednecks at another table glaring at us, especially my girlfriend (I don't know if they sensed we were lesbians, I think they just didn't like a blasian sitting with us). The other rednecks finally looked away when they realized we would fight if it came to that and it went back to normal...and just as my cousin did to me when I was 13 he grossed out my girlfriend by "sucking out the brains" of the crawdads (they got boiled alive and served straight up). But she managed to get along with them (of course had she MOVED there then that would've been a problem and my family less tolerant...)

Dang, I just realized how long this is (maybe I should forward it to NatGeo ) and also had to put this part up here as it was too long to post as one...sorry if it's too much, but if you really want to know what growing up in rural East Texas is like that (along with my previous post about East Texas in general) should give you a good idea that a simple 3 paragraphs couldn't have really explained to someone from a completely different background...just be glad I didn't go into the drama between the different churches (very important if you live there!) as that would've taken more paragraphs just to sum up!

[bryandurel]

are you kidding? Pix... that was AWESOME!

[Pix]

I'm glad I shared it then. mile:

And I also came across this on "the southern strategy" that you might find interesting:

http://www.salon.com/2012/11/13/audio_of..._strategy/