MAMA DON'T TAKE MY KODACHROME AWAY

Got me a note the other day from blog pioneer and occasional State Representative Aaron Pena. He informed me that I was on his "blogroll." Since I was not familiar with that word, Billy Clyde assumed it was synonymous with "shit list."

After performing a Google search (if you don't know this little computer trick, I'd be happy to teach you; just give me a call), it turns out that getting on someone's blogroll is a good thing. So thanks. You da man, Aaron!

I decided to check out The Rep's site http://acapitolblog2.blogspot.com/ this evening to see what wisdom he was sharing with the masses. And to see if he REALLY put me on his blogroll. Visiting his page was kind of a bummer.

Now, Aaron probably has a dozen or so highly skilled backroom technical Internet guys doing the real work. But his site rocks. It looks nice, and he's got tons of photos. In contrast to Billy Clyde's site, which has an rather amateurish look and zero photos.

Being a man of action, I went to work. Goal: to learn how to post a photograph in an effort to play catch-up (and, natch, eventually surpass) Representative Pena's fancy-pants blog with all its bells and whistles. Not having any photos of my own to post, I stole one from his site. You can respect international copyright law yet still hide behind the Fair Use Doctrine.

His most recent pics were taken during Valley Weekend, which my sources tell me was a smashing success. Senator Dan Patrick spent two full hours on its greatness on his talk show today. He is very impressed that there are so many nice Mexican-American persons down there and apparently tried to learn something, proving that despite his lengthy service in the Senate, he has yet to master the concept of a junket. (I changed tenses three times in that sentence, tying my previous record.)

Senator Patrick singled out Representative Juan Escobar as a Valley delegation member who was particularly enlightening. Though he kept referring to him as a new member, even though Juan has been in the Legislature for more than four years, while Dan's tenure is about two weeks. Go figure.

Anyway, here's the picture I stole.


The above photo depicts Escobar showing Patrick the EXACT best spot on the Rio Grande River from which to shoot Mexicans.

While listening to Senator Patrick's broadcast and learning to steal and post pics (call me Mr. Multitasker), BC damn near fell out of his chair. Dan told his audience that he now thinks a guest worker program is a nifty idea, leaving his approximately 100,000 listeners as the only people in Texas (est. population 23 million) who didn't already know this intuitively at birth. The man learns and is flexible; he's no John Leedom.

Billy Clyde has been following Dan Patrick since he was the wacky sportscaster on KHOU Channel 11 and thinks he's great. It gets lonely being a right winger at the Capitol (Toomey doesn't count; he's nuts) and I'm glad to have some company. But I worry about Dan losing his base by grasping reality so well and so quickly.

According to my scorecard, the Senator from the 7th District now likes lobbyists, insider politics, Austin special-interest fundraisers, Mexican guest workers, compromise, creating new fees that interfere with private enterprise (see tomorrow's bill filings), and, get this ... he's THIS CLOSE to supporting busting the constitutional spending cap -- pending the outcome of the on-line poll he launched today.

Wow!

Billy Clyde's nimble mind has a tendency to wonder from time to time. So let's recall that this post is about Representative Pena's splendid blog and the photos I stole from him, plus some Senator Patrick stuff. Time to wrap it up.

The bonus photo below was burgled from Aaron, and it shows the Reverend Joel Olsteen and professional House member impersonator and Olsteen body double Kelly Hancock taken on Inauguration Day. If my memory is correct, Dan Patrick ran the teevee operations for the Rev. Olsteen for a while. So it's mighty relevant. Focused and concise. That's our goal.