The Era of Jose Crow Will Have to Wait

In my ballgame, Nashville has two strikes against it. By voting down the English-only amendment, Music City saved itself from an embarrassing out.

To put it country simple, the amendment would have required all city business to be conducted in English. I shudder to think what that would have done for restaurant inspections.

The backer’s rationale was that other countries don’t give language exemptions; when he served in the military, the Japanese expected him to know the language. OK, fair enough – he married a Japanese woman, so he doesn’t deserve the racist label.

The problem is every dirt-eating redneck racist saw it as an opportunity to punish immigrants legal or otherwise. The Southern stereotypes - the hillbilly who thinks anyone with a remotely foreign surname entered this country via the Arizona desert – appeared ready to rear their heads.

If English-only passed, I recommended calling it the Jose Crow Law. Let's face it - for most, this wasn't about Nashville's big Kurdish population, Pakistanis or the East Africans. This was all about Hispanics, and punishing them for daring to bring their culture to ours without assimilating.

Luckily, the cretinous shut-ins who comment on the Tennessean message board stayed home (really, these message boards must come with a “Your IQ cannot exceed 60” disclaimer).

My great-grandmother never spoke more than rudimentary English, and she died just 15 years ago at age 95. My grandmother never spoke a word of English until she went to school – well, maybe one word (their last name, English, was the Anglicized version or Inglizi).

I went into the polling place as one local genius explained to the people in line the importance of the second amendment that prevented Metro Council from changing any voter-approved amendment for at least four years. The people are sheep, easily flocked when an issue is portrayed as an assault on their (supposed) morals or their wallets.

It also made it easier to place initiatives on the ballot. If you’ve looked at a recent general election ballot in Colorado, Ohio or any other state with easy access to the ballot, you know why this is a bad idea. Anyone with a cockamamie policy thought and the money to pay an army of homeless guys to collect signatures can put crazy laws before the voters.

So, Nashville, where does that leave us? You don’t get either strike back yet, Nashville, but I’ll save my airing of grievances for another week.

We've been spared from an idiotic law. To know rednecks across Davidson County are seething about the loss is worth the wait.

Even in my Dreams, Women Deride Me

Activity on the female front has been minimal as of late.

By minimal, of course, I am mean nonexistence. A man can rationalize, can't he?

Even my dreams play out like a formulaic sitcom flirtation.

As with all dreams, we’ll begin in medias res, attending some conference of international diplomats for some unknown reason. Why they would pick Nashville, I have no idea. The Nashville of my dreams had a more stately, European vibe evident nowhere in the real Music City, so that might have played a role.

As a reporter covering the events - or a functionary with some other role, I never ironed that out - I ended up in conversation with a Swedish diplomat's assistant, and amazingly, we hit it off, then decided to ditch the diplomats and tour the city.

So the diplomat’s assistant and I took off in a sedan. I quickly discovered she was in demand, as our tour route involved evading her comrades. On our search for a coffeehouse to depart from from frantic pace, her cohorts, left behind at the conference swarmed to find her.

This was an imaginary Nashville – first, the weather was comfortable, a rarity in Music City. In a fifty-degree afternoon with a slight breeze, we strode along a riverfront promenade, beneath old cobblestone bridges and swapped life stories. She told me of growing up in a suburb of Gothenburg and her service in America, all the while omitting the identity of her pursuers - namely, her boyfriend.

We approached a checkpoint made essential by all those foreign attache types wandering the brick streets. Past it, we crossed a busy city square/urban park where a man with wild brown eyes cordoned us away from everyone passing.

The boyfriend had arrived, and he swiftly turned his cross gaze to her.

As she went to explain the situation, I shook my head and calmly told her I was who he was. He began his rant in earnest, but not before condescending telling me to have a seat on the curb opposite where we stood.

The blow was that he was utterly unconcerned with me. He waved me away as he would a servant or an out-of-favor employee.

Apparently, I was just a prop, an engine for driving jealousy in her boyfriend.

Apparently, even in my dreams, I can't catch a break.

Great Lakes Christmas Ale: A Personal History

The holidays might have been less than stellar, but one tradition has carried over well into 2009.

Thanks to old friend BC, I have spent the past two weeks working my way through two six packs of Great Lakes Christmas Ale - my favorite holiday libation, and easily the best winter ale I ever tasted.

I’m always thankful I didn’t discover it alone. Too often, being a devotee of good beer is a lonely existence; it’s a Flavorless American Lager World out there.

I remember the night well. After Braif, Nirav and myself helped BC and Abigail move into their Northwest Columbus pad in Fall 2004, the couple had us working folk over for a celebratory dinner.

Abigail picked out some mixed six-packs from the Kenny Road Market. As we each picked music while hanging out before dinner, we dove into the bucket of beers and everyone marveled at the Christmas ale. Our adoration of GLCA was so strong, I couldn’t tell you anything else Abigail bought. Nothing like it had come before; our beer worlds had been forever altered.

That winter, it became a regular libation, even at $10 a six-pack, a hike from my typical $6 Goose Island selections at the Sharon Square Beverage Shop. That skillful addition of honey, cinnamon and ginger pushes this ale into the stratosphere. I could no longer separate it from the season.

BC left town in August 2005, Abigail followed in October, but the tradition would survive the 800-mile gulf between us all.

At a 2005 dinner at the Winking Lizard, I landed my official Christmas Ale glass, which has served me well in years since. Before trekking down to Hilton Head to see BC and Abigail, I loaded a cooler with 12 Christmas ales, stocking us up for the week in South Carolina.

By Christmas 2006, the ale departed from store shelves and taps by the week before Christmas. The Winking Lizard last longer than any other pub, but other sad events intruded, so hunting down beer was far from my mind.

In Nashville, it wasn’t a matter of the separating GLCA from the season – distance did that for me.

But 2007 still brought plenty of GLCA. Bob’s Bar returned it to the taps in time for a November trip to Columbus. A few sixers held me over in December, and when back in Columbus for the Mumm-Terman wedding, Bob’s still had some kegs to empty. I gladly aided their cause.

I thought I had almost no chance of scoring some this year, so I turned to an old friend. BC dutifully carted around two six-packs in his trunk for several weeks, until I took ownership on New Year’s Eve.

Two weeks later, I’m slowly coming to the end. I’m down to a pair of GLCAs, and will every savor every drop.

Although I recently discovered that a liquor store in Bowling Green, Ky. (a one-hour drive) stocks Great Lakes beers, that won’t serve any good at this point. Those two are all I have until the tradition resumes in November.

Something tells me BC will once again be involved. I wouldn’t have it any other way.

I'll Blog Again, Don't Know Where, Don't Know When, But I Know I'll Blog Again Some Sunny Day

The rollercoaster weekend in Columbus crippled my blogging schedule, and with another Forgotten Favorites due at wnew.com on Friday.

I'll have more to say at week's end.

But the days have been cold and rainy, the nights short and uneventful ("It don't snow, it stays pretty green/I'm gonna make a lot of money/Then I'm gonna quit this crazy scene").

So hang in there.

That all I'm trying to do while living in this Redneck Paradise.