Briar Patch
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The women who'd won the legit contest didn't think it was funny either.
"They really got screwed," observed one of the more sympathetic elves later on. "They had to buy their own dresses and no men came out to hustle them. It turned out to be a bummer for them."
No one ever did find out exactly who had put the elves up to their mischief.
WON'T THE BABOONS BE WANTING ONE TOO?
THE NEW GORILLA HABITAT (SOUNDS so much nicer than "cage," doesn't it) in Houston's Herman Park Zoo will contain, in addition to such pedestrian items as vines for swinging and paintings of jungle scenes, a large television set. Does this important fact reveal something unknown but suspected about gorillas? Or something unknown but suspected about television?
WAR IS SWELL
IT'S CONSIDERED BAD JOURNALISTIC FORM to run press releases verbatim, but we were tempted to do so when the release from the "War Museum of History, Inc." crossed our desk. American promoters have brought London Bridge to the Mojave and "Holyland" to Georgia but now, we discovered, they are bringing war to Grand Prairie, Texas, and it's aIl supposed to start this spring.
Mr. Mike Giles, a newspaper advertising salesman, is evidently the prime mover behind aIl this since the press release describes him as both president and general manager of the War Museum of History, Inc., and as curator of the museum, and as a major donor of war memorabilia. What first interested us about his project was the news that the museum would be "designed in the shape of a military bunker" which will be "partially surrounded by a moat where a World War II submarine and naval surface vessels are to be displayed." Furthermore, "visitors to the museum will enter the displays through the darkened entrance of the bunker." No hint is given of how the visitors are going to get out.
Mr. Giles is building the musem so near the Dallas-Ft. Worth Turnpike that he doesn't plan to erect a large sign. "I don't expect we're going to have that much trouble attracting attention, anyway," says Giles in the press release. "You can't imagine someone's reaction when they look off the turnpike and see a World War II fortress and a submarine conning tower 250 miles inland." Hell, when we look off the turnpike, we're happy to see even half a mile inland. Fortresses and conning towers would be gravy.
Lest he be misunderstod, Mr. Giles insists the museum "is not meant to promote war or the suffering it causes—but to provide an authentic, realistic vision of the wars as they were." He adds later: "We're striving for the things that make you feel that you were actually there." A realistic war without suffering! Before you know it, they'll make a coffee we really like without caffeine.
CROSSING THE CHORUS LINE
THIS FALL FREDDIE DELOIS GOOSBY, an l8-year-old black South Oak Cliff (Dallas) graduate broke a 32-year-old, all-white tradition when she joined Gussie Nell Davis' precision high kickers, the Kilgore Rangerettes, who are as representative of Texas as bluebonnets and oil wells.
Taught to kick higher and with more precision than the Radio City Rockettes, the Rangerettes were the first chorus line on the football field in the nation: all those others you see every weekend are mere copies. No, the Rangerettes are still the Tiffany's of halftime shows, so much so that Lowell Thomas filmed them for Cinerama's Seven Wonders of the World, Macy's has had them in thek parade, and television variety and news programs have looked at their training and their performance.
Rangerettes can never miss unless they are sick in bed; they cannot marry; and they cannot attend parties where liquor is served. Director Davis admonishes them to "Be Gracious" and the whole experience is like a finishing school chorus line.
Freddie has aspired to be a Rangerette since she first marched on a football field with the Pivoteers of South Oak Cliff. "I came down here to make it. I didn't know anyone at Kilgore Junior College, but I just knew I'd make it no matter what," she said in a recent interview. Five years as a Sanger-Harris Young Texan Fashion Board model and her performance as co-captain of the high school drill team undoubtedly made her a strong contender in the tryouts which are judged much like Miss America competition.
Of the workouts which take place in an auditorium with a flashing SMILE sign, she says, "It's a lot harder than high school, but I love every minute of it."
A MOTORCYCLE IS A MOTORCYCLE IS A MOTOR-ASSISTED BICYCLE
A SOLEX IS A SMALL bicycle propelled by a very small motor. It will attain the breathtaking speed of 20 miles per hour. Over eight million Solex bikes have been sold in Europe and the Orient; but until a distributorship opened in Dallas about a year ago, they were unobtainable in this country. What's interesting is how quickly the French company learned the importance of a good lobbyist.
Texas law, before last August 27th, provided that anyone riding a motorcycle must wear a helmet. Under that law Solex was considered a motorcycle and that put quite a crimp in Solex's sales. As Adbil Said, Vice-President of Sol-U.S. Imports, put it, "Texans felt they looked silly wearing a helmet on this little bike." Under the new law, written and passed through Solex's efforts, any vehicle that will not travel over 20 miles per hour is defined as a "motor-assisted bicycle"; its operator doesn't need to wear a helmet. Solex plans an elaborate advertising campaign of this recently earned privilege.
Perhaps the Japanese have something to learn about business after all. Don't Texans feel as silly wearing helmets on small motorcycles like the Ronda 90 as they did on Solex's? Don't those machines go about 40 miles per hour, a speed easily reached by most human powered bicycles? If the legislature winds start blowing that way, the helmet companies may have to send their own man down to Austin. The helmet lobby?
WHAT HAS BILLIE JEAN DONE?
CONVERSATION OVERHEARD BETWEEN A FATHER and his seven-year-old son:
Son: Is there anybody in your office better than God?
Father: Nobody's better than God.
Son: There is too, Jesus is.
Father: (nonplussed) Oh yeah?
Son: Yeah, Jimmy told me. Jesus is everywhere. E-v-e-r-ywhere. Jesus is right there standing on your arm, you just can't see her.
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