The 2001 Bum Steer Awards

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Presi-dense-tial

Have words, will mangle: Our second annual George W. Bush language quiz. Fill in the blanks with what George W. Bush really said.

1. “I don’t think we need to be _____________ about the differences between our views on prescription drugs.”
(a) subliminal (b) subliminable (c) sublime (d) key lime

2. “It is clear our nation is reliant upon big foreign oil. More and more of our imports come from _____________.”
(a) Iraq (b) Iran (c) I dunno (d) overseas

3. “A tax cut is really one of the _____________ to coming out of an economic illness.”
(a) antidotes (b) anecdotes (c) antipodes (d) ante up

4. “We don’t believe in planners and __________ making the decisions on behalf of Americans.”
(a) deciders (b) decisivists (c) decisioners (d) deciduous

5. “Reading is the _____________ for all learning.”
(a)(a) basis (b) basics (c) first base (d) home plate

6. “The senator [can’t] have it both ways. He can’t take the _____________ and then claim the low road.”
(a) high road (b) high horse (c) hyena (d) interstate

7. “This is Preservation Month. I appreciate preservation. It’s what you do when you run for president. You gotta __________.”
(a) persevere (b) preserve (c) strawberry preserves (d) jam

8. “We cannot let terrorists and rogue nations hold this nation ____________.”
(a) hostage (b) hostile (c) hostel (d) hospital

BONUS QUESTION: What issue was George W. Bush talking about when he said, “It’s going to require numerous IRA agents?”
(a) Irish foreign policy (b) terrorism (c) individual retirement accounts (d) Al Gore’s tax-cut plan

Sancti-moan-ious

God works in hilarious ways.

THEY’RE GUILTY AND ‘N SYN
Sunnybrook Christian Academy of San Antonio suspended four students for violating a school rule against “involvement with inappropriate music” because they attended a concert by the Backstreet Boys.

AND YOU THOUGHT ONLY HELL WAS ON WHEELS
Musician Frank Rodarte of San Antonio planned three “drive-by concerts” featuring a huge picture of Jesus Christ mounted on a flatbed trailer that was pulled through the streets of several high-crime areas.

ACTUALLY, IT LOOKED MORE LIKE CHERRY GARCIA
Hundreds of pilgrims visited a Southwest Houston apartment complex to view a spilled ice cream stain that they believe resembled the Virgin of Guadalupe.

WILL WORK FOR DAILY BREAD
The National Catholic Reporterreproduced a painting by Michelle Karam of Texarkana of Jesus as a homeless man, carrying a cardboard sign reading “I Am for You” and wearing a cap emblazoned with a Bible verse.

THOU SHALT NOT COVER THY NEIGHBOR’S BOOKS
After religious activists provided Ten Commandments book covers for students in the Grand Prairie Independent School District, John and Shelly Hattan distributed atheist book covers that quoted several U.S. presidents as well as Madalyn Murray O’Hair.

Inter-nettlesome

On-line and off the wall.

BID NOW, BEFORE IT’S TOO LATE!
Taking advantage of a rule that allows death row residents to have five witnesses at their execution, Michael Toney attempted to auction off seats at his lethal injection for a starting bid of $100 each on the Internet site eBay.

WWW.WHOCARES.COM
Mitch Maddox of Dallas legally changed his name to DotComGuy and undertook a year-long project to live in a one-bedroom apartment and obtain everything he needed via the Internet, through which, thanks to a live video camera in his living room, interested observers could watch him twenty-four hours a day.

YOU’LL GIVE THEM A .COMPLEX
Siblings David and Sandy Hastings of Fort Worth changed the name of Halitosis Alert, a service they had established to allow people to anonymously inform friends who suffer from bad breath, to dearestfriend.com, a Web site offering some twenty letters that can be sent to people who have problems ranging from a lack of personal hygiene to out-of-control kids.

THE GIRLS ALL LOVE HIS HARD DRIVE
Tony Northrup of Pflugerville won a national Sexiest Geek Alive contest.

BEWARE OF GEEKS BEARING GIFS
More than five hundred people showed up for the usually underattended monthly meeting of the Dallas Internet Society after president Gregg Wetterman rechristened the group’s regular gatherings “Geek Meets.”

STREAMING MEDIA, NO DOUBT
So many drunken revelers along Dallas’ Lower Greenville area, a popular bar and restaurant strip, used nearby bushes and parking lots as restrooms that residential neighbors began snapping pictures of the acts and then handing the offenders a card with the address of the Web site on which they planned to post the photographs.

In-stink-tive

In search of the straight poop.

THERE IS METHANE IN THEIR MADNESS
Lone Star livestock produced some 140 million tons of manure in 1999, making Texas the top-rated state in the union for manure production.

SOUNDS LIKE HE HAS A PRIMA FECE CASE
Bill Warren of Driftwood lost and appealed a $50 million lawsuit against the United States government over the possession of the Caribbean island of Navassa, which is laden with bird guano.

IT WAS A NUMBER-TWO-ALARM FIRE
A fire at an Ennis apartment complex was attributed to a soiled diaper sealed in a plastic bag, which was left on an apartment patio and burst into flames because of high temperatures, causing $3,000 in damage.

HOW FLORIDA ELECTIONS WILL BE DECIDED FROM NOW ON
As a fundraiser, the Angleton Chamber of Commerce divided the local football field into squares and hosted a county-wide contest of cow-patty bingo, in which the first plop produced by a heifer set loose on the field determined the winner.

AT LEAST HE WASN’T SCARED YOU-KNOW-WHATLESS
A 22-year-old Austin man, while roaming a wooded area of the city with friends in an impromptu nighttime reenactment of The Blair Witch Project, had to be rescued by emergency workers after he fell ten feet into a sewer.

Sylla-busted

The Bum Steer bookshelf.

HOW TO MARRY RIGHT AND LIVE HAPPILY EVER AFTER, by Daniel Lee Shinzing of Cleburne (Dani Lee Productions, $14.95). Do-it-yourself marriage-counseling manual features valuable tips, such as “A woman out looking for a husband is probably going to do something stupid!” as well as personal reflections, like “I wonder if there are too many men out there thinking with the wrong head? And too many women looking for security? Do you think I’m onto something here? Maybe?”

WHO CUT THE CHEESE?, a parody of the management best-seller Who Moved My Cheese?, by Stilton Jarlsberg, M.D., a.k.a. Stephen White of Plano (Crown Publishers, $12.95). Four characters must navigate a maze to claim their Cheese, a reward “symbolic of the things that we all want out of life: success and self-confidence, a nice house, a loving marital relationship, perfect children, a loyal dog, indoor plumbing, good Chinese food, several million tax-free dollars, and red-hot sex with multiple partners.”

TEXAS MEN, by Martana (Ten Speed Press, $49.95). The 81 title characters, hunky and otherwise, are asked to answer such questions as why they are real cowboys. Subjects include singer George Strait, coach Darrell Royal, NASCAR champion Bobby Labonte, and actor Chuck Norris (“I’m a real cowboy because: I kiss my horse and pat my woman”). Contributors of Lone-Star-male anecdotes include Texas Monthly publisher Michael R. Levy and senior editor Pat Sharpe.

SURVIVING MEXICO: THE INSIDER’S GUIDE TO SAFE TRAVEL, by John Stanley, a onetime smuggler, counterfeiter, and auto thief who lived in Mexico for eight years while a fugitive from U.S. justice, written with Ona Barry (Adios Press, $17.95). Stanley proffers advice for dealing with the seamier side of south-of-the-border life (“[I]f you are incarcerated, be concerned about release”).