Dodge Durango: Why I mute your ad.

1. Dodge took a government buy out.

2. See No. 1.

Hughes Net: Why I mute your ad.

1. I live in an area where people use your service and it's spotty.

2. Make it more reliable and I'll use it. Until then, I'll use what I have.

Army Reserve

1. I won't mute this ad because I like the message.

2. Keep up the good work.

Meat Math--Burger King

Why I mute your ad:

1. I do not identify with your idea.

2. I watched it once and decided it lowered my IQ.

3. Keep running your ad and you loose money because there are millions of people like me.

4. You wasted money in the first place with the ad agency.

A great Fort Worth Destination

Even though I live in the Forth Worth area, I never grow tired of visiting the Historic Fort Worth Stockyards. It's a fun place to visit for out-of-state travelers, especially in the fall or spring.

Spring and fall up north, I know because I've lived in several northern states, can stay wintry but are terrific seasons to see the Stockyards. A visit to the website (http://www.fwssr.com/) lists events, recurring events, shopping, dining, lodging and dining.

Booking a room at one of the hotels provides a great opportunity to poke around the shops; schedule a trip on the Tarantula Steam Train and ride to Grapevine and back; and you won't miss the daily long-horn cattle drive at 4 p.m.

Dining is a treat, from Riscky's Barbecue to the Lonesome Dove to the Cattlemen's Steakhouse. No one should miss Billy Bob's Texas Bar B Q, famous for the star western bands who perform on a regular basis.

Anyone living in northern states should consider the Fort Worth Stockyards. Yeee! Haaa!

FINALLY, An Original MovieThe Book of Eli

I yearn and yearn for something original, refreshing and engaging out of Hollywood. I don't think it's too much to ask.

The movie needs to come out of a mind that pays no attention to plots that have gone before. The OVER USE of computer animation has become boring and does not in the lest lend anything to character development except when a human morphs into another being. A movie needs to provide entertainment for me and I am not entertained when I perceive a thinly-veiled political statement heavy on the liberal side.

Over the years, there have been plenty of life-after-world-wide-catastrophe movies. The Book of Eli is a life-after-a-world-wide-catastrophe movie and has none-of-the-above elements. There is a natural progression of character development unaided or hampered by any obvious computer animation. At no time was I disappointed with plot aspects borrowed from past movies because there were none; neither was the experience marred with liberal political statements.

Denzel Washington not only makes the character Eli live on the screen, I cared immediately and to the bitter-sweet end. I saw the movie in a small-town theater. At the conclusion, there was applause.

I hope to see more of Gary Whitta's work, writer of The Book of Eli . No one should miss this movie.

I have a new job

I have a new job. It is in a bail bonds business. This is a job which has never been in my mind before.

This is a business which gets people out of jail for 10% of the bond amount. If the bond is $5000, the bond fee is $500. For any charge higher than a misdemeanor c, there is a filing fee of $15 for each charge. A misdemeanor bond can go no higher than $5000.

Higher bonds from $10,000 up are felonies and can go as high as a judge in a bad mood can reach. Of course, a murder charge tends to make a judge cranky. A murder charge in a small county can make any judge out of sorts, to say the least.

A day or two ago, four young girls in their late teens decided to take about a three-hour trip to a lake to have some end-of-summer fun with marijuana, alcohol and possibly additional substances. They drove through a small town. Perhaps they were having some sips of alcohol along the way, including the driver. The driving might have been less than spectacular and a patrol officer pulled the car over.

Long story, short, they went to jail and spent the night.

Each respective parent bailed out the daughter.

Anyone see something wrong with this picture? Hello, Parents. This entire scenario could have been avoided had the parents anticipated what the kids were up to and said, "Yah know, I think you should find some fun closer to home. Why do you want to go so far away?"

A teenager goes as far away from home to do something wrong, hoping not to get caught. Well, these girls got caught. Hopefully, they learned a lesson. Hopefully the parents learned a lesson as well.

There's no telling.