Page 2AThe BattalionAVednesday, January 13, 1988
i
Opinion
15 easy ways to improve your love life
Editor's note:
Mike Royko is on
\ :icnlion. This col-
u m n I i r s t ap
peared Dec. 6.
1978.
A sex advice
magazine that I’ve
never seen has
sent me a publicity
an n ou nce me n t
about 15 ways’ we
can improve our
Mike
Royko
“love life” in the coming year. This list
was compiled for the magazine by a
woman identified as a “therapist.”
I’ve heard a lot of interesting sugges
tions on ways to improve one’s love life.
But never from a magazine therapist. I
usually hear them in the bar where I oc
casionally stop on the way home. So I
stuffed the magazine list in my pocket
and took it there with me to hear how
some of the regulars would react.
“I have a list of 15 ways to improve
your love lives,” I said. “A magazine sent
it to me.”
Cicero Charlie looked up from his
beer and said, “Is there anything in
there about where to find a good di
vorce lawyer cheap? No? Then it can’t
help me.”
I began reading the list.
Item One: Sleep in satin sheets.
“I tried that once,” said Bernie, a city
worker. “They’re slipperv and I kept
sliding off the bed. The noise woke up
the guy downstairs and he told me that
if I kept it up, he'd punch me out. I
don’t see how getting punched out is
going to help my love life.”
Item Two: fell your lover what you
love about him or her every day.
After a few moments of thought,
Little George said: “Assuming that
means my wife, since 1 don’t have a
lover, what I love about her is that she
does a good job shoveling snow. I have a
bad back, see. But even if I didn’t have a
bad back, she'd do it anyway because
she’s strong as a bull. But 1 can’t tell her
that every day because it doesn’t snow
every day.”
Item Three: Arrange to meet your
lover in a singles bar and pick each
other up.
Chester the car salesman said: “ That’s
the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard. If I
went to a singles bar, what would l want
to pick my wife up for? In fact, why
would anyone want to pick my wif e up."
Bernie the city worker said: “But il
you went to a singles bar, who would
pick you up?”
Chester thought about that and said:
“Yeah. So we might as well stay home
and order out for a pizza.”
Item Four: Brush and wash each oth
er’s hair.
“Not me,” said Little George. “I read
about a guy who let his wife wash his
hair. One clay she got his whole head
down in the water, and she didn't ever
let him up. She said she just wanted to
be sure it was well rinsed, and she beat
the rap.”
Cicero Charlie said: “My wife won’t
trust me that close to her with a blunt in
strument like a brush in my hand. Not if
she’s smart, she won't.”
Chester the car salesman said: “I’ll be
honest, we do something like that now. I
got two hail pieces, and sometimes she
drops one of them off to be cleaned. But
it’s not something that turns us on. She
won’t even touc h it. I have to put it in a
plastic bag first. She says it reminds her
of a rat.”
Item Fi\e: Make love blindfolded
Warren the bartender said: “That’s
the most dangerous idea I’ve ever
heard. You start chasing each other
around the bedroom blindfolded and
you could fall out the window without
vour pants on. And if you didn’t break
yotn neck, the neighbors would think
you’re a weirdo.”
Item Six: Describe vour favorite sex
ual fantasv in explicit detail.
That brought a response from Nor-
bert the Norweigan, who had been lis
tening quietly as Norweigans often do.
“Believe it or not, I once did that with
my wife. 1 described this favorite f antasy
I had down to the last bead of sweat.”
“Was it a turn-on?” asked Chester the
car salesman.
“No,” said Norbert. “Just the oppo
site. She didn’t talk to me for a month.
The fantasy was about three of her girlf
riends.”
Item Seven: Wear erotic underwear.
“I’ll start wearing erotic underwear,”
said Cicero Charlie, “when Sears, Roe
buck starts making long winter under
wear that’s erotic.”
Little Ernie said, “You could always
buy their regular long underwear and
have it dyed black.”
“What would be erotic about that?”
“Well, you’d look something like a
Navy frogman. You could jump out of
the bathtub at her.”
Item Eight: Don’t wear underwear at
all.
“I think it’s indecent not to wear un
derwear,” said Chester.
“Even at home in bed?” asked Little
Ernie.
“That’s right,” said (Tester. “What if
there was a fire and you didn’t have
time to get dressed? How would you feel
running out of your house without any
underwear on in front of the firemen?
And would you want firemen seeing
your wife that way?”
“No,” said Little Ernie, “they’d pro]
bly go on strike.”
“My mother always told me tod
clean underwear,” said Norbert
Norweigan. “She said that in caseo
accident, you don’t want to be emlj
rassed at the hospital.”
Item Nine: Give your lover a
massage.
“Yeah, I wouldn’t mind giving]
wife a massage with my foot,” saidl
cero Charlie. “With both feet andt|
my boots on.”
Item Ten: Send your lover level
ters on perfumed stationery, or lej
notes in unexpected places.
“My wife leaves me notes on
kitchen table,” said Chester. “Thevj
things like: ‘ Take out the garbage,
‘Drop of f the cleaning.’ But she doe
put perfume on them. Maybe T1
her a perfumed note saving: ‘ Take]
the garbage yourself.’
We skipped the rest of the items,I
cause some of them were too lewd
respectable bar.
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“Who made up that list?” asked|
cero Charlie.
“A lady therapy.”
“Yeah? That woman needs help.'l
Copyright 1987, Tribune Media Services, h:
lege
Aversion to beer
creates stigma
for native Texan
M any people
don’t consider me
a real Texan. It
really doesn’t mat
ter that 1 was born
here, specifically
on Galveston Is
land. It doesn’t
Lee
Schnexneider
Guest Columnist
matter that I have only left the state on
rare occasions, vacations and such. I am
not a real Texan because I don’t drink
beer.
I guess beer goes along with the
T exas mystique. You know — cattle,
horses and cowboys. But I wonder how
many cowboys of the Old West, after
riding the range all day, came back to a
chuck wagon with a cooler filled with
cans of Bud Light. And of course there
is the other analogy; Texans love foot
ball, people drink beer when watching
football, so therefore Texans love beer.
Or is it the other way around?
I guess it comes from my father; he
rarely drinks and doesn’t like most beer.
So there was never any in my house
when I was growing up, which is
strange, because
he worked at the
Falstaff brewery
in Galveston for
ten years. But
considering how
Falstaff beer
tasted, that’s not
surprising.
They say that
beet is an ac
quired taste. I
guess 1 just never
acquired it. And
why do I think
b e e r tastes s o
bad? Well, when
I was in high
school, I did ex
periments with
alternate energy
sources. Alcohol
I have heard the sermons of the beer-
preachers, who have been trying con
vert me to their ways for years. You’d be
surprised how many friends of mine still
pour me axirink from a pitcher and give
me a glass of that
foul brew. When I
remind them 1 don’t
drink beer, they ac
cuse me of being
from out of state.
Even worse, they ac
cuse me of being a
Northeasterner.
They lecture me on
what it is to be a
Texan. You m u s t
drink beer, like cow
boy boots, and be
willing to die for
Texas i n d e p e n -
dence. So I guess
that makes me only
two-thirds Texan.
But when 1 tell them
I like whiskey, they
seem to calm down a
MafftiBiif dbwm Tbs
“It’s
khe saic
Buti
S
t&M’s
iger. 1
shipme
pianag
Tl.
)l
The
eived
; S100
Congress should not reduce
funding for the space station
With two recent
hardware failures
occurring on the
space shuttle
booster, coupled
with severe budget
cuts in the pro
posed space sta-
John
^JacDougal^
fuel was one of them. Honestly, I wasn’t
making the stuff to drink. I didn’t know
how to get those killer impurities out,
and we used the excess to remove stains
from concrete. But I remember the
smell of the mash fermenting, and I
don’t drink stuff that tastes like a science
experiment smells.
bit.
I can tolerate beer in low doses with
limes, or in drinks like boilermakers and
Dr. Peppers. (Not the soft drink Dr Pep
per, but a mixed drink where you drop
a shot glass filled with flaming amaretto
and Barcadi 151 into a glass of beer and
as soon as the fire is extinguished you
chug the whole ungodly mess. Suppos-
edlv it tastes like the soda water Dr. Pep
per.)
I didn’t really notice the beer preju
dice that much in high school, but in col
lege it became immediately apparent,
especially since college students are per
petually poor, and beer is the cheapest
thing with alcohol in it short of Mad
Dog 20/20. And I do have to bring my
own alcohol to keg parties instead of
mooching beer off the hosts.
To show you just how disloyal I am to
this Texan beer-drinking concept, I
christened my Aggie senior ring by
downing a pitcher of red wine coolers. I
guess my excommunication papers
from the governor will be coming soon.
Lee Schexneider is a senior journalism
major assistant editor for At Ease.
tion program and sagging public confi
dence in NASA, it seems that America’s
space program is stymied. Myopic oppo
nents of the space station argue that the
$8 billion, 10-year project is expensive
and unnecessary. They fail to see that
the space station is justifiable on long
term economic, strategic and political
grounds.
create its own space program. Japan
hopes to manufacture products in
space. By year 2000, the Japanese gov
ernment plans to spend more than $40
billion to commercialize space. They al
ready have successfully launched rock
ets from Japan. If L.S. space station
funding goes through the Japanese will
build a space-processing module that
will be attached to its U.S. and Euro
pean counterparts.
The Battalion
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News Editors
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Sam B. Myers, Photo Editor
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Every day the shuttle sits idle on the
ground; the United States is losing its
competitive edge in space technology to
the Soviet Union. Without a space sta
tion and an operational shuttle to sup
port it, the U.S. space program will be
overshadowed by the Soviets’ efforts.
The Soviets successfully have operated
several versions of space stations for a
few years and recently returned a cos
monaut to Earth after a record-break
ing stay in space. They have cleverly
used their lead position in space as a
publicity tool to promote international
space cooperation in preparation for
the “International Space Year” in 1992.
T he Soviets see the value of a space sta
tion not only as a vehicle to help bring
about scientific achievements, but also
as a magnet for polarizing public opin
ion by utilizing the station as a celestial
United Nations.
What the Japanese are beginning to
understand, and what many Americans
have known all along, is that — in the
long run — space exploration pays off.
Historically NASA research has led to
great advances in science and technol
ogy. Many of these achievements have
been incorporated into “spin-off” items
we use every day. These include Velcro,
aerodynamic automobiles and planes,
home insulation, speedy semiconduc
tors and calculators. And the list goes
on.
Washington dealmakers could jl
afdize the entire space station prod
if they decide to cut the budget fiirtlj
Congress and the administration, il
attempt to reduce the federal M
deficit, will exact a high toll from'
American people — their natiol
pride. It seems like centuries agowl
Americans looked to their space f I
gram as a symbol of national achif 1
ment. President Kennedy gave K [
mandate to reach the moon by end I
the '60s. We did it and a lot more,
somewhere along the way, many Am
cans became distracted. We aresoo'l
whelmed with the threat of nuclear* |
rising unemployment, huge deft
war in Central America and thecr
on Wall Street that we have beet
short-sighted.
While the Soviet bureaucrats have
(been enjoying good press about the Mir
(station, Japan has been working hard to
Space is a long-term investment.
Though some of the benefits are tan
gible in the short run, in terms of dollars
and cents, many others are immeasura
ble in the long run. Because of this, a
cadre of politicians wants to torpedo the
space station. Congress, slashing pro
grams from the budget, is stalking pro
grams that currently lack popularity or
strong partisan support. With no solid
backing from the Reagan administra
tion the space station went through the
funding shredder in December. The
House and Senate appropriation com
mittees axed the space station budget to
$425 million in 1988, $300 million less
than NASA originally requested. Some
expect the cuts to delay the space station
by at least a year, and who knows what
reductions are in store for fiscal 1989.
Our nation mourned whenoursej
astronauts perished in the Challeiil
two years ago. But our dreams of sp
exploration haven’t vanished with
of the shuttle. The space station
once again give, us a chance to loot
the stars with pride. It is in the natie
interest to fully fund the estimated
billion it will cost to complete thesw> i |
during the next ten years. By they
] 990s, the space station could be
operational — manned 24 hours a
365 days year. The station will en* 1
that America nhaintains its compete 1 !
lead in space technology. The space
tion wall pay the United States ancU
lies back by providing facilities for
searching and experimenting with
technologies that one day will benefit!
mankind.
John MacDougall is a graduate st0'
and a columnist forThe Battalion.