Page 2/The Battalion/Tuesday, June 21, 1988
Opinion
Mail Call
Some dangerous adiposity
EDITOR:
You asked for letters, so here’s one sure to get some irate, self-serving
responses. In rebuttal to Jill Webb’s column concerning social bias against fat
chicks (can we call them fat young women?), I would like to offer comments
from one who decided not to knock ’em ’til 1 tried ’em.
Fat women sweat a lot. The human body wasn’t designed to cool such a
mass of adiposity. They cover the smell with a half-ton of perfume. I picked
up my date and spent the rest of the evening unable to smell anything. My
sinuses had been grenaded. The woman ate more than 1 did at dinner
(decidedly unfeminine). She also smoked — a tremendously gross thing to do
in polite company. I tried manfully to dance with her. Leading her was like
steering a small planetoid. Very unwiedly, and I couldn’t get my arms around
her properly (I’m 6’1”). I had to constantly watch her feet. She had on stiletto
heels. I was afraid that one misstep by her would nail my foot to the floor.
Let’s face it, half of 300 pounds is still 150 pounds, a formidable weight on a
small surface, as the physics people would say.
Fat people have a lot to offer society. Certainly, society would be missing a
“large” piece of its rich tapestry without them. Fat women can be the sweetest
around, if you ignore the fact that they are always stuffing their faces. Let’s
not forget that you have to be big in order to sing opera properly! But please
don’t inflict them on average men socially! It’s too dangerous!
John S. Snowden
Grad Student
Making tracks is no good
EDITOR:
Once again the proposal for moving the railroad tracks along the
Wellborn Road corridor is in the news, this time with an estimated $50
million price tag. The Board of Regents wants the tracks moved so west of
campus will no longer be “divided” from the rest. This project will be funded
45 percent by the state, which includes A&M and state highway department
funds, 45 percent by the federal government, 5 percnet by local government
and 5 percent by the railroad. The Board of Regents has done all of this
without public opinion on the matter.
Where A&M, Bryan, College Station and Brazos County will get the
money is anybody’s guess. At A&M, aren’t there many more pressing needs
such as day-care facilities for faculty/staff, dorm space, parking, a sometimes-
inadequate library, establishing colleges of music and fine arts, minority
recruitment and pay raises to name a few? What will Bryan and College
Station do, cut our already-cut services, not get pay raises, stop building
needed roads and parks? All of these could be provided for, and improve the
quality of life more than moving the railroad tracks.
On the safety side, lowering gates have been installed at all intersections
and train derailments are about as common as blizzards in this area. Why not
build, at a much moi'e reasonable cost, over- or underpasses for pedestrians
and/or automobiles if the tracks are in the way?
Moving the railroad tracks is an idea that’s time has come and gone. The
cost is too great and the benefits too few for too few people.
Mike Varner ’SS
Letters to the eilitor should not exceed 300 words in length. The editorial staff rrserves the right to edit letters
for style and length, but will make every effort to maintain the author’s intent. Each letter must be signed and.
must include the classification, address and telephone number of the writer.
Who is that mystery voice?
1 don’t want to
sound too h i g h
and mighty here,
but if it weren’t ab
solutely necessary,
I don’t think I’d
spend the night at
a Motel 6.
I spend about
half my life in mo
tels and hotels as it
is, and I’ve gotten
to the point where
Lewis
Grizzard
I even tried to talk to th.e man di
rectly, but he lives in Alaska, as it turns
out, and he was off on his dogsled some
where. v
I did learn the following about him:
Tom Bodett was born in Michigan in
1955. He has been a cannery worker, a
logger, a building contractor, and a
commentator on Naional Public Radio’s
“All Things Considered.”
He lives in Homer, Alaska, with his
wife and son.
I need my comforts — minibar in my
room, little jars of shampoo and turn
down service where they leave a candy
mint on my pillow.
I’m certain a room at a Motel 6 would
be clean, but I’ve got the feeling the tow
els would be small and there wouldn’t be
but one pillow and there wouldn’t be
HBO on the television.
Regardless, I’ve become a Tom Bod
ett fan, and if you listen to radio at all,
you know Tom Bodett is a national
spokesman for Motel 6.
His commercials are homey and
clever and he always signs off by saying,
“We’ll leave the light on for you,” which
is what your mother used to say when
you were going to be out late.
In a w'orld where an advertiser would
hire that idiot from Australia to scream
at you about batteries, Tom Bodett’s
calming voice is most welcome.
He talks about Motel 6’s great room
service (there’s a pizza place nearby that
delivers) and he even spoke the recent
good news that in some Motel 6 rooms,
there are new bedspreads.
Since I’d never heard of Tom Bodett
before he broke in with Motel 6, I set
about to find out more about him.
I also found out he is an author. I am
now in possession of two of his books
and I have read them and they have
brought me much joy.
One book is “As Far As You Can Go
Without a Passport,’ (Addison-Wesley).
The other is “Small Comforts’ by the
same publisher. Both books are filled
with essays that come across as a conver
sation with your neighbor.
Tom Bodett has a lot to say about
stacks of wood, McDonald’s coming to
Alaska, getting a truck out of a ditch,
naming a baby and machinery.
“Machinery and I have an understa-
ding,” he writes. “We hate each other.’
What I like most about Tom Bodett’s
writing is he’s not topical. He neglects
AIDS, nuclear war, racism, the falling
dollar, and airline deregulation and
deals instead with the fact he’s never
been able to spit very far.
Tom Bodett has the most believable
voice in radio advertising since Arthur
Godfrey tried to sell me tea.
And you know, he is the sort of per
son who would, in fact, leave the light
on for you if he said he would.
Copyright 1988, Cowles Syndicate
Spare a dime for a space station!
I recently hap
pened to be wan
dering aimlessly
around some large
unnamed down
town area when I
stumbled upon a
poor, hopeless fel
low who was ap
parently down-
and-out on his
luck. He was
dressed in a sharp
Mark
Nair
three-piece suit and was rattling a few
pennies in a small tin cup.
“Excuse me,” he said in that raspy,
down-and-out voice of his. He rattled
the cup and looked at me pitifully. “Got
a dime, mister?”
Now' I was oblivious to the more than
obvious faux pas of helping our society’s
downtrodden and poor, so I offered to
buy the poor fellow a cup of coffee and
a nice, glucose-laden danish.
“Oh, no,” he said, smiling a raspy,
down-and-out smile. “I don’t want any
of that. Just a dime. Or a quarter, if you
have a quarter.”
How strange, I thought, as I rubbed
my chin in puzzlement. But I was quar
terless. All I had with me was my check
book.
“Do you take checks?” I queried quer
ulously.
“Sure,” he said and handed me a pen.
“Make it out to NASA.”
Oh, ho. I could smell financial trou
ble on the horizon. “NASA?”
“Yes, its for the space station.”
Ah. It suddenly became clear. NASA,
the Space Shuttle, the space station,
pennies from heaven. No problem.
He leaned into the light to grab my
check. I gasped a hearty gasp. Golly! He
looked very similar to James Fletcher,
big man on campus at NASA, The Ad
ministrator. But before I could he cer
tain, he snatched my check from my
hand and retreated into the dark and
dreary shadows.
“Thanks,” he said. I could tell he was
on the verge of tears. Here was a man
with a story to tell.
“You know,” the down-and-out fel
low said, “I wouldn’t have to be doing
this if it weren’t for those meatheads in
Congress. You want a space station,
don’t you?”
“Sure,” I said. Heck, ever since the
Ruskies shot old Sputnik over our heads
playing the Soviet theme song over and
over and over again,I was for anything
spacial.
“Yeah,” he said, wiping his nose, “e-
veryone wants a space station, except
those meatheads in Congress.” He be
gan to mimic a senator’s voice (doing
quite a good job, I might add), “Oh, we
need to cut someplace. You hoo, NASA,
odd man out. Its your turn. You want
$900 million? Well, take $200 million.
HA HA HA.”
“Sorry,” I said, genuinely sorry.
“Well, it’s not your fault that the
space station is doomed. Two hundred
million? You can’t even buy a decent
hammer for $200 million. Jeez.”
I was stumped for even a few helpful
words of consolation.
“And then, oh get this, now' they’re
saying that “Star Wars” can’t be de
ployed before the turn of the century
and it’ll cost more than $170 BIL
LION!”
“That’s a lot of money,” I said.
“You said it, buddy,” said the poor
old down-and-out fellow. “But, ho ho,
let’s give them they’re money on a silver
platter and we won’t even give NASA
the stinking time of day.”
“Politics,” I said, pacing up and down
the alley, looking angry. “Everything is
politics.”
By 1
■giit'd fori
■oreign uni
) reign
itutions
“No kidding. And you know
1 he senate subcommittee thatti
dreams to boldly go where nospatJ
lion has gone before and smashed
like roaches told us to usethegei
$200 million sum to either phase
space station program or mail
with $50 million a month until net
nary.”
“That rivals my utility bills," |j
writing another check.
The poor old down-and-out, iij
piece suit bum/beggar/borrowern
Ins fist and chanted “SDI stinks,Si
number one!” a few times untilh
came hoarse from the exdtemeu
petered out by whimpering, “No
lion for the station. Money now.’
“What else can I do?” I asked,>i
checks like machine gunfire.
But my downtrodden friendti
ued to ramble. “Even DOD’sbudc
congress have said that SDI will
knoc k out 16 percent of incoming!
missies. HA! We could spend
money much better than ...thi
than wasting it!”
By then I had
asked if he took credit cards hi
didn’t after dark. He thankedme|s
sely, shaking my hand as if he
pumping a water pumpinthedi
lef t a stunned yet hopeful space
supporter.
And on my w'ay, a few street'
the block, I heard another rasp
nearly as bad down-and-outvoiccBn HQ
the alley. I looked around and s Jp i?''*
my eyes. It sure as heck looked!
cranky Frank Carlucci.
“Pssst, buddy. Got a quarter'l
SDI in the sky?”
“Jenkies,” I exclaimed loudlvl
then I cjuickly ran away.
Mark Nair is a graduate studei;
opinion page editor forThefouit Monday o\
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The Battalion
(USPS 045 360)
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Southwest Journalism Conference
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Richard Williams, Editor
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Mark Nair, Opinion Page Editor
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Jay Janner, Art Director
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