I've had no inspiration lately for original posts, but I had to share this. Too funny.

1. Most Blues begin with: "Woke up this morning..."

2. "I got a good woman" is a bad way to begin the Blues, unless you
stick something nasty in the next line like, "I got a good woman, with
the meanest face in town."

3. The Blues is simple. After you get the first line right, repeat it.
Then find something that rhymes, "sort of":
"Got a good woman with the meanest face in town. Yes, I got a good
woman with the meanest face in town. Got teeth like Margaret Thatcher
and she weighs 500 pound."

4. The Blues is not about choice. You stuck in a ditch, you stuck in a
ditch. Ain't no way out.

5. Blues cars: Chevys, Fords, old Cadillacs and broken-down trucks.
Blues don't travel in Volvos, BMWs, or sport utility vehicles. Most
Blues transportation is a Greyhound bus or a southbound train. Jet
aircraft ain't even in the running. Walkin' plays a major part in the
Blues lifestyle. So does fixin' to die.

6. Teenagers can't sing the Blues; they ain't fixin' to die yet. Adults
sing the Blues. In Blues, "adulthood" means being old enough to get the
electric chair if you shot a man in Memphis.

7. Blues can take place in New York City but not in Hawaii or anywhere
in Canada. Hard times in Minneapolis or Seattle is probably just
clinical depression. Chicago, St. Louis and Kansas City are still the
best places to have the Blues. You cannot have the Blues in any place
that doesn't get rain.

8. You can't have no Blues in an office or a shopping mall; the
lighting is wrong. Go outside to the parking lot and sit by the
dumpster.

9. Good places for the Blues:
a. Highway
b. Jailhouse
c. Empty bed
d. Bottom of a whiskey glass

10. Bad places for the Blues:
a. Nordstrom's.
b. Gallery openings.
c. Ivy League institutions.
d. Golf courses.

11. No one will believe it's the Blues if you wear a suit, 'less you
happen to be an old black guy - and you slept in it.

12. Do you have the right to sing the Blues?
Yes, if:
a. You older than dirt.
b. You blind.
c. You shot a man in Memphis.
d. You can't be satisfied.

No, if:
a. You have all your teeth.
b. You were once blind but now can see.
c. The man in Memphis lived.
d. You have a 401K or trust fund.

13. Blues is not a matter of color; it's a matter of bad luck. Tiger
Woods cannot sing the Blues. Sonny Liston could have. Ugly white people
also got a leg up on the Blues.

14. If you ask for water and your darlin' give you gasoline, it's the
Blues. Other acceptable Blues beverages are:
a. Cheap wine.
b. Whiskey or bourbon.
c. Muddy water.
d. Black coffee.

The following are not Blues beverages:
a. Perrier.
b. Chardonnay.
c. Snapple.
d. Slim Fast.

15. If death occurs in a cheap motel or a shotgun shack, it's a Blues
death. Stabbed in the back by a jealous lover is another Blues way to
die. So are the electric chair, substance abuse and dying lonely on a
broken-down cot. You can't have a Blues death if you die during a
tennis match or while getting liposuction.

16. Some Blues names for women:
a. Alma.
b. Big Mama.
c. Bessie.
d. Fat River Dumpling.

17. Some Blues names for men:
a. Joe.
b. Willie.
c. Little Willie.
d. Big Willie.

18. Persons with names like Michelle, Amber, Jennifer, Debbie, and
Heather can't sing the Blues, no matter how many men they shot in
Memphis.

19. Make your own Blues name starter kit:
a. Name of physical infirmity (Blind, Cripple, Lame, Ugly, etc.)
b. First name (see above) plus name of fruit (Lemon, Lime, Kiwi, etc.)
c. Last name of a President (Jefferson, Johnson, Fillmore, etc.)

For example: Blind Lime Jefferson, Jakeleg Lemon Johnson or Cripple
Kiwi Fillmore, etc. (Well, maybe not "Kiwi.")

20. I don't care how tragic your life: if you own a computer, you
cannot sing the Blues!

SAN MARCOS, Texas (AP) -- The results are in: The ugly, big-eared animal found during the summer in southern Texas is not the mythical, bloodsucking chupacabra. It's just a plain old coyote.

Phylis Canion holds the head of what researchers determined to be a hairless coyote.

Biologists at Texas State University announced Thursday night they had identified the hairless doglike creature.

KENS-TV of San Antonio provided a tissue sample from the animal for testing.

"The DNA sequence is a virtually identical match to DNA from the coyote," biologist Mike Forstner said in a statement. "This is probably the answer a lot of folks thought might be the outcome. I, myself, really thought it was a domestic dog, but the Cuero Chupacabra is a Texas Coyote."

Phylis Canion and some of her neighbors discovered the 40-pound bodies of three of the animals over four days in July outside her ranch in Cuero, 90 miles southeast of San Antonio.

Canion said she saved the head of the one she found so she could get to the bottom of its ancestry through DNA testing and then mount it for posterity.

Chupacabra means "goat sucker" in Spanish, and it is said to have originated in Puerto Rico and Mexico.

Additional skin samples have been taken to try to determine the cause of the animal's hair loss, Forstner said.

As I mentioned a month or so ago, my newest novel deals with the topic of illegal immigration. In the past few weeks I've realized that, for whatever reason, this is an issue that doesn't get discussed much outside the media. At dinner parties, for instance, people don't usually begin to debate the immigration issue, though they'll gladly discuss terrorism, gun control, religion, global warming, the presidential race, and Britney Spears. I have no idea how my friends feel about illegal immigration.

So I'm asking you to give your opinion. How do you feel about illegal immigrants? Can you understand why they come to the United States? Would you do the same thing if you lived in a different country? Should we try to tighten the border, and if so, how? What sorts of threats, if any, do illegal immigrants pose to our country? Under what circumstances should a person be allowed to immigrate (or emigrate--I get those two confused) to this country?

If you have any thoughts about this topic, please share. If you want to comment anonymously, please do. You can also send an email directly to me via my website (www.benrehder.com) if you'd rather not post here.

Joe. V. sent me the following joke (typos and all). I'm not posting it because it's funny--far from it--but because Joe is a powerful man and I shudder to think what might happen if I don't cater to his whims. So here goes...

A man kills a deer and takes it home to cook for dinner. Both he and his wife decide that they won't tell the kids what kind of meat it is, but will give them a clue and let them guess. The kids were eager to know what the meat was on their plates, so they begged their dad for the clue. Well' he said, 'It's what mummy calls me sometimes'. The little girl screams "don't eat it, don't eat it, it's an ass hole!"

Authors are always trying to come up with new ways to reach readers, or to somehow burrow their way into the public's general awareness. Postcards, web sites, MySpace pages, viral trailers, blogs, ads, emails, appearances on Letterman (if your last name is Bush), etc.

A few weeks ago, I came up with one angle that, as far as I know, other authors haven't explored yet. I'm using YouTube as a promotional tool. Might not be a completely original concept, but what the hell. What I've done is post a couple of short videos, with a small "ad" at the end. Maybe the promotional aspect will piss some people off, but I haven't gotten any negative feedback yet.

Below is a link to one of the videos I posted. Take a look and let me know what you think. I shot it about twenty yards from my back door.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sa0Bz3wWSkA